The album in question is called The Middle Distance, is by the trio of Chris Burn, Philip Thomas and Simon H Fell, and is a recent release on the Another Timbre label. I should of course point out that AT’s Simon Reynell is a friend, wrote a review for these pages a couple of days ago, and is hopefully meeting me for a drink tomorrow before the concert, but that would not stop me writing a bad review here if I thought the CD merited one. As it happens I really like the music here, as is often the case with Another Timbre releases.
I should state right now though, that if you are one of those people that likes to pigeonhole improvised music into categories and then subsequently does not like the one labelled “EFI” then I probably wouldn’t read on any further. Although the music on The Middle Distance is actually quite varied, and is always very subtle and delicately balanced it is occasionally quite busy and expressive. It should also be added that it is often also quite quiet and spacious, but as wonderfully crafted as it is it probably won’t be everyone’s cup of tea, sadly.
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As today is Sunday and I am feeling very guilty about slacking on my classical music posting, my walk was accompanied by the first of five discs that form part of a five CD set of seventeenth century English viol music by a group named Fretwork. Actually I don’t own the CDs yet and downloaded the music from iTunes for now. I was recommended this set, which sells at a dirt-cheap price on one of the Virgin labels, by the Advice Lady a week or so back, and as I have been too busy to get to a CD shop over the last week Apple’s virtual domain will have to do for now. The set contains recordings of the music of four English composers, Lawe, Locke, Purcell and on the disc I have been playing today John Jenkins.
So the usual caveats here when I write about classical music, and early music in particular; I haven’t a clue about the technical details or much in the way of contextual information about this music. All I can do is put it on the CD player, try and keep an open mind and open ears and see what happens. Without the benefit of having the liner notes to hand, Wikipedia (hopefully reliably) informs me that Jenkins lived to the surprisingly old age of 86, passing away in 1678 and living right through the English Civil War, thus he wrote music just a little later than John Dowland, whose lute music I discovered and wrote about here. Obviously, compared to the more minimal, stripped down music written for lute, the nineteen pieces for assorted combinations of viols (plus an organ on five of the tracks) are more fully formed and richer in timbre and depth, and perhaps more appealing to me than the Dowland recordings as a result.
Well its way past midnight and I only just got home from work after a difficult and stressful day. Looking forward to a day’s rest tomorrow though and not getting out of bed before my body says its OK to. So I haven’t listened to any music again, and I haven’t had time to write again, but fear not dear readers as tonight I have a special treat for you, a review written by someone else…! Simon Reynell, he of Another Timbre fame has very kindly stepped in to write a lengthy review of two albums I have yet to hear, but hope to soon after reading his words. Thanks Simon for doing this, it has made my day that little bit easier, and the review makes good reading.
Sometimes life gets in the way. I’m sorry that I have not made it to London tonight for the FEN concert, and sorry that I will miss Ryu Hankil’s first visit to these shores. Fortunately he is back in March and I will be able to catch up with him then. Still, it would have been nice to have seen the performances tonight. I haven’t been able to listen to any music today either, attending an unwell girlfriend and having to sort out one or two other pressing issues linked …
Normally at work late in the evening we will have the radio on, usually some terrible local commercial station that pipes out all the rubbish that local commercial stations pipe out as you would expect. Quite often, particularly when the day’s work is not going so well this can really do my head in, and its not uncommon for me to moan vociferously, albeit with the resigned understanding that I am wasting my time, about the standard of cultural stimulation we have to listen to. I am of course resolutely ignored and considered as something of a lovable but slightly odd old fart that whinges a bit every now and again. On mOnday though, I announced that for a while I would be pulling rank and choosing the music for a while, and so once the bulk of the staff had gone home for the night and just a few of us remained I commandeered the stereo system (which is really atrocious and of course did the music no justice at all, but I didn’t expect any serious listening to take place!) and played a few discs. I think I have mentioned before that I have a vague plan to write a book about the act of listening and its many adjacent conversations, and one of the elements I want to base a chapter on is how and why people respond completely differently to different sets of sounds. At the risk of placing my beloved colleagues in the category of guinea pigs, well perhaps that’s what they were 
Yes, the inclusion of voices, particularly on free improv recordings always makes me check very slightly before putting a CD into the player, butof course it depends on how they are used. Streetlevel actually makes good use of them in some places, though one track in particular reminded me why I have a problem with them in general.I don’t know the music of Peter Nicholson (or at least I don’t think I do) but Raymond MacDonald’s sax has appeared on several Iorram releases so far. He plays in a very expressive, almost post-Evan Parker style, gentle and subtle but relatively active and without much in the way of extended technique. Nicholson’s cello work is very nice on the six tracks here (or at least the ones he plays cello on) The opening Esmond is a good way to start the album, Nicholson generally taking a back seat, working with dry sounding bowed sounds and little stabs of colour here and there. MacDonald drifts from hushed longer tones into busier talkative passages, but always very much in tune with Nicholson’s purring strings. Nice stuff, very much from the older school of improvisation but very well executed.
