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R 111CD
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Zachary Paul is a violinist and composer currently living in New York. Having played in orchestras for most of his life, his beautiful violin work has recently emerged in the new music scene on the East and West coasts. Recently collaborating with musicians like Simon Scott and Patrick Shiroishi, Zachary has long been a "session violinist" for many Recital releases. It's with great pleasure to finally release a full-length solo album of his work on Recital. Calendar is a collection of unfinished demos, compositional experiments, and edited re-released tracks which span the past eight years. Recital operator and composer Sean McCann took seven hours of Paul's music and edited it down to these eight tracks over 50 minutes, folding them into themselves and into one another. The editing is also sometimes crude and immediate, with creases and torn edges. This album reflects trying to break one's perception of time into its smallest parts, watching the seconds pass, and freezing these snapshots into saturated memories and moods. "Wind of midnight" is a pastoral quartet piece (two horns, cello, and violin) that breathes slowly, not unlike an Ingram Marshall work. While "Fear" conjures up memories of Los Angeles at night, an imagined soundtrack for a hazy Michael Mann-ish cobalt landscape. A gust of smog on "Possessor" interrupts this vaporous scene, getting swallowed up in tape destruction, then settling back into the underlying pastel dusk of Calendar's unhurried chamber ambience. Glass-mastered CD edition, limited to 200 copies. Includes a 12-page booklet.
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R 108LP
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Recital presents composer Allan Gilbert Balon's first full-length LP. Born 1986 in Les Abymes on the island of Guadeloupe, Balon is an artist (exhibiting at MoMA PS1 in 2022) who publishes beautiful handmade books and audio on XYÄ Edition run with Uta Guan Hyë in Créteil, France where he now resides. The Magnesia Suite harbors an unhurried, coastal tranquility that flows lucidly as an album. Though prominently a pianist, a breadth of Balon's musical spheres are visited on this record. Disparate elements of percussion, reeds, organ, voice, and tape recordings are all cast together. Each slowly excavated, surveyed and then set away. "Stella Maris" opens with an organ and voice procession in the vein of a Charlemagne Palestine singing piece. "Lustras" is a patchwork of various tape captures (a la Alvin Curran, Rip Hayman, or André Thomkins); piano clusters dredge into xylophone by night with cicadas swimming in radio transmissions. First hearing the track "Pleuro Delez Waltz" is what made Recital approach Allan about making an album. The proximity of the voices against the small percussions, all laced with Balon's piano stylings. The album ends with "Ogadia," a gentle piano march with soprano saxophone and electronics. Feels like a Dave Burrell-infused rag played slowly, beautifully resolving the outsider-jazz-sound-art-poetry-collages of The Magnesia Suite. The LP includes a booklet of quiet texts and beautiful graphic scores.
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R 110LP
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Nour Mobarak's Dafne Phono is an adaptation of the first opera, Dafne, composed and written by Jacopo Peri and Ottavio Rinuccini in 1598. Drawing on the myth of Daphne and Apollo from Ovid's Metamorphoses -- a story of unrequited love, patriarchal possession, conquest, and transformation -- Mobarak's multimedia and multispecies reimagining splinters the opera's Italian libretto. Alongside English and Greek versions, it is translated into some of the world's most phonetically complex languages -- Abkhaz, San Juan Quiahije Eastern Chatino, Silbo Gomero, and !Xoon. In this process, the narrative -- and an artifact of Western culture -- is dismantled, metabolized, and rendered into unruly utterances that shape the sensorium as much as they do the capacity for sense-making. These voices are given material form by a cast of mycelium sonic sculptures whose rhizomatic compositions and broadcasted recordings resemble the formation and mutation of language over time, reconstituting speech into a new, polyphonic body politic, composed of voices whose striking, poetic utterances transfix and transcend meaning. The A-Side of the record presents a stereo version of Mobarak's 15-channel sound installation, Dafne Phono. The B-Side uses a recording of a portion of the translation process the libretto underwent in Namibia, live-processed by the artist. Dafne Phono is released in tandem with a book of the same name, published by Wendy's Subway.
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R 107LP
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Recital presents an artists' record from the two giants Richard Hamilton and Dieter Roth. Hamilton (1922-2011) is revered as the father of British Pop Art as both theorist and practitioner, in addition to famously designing the artwork for The Beatles' White Album. Dieter Roth (1930-1998) was a Swiss German artist who blithely ignored all artistic boundaries and aesthetic dictums. His oeuvre includes hundreds of artist books, almost half a thousand prints, sculptures, multiples and records, all balanced between magnetic playfulness and self-deprecating paranoia. Roth also ran his own record/book press Dieter Roths' Verlag, and was a major force in the reckless improvisational music group Selten Gehörte Musik (1973-1979). The two artists most significant collaborations happened between 1976 and 1978, beginning with a series of 74 paintings in which they reworked each other's art. The paintings were made for an exhibition for dogs (as suggested by the late Marcel Broodthaers, to whom the works were dedicated) in Cadaqués, Spain. Hamilton and Roth then produced the catalogue Collaborations of Ch. Rotham with reproductions of all the paintings alongside four brilliant new collaborative texts. The narrative of the texts sprung from the "fairy story" (Hamilton) quality that emerged from these dog paintings -- a hallucinatory tapestry of sausages, gestating giants, Sancho Panza, Don Quixote, and a donkey. Together they gallop, humorous and beautifully absurd, across the wild field of an imaginary seaside backdrop with endless garbled iterations of ever-mutating names riddled with mad typos. For these recordings the individual texts were read by Roth and Hamilton, actor friend Duncan Smith, and a huge cast of British artists for the final play Die Grosse Bockwurst, performed at the Whitechapel Gallery in London in 1977. The recordings were first released on cassette on the Audio Arts label in 1978, and have now been remastered from the original tapes for this double vinyl edition. Also included are two booklets: one is a new essay written for this edition by artist and co-producer Malcolm Green (Red Sphinx, Atlas Press), alongside full reproductions of the Roth/Hamilton collaborative Ch. Rotham texts. Thanks to Björn Roth, Rita Donagh, Hansjörg Mayer, William Furlong, Tate Modern, and Hauser & Wirth.
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R 109CD
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Recital presents a collection of new sound poetry works from Vittoria de Franchis (b. 1993, Bruxelles), an independent curator, language researcher and writer operating between London, Berlin and Rome. Solo Voce, Vittoria's first album, carries a certain arousal and intimate elation, a kind of sensual communiqué absent from much contemporary music. As Vittoria divulges: "These tracks were made for voices I wanted to touch rather than bodies. Voice is the uttermost source of fantasy for me, fantasy in general and erotic fantasy. Cities have been another tonica of the album. I love to just wander through cities and listen to sounds around me, experiencing this sort of perennial concert. What makes me click with a metropolis is its soundscape, in the same way I'm more attracted to a voice rather than a body. I like to eroticize voices. I remember taking days off just to walk, sometimes I would walk for hours without eating, guided by a specific cacophony I was drawn to or by a conversation I would overhear in a bookshop. Of the 16 tracks that make up this album, some were written and then performed, others just appeared; triggered by something around me and I recorded them with my phone (intentionally merging with the context that inspired them). As much as I'm fond of crystal-clear recordings which give space and transform the voice into space, I'm extremely attracted by overlaps and mismatches between voices. I don't know how this obsession started. I have always had a special connection with my voice, I used to talk out loud to a lot of imaginary friends and loved to sing. I hardly listen to lyrics in the same way I have a hard time looking at movies without subtitles as I automatically transform the voice into sound and can't follow the plot. Solo Voce is an album or composition of compositions or composition of the desirerer's desires in which voice is the solo instrument. It deeply excites me to think I can do everything with my voice just by repeating, looping, overdubbing, collaging. I always perform, every day and every moment, this is why there is this 'totale' appendix to my name, and I mostly perform when I speak." Glass mastered CD edition, limited to 200 copies. Includes a 16-page booklet of concrete poems by the artist.
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R 105LP
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Recital presents the first full-length vinyl LP by sound artist Asha Sheshadri. Whiplash combines elements of sound poetry, diary-like narrations, and delicate incidental music. Sheshadri has crafted a unique and marvelous album here. Limited edition of 200. 180-gram black vinyl. Includes 12-page printed artist booklet.
"This record is an alternate approach to the autobiographical 'confessional' -- I wanted to stitch together some pivotal sketches in self-understanding and forgiveness. While their designs may seem affectively disparate, they are in fact quite interrelated. My intention (as with past recordings) is to task the listener with tracing the contours of the narrative (or lack thereof). Each track contains sound from video work, excerpts from writers I admire, ethnographic methods, recovered and recycled voice/text memos, photographs from personal and public archives, and research-driven fictions. These sources expand and collapse into each other, only to reveal the eponymous 'whiplash.' To me, the feeling of 'whiplash' is the collision of: a refracted ambivalence towards what was once real, the endless cycle of reckoning with wherever 'home' has taken place, the fraught process of anchoring one's self in the wake of slow-release trauma, and how (if even possible) to translate all of this into artwork." --Asha Sheshadri, 2023
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R 106LP
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Recital presents a newly unearthed recording of an interview between Sun Ra and composer Charlie Morrow recorded at his New York studio in 1989. This voice-only recording develops more like a kaleidoscopic sermon than any standard interview. Charlie Morrow recalls: "My 1989 Summer Solstice Celebration featured Sun Ra and his Arkestra. On March 29, 1989, ahead of this historical performance, Sun Ra came to New York to plan the performance and do an interview with me in the Charles Morrow Associates studio. There were members of the Sun Ra Arkestra, some of my team, and a photographer present. Once in the sound studio, Sun Ra wanted to record the discussion. What he says is so much more than anyone expected. I pushed record on the tape recorder, which quietly took it all in. What Sun Ra recorded is a breathtaking expression of his feelings and strong convictions, illustrated with personal memories and stories. My few questions to him about the upcoming Solstice and about the sun and his thoughts about a dawn event triggered his mind. He launched into a nonstop journey of ricocheting stories and concepts, climaxing when I started jamming with Sun Ra on conch horn. Our duo drives to a climactic peak with explosive conch breath sounds giving line-by-line affirmations to Sun Ra's points. The 1989 Summer Solstice event brought together Sun Ra and his constellation of musicians and fans with my large-scale gatherings and work with the New Wilderness Foundation. Here in 2023 and beyond, the events live again. Sean McCann of Recital was drawn to Sun Ra's words, which inspired the production of this edition. Sun Ra's words seem to have an even greater resonance in present time. Ra is calling out the turbulence of the bad actions of the righteous and the good actions that an evil man, as he dubs himself, can perform, all the time believing that music has the possibility to bring all humans to a better place." One-time pressing of 425. Includes 12-page booklet with photos and full transcription of interview. Also includes 24"x18" poster of Sun Ra 1989 Solstice performance photograph.
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R 104LP
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Recital presents the first vinyl edition of Let the Darkness Fall, a forgotten corner from the vast discography of Suzanne Langille & Loren Connors. Joined here by David Daniell and Andrew Burnes (of the Atlanta-based group San Agustin), Darkness was recorded in the summer of 1998 on a Tascam Porta-5 in Loren and Suzanne's Brooklyn living room, and issued the following year as a limited CD by Secretly Canadian. The tender gloom of Let the Darkness Fall sounds like a broadcast of some private séance. The trio of guitarists here show a beautiful restraint, hovering just underneath vocalist Suzanne Langille's ephemeral poetry. Once they hit record, the sensitivity of the players melded this quartet into a sole-entity; finishing each other's phrases in slow motion. Suzanne's gentle voice glows through the wispy guitar shadows with a quiet determination. One could almost imagine her building a nest out of the guitar lines she's gathered. This collection of musicians is a precursor to the band Haunted House, a wild sort of jam-band playing the blues without playing structure. Recital is proud to continue the series of Loren Connors-related editions, stretching from his art books Wildweeds & Night of Rain, to his masterpiece solo LPs Airs & Lullaby. And Recital is equally thrilled to highlight Suzanne Langille's mystifying command of voice and word and the intricate guitar work of Andrew Burnes and David Daniell. Come revisit the mist that filled that living room 25 years ago.
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R 102CD
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Recital presents a book and CD homage to the New Zealand-born American composer Annea Lockwood (b. 1939). The unique concept for this album was conceived by artists Noel Meek (New Zealand) and Mattin (Basque Country), who each share a deep admiration for Lockwood. A longform Skype conversation between the three artists was arranged at the end of 2020. They discussed politics, aesthetics, and Annea's compositional practice among other things. Noel Meek and Mattin had from the beginning decided that the conversation itself would be used as a score for this album, Homage to Annea Lockwood. Each piece on the album reflects her prismatic compositional practice: sound maps, scores that unfold temporally or environmentally, synchronous with nature, and pianos transplanted to exotic locations (often engulfed in flames). Meek and Mattin maintain a playfulness and curiosity of Annea's sound world; from electronic verbal fizz, a recording of lighting a laptop on fire, hydrophonic diaries from underneath an old oak tree in New Zealand, to a polyphonic choral piece which concludes the album. Homage to Annea Lockwood is housed in a hand-numbered paperback book, which carries a full transcription of the conversation, in this case: the score, along with lush photographic documentation, and ending with a lovely afterword written by Annea Lockwood. Recital is working with Annea again years later, after publishing her 2014 album Ground of Being. What a joy it is to celebrate Annea, and how appropriate it be done through the ritual of music.
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2LP
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R 098LP
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Double LP version. Edition of 350. Recital presents a new double album of rarely heard Robert Ashley compositions performed by baritone singer Thomas Buckner. In the 1960s, Robert Ashley pioneered the American avant-garde with the ONCE Group and festivals, before irrefutably changing the face of American opera later in the 20th century. Buckner, in addition to running the fabulous 1750 Arch record label in the 1970s and '80s, is a noted baritone who has collaborated for decades with the likes of Roscoe Mitchell, Annea Lockwood, and the late Noah Creshevsky, amongst countless others. The title of the album, Spontaneous Musical Invention, refers to Ashley's method of instructing the singer to do what he called "spontaneous musical invention based on the declamation of the text." A vocal practice that Thomas Buckner perfected over the 33 years that he collaborated with Ashley. First performing in Ashley's 1984 opera Atalanta (Acts of God), Buckner continued on as an integral performer in the ensemble until Ashley's death in 2014. The album is composed of two halves, the first is a new rendering of Ashley's second opera Atalanta (Acts of God). Robert Ashley wrote about ten hours of music for the opera Atalanta, divided into three acts: "Max", for the surrealist artist Max Ernst; "Willard", for the composer's uncle, Willard Reynolds, a great story teller; and "Bud", for Bud Powell, the great jazz pianist and composer. One is invited to construct a version using any material from these ten hours. Over the years they worked together, Thomas Buckner commissioned three reworkings of arias from Atalanta that he could perform in concert: the "Odalisque" aria from Max, "The Mystery of the River" from "Willard", and "The Producer Speaks" from "Bud". So, this first section of the album is one of many possible versions of Atalanta, albeit in strikingly different versions from the originals. The second section of the album is dubbed "Occasional Pieces", and holds two unpublished Ashley works. "When Famous Last Words Fail You" and "World War III Just the Highlights" are not from any Ashley opera. However, each is highly dramatic and theatrical. They were written as standalone pieces for Thomas Buckner. Buckner's distinct vocal cadence projects the sharp wit and wry storytelling of Ashley's librettos. A portion of the record was recorded live at Roulette in Brooklyn, NY, at an intimate memorial concert held for Robert Ashley in 2014. Spontaneous Musical Invention, in essence, functions as a tribute to both exceptional artists, and to their decades of collaboration. Includes 24-page booklet of Ashley librettos, scores, and program notes, with an introduction written by Alvin Lucier.
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R 098CD
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Recital presents a new double album of rarely heard Robert Ashley compositions performed by baritone singer Thomas Buckner. In the 1960s, Robert Ashley pioneered the American avant-garde with the ONCE Group and festivals, before irrefutably changing the face of American opera later in the 20th century. Buckner, in addition to running the fabulous 1750 Arch record label in the 1970s and '80s, is a noted baritone who has collaborated for decades with the likes of Roscoe Mitchell, Annea Lockwood, and the late Noah Creshevsky, amongst countless others. The title of the album, Spontaneous Musical Invention, refers to Ashley's method of instructing the singer to do what he called "spontaneous musical invention based on the declamation of the text." A vocal practice that Thomas Buckner perfected over the 33 years that he collaborated with Ashley. First performing in Ashley's 1984 opera Atalanta (Acts of God), Buckner continued on as an integral performer in the ensemble until Ashley's death in 2014. The album is composed of two halves, the first is a new rendering of Ashley's second opera Atalanta (Acts of God). Robert Ashley wrote about ten hours of music for the opera Atalanta, divided into three acts: "Max", for the surrealist artist Max Ernst; "Willard", for the composer's uncle, Willard Reynolds, a great story teller; and "Bud", for Bud Powell, the great jazz pianist and composer. One is invited to construct a version using any material from these ten hours. Over the years they worked together, Thomas Buckner commissioned three reworkings of arias from Atalanta that he could perform in concert: the "Odalisque" aria from Max, "The Mystery of the River" from "Willard", and "The Producer Speaks" from "Bud". So, this first section of the album is one of many possible versions of Atalanta, albeit in strikingly different versions from the originals. The second section of the album is dubbed "Occasional Pieces", and holds two unpublished Ashley works. "When Famous Last Words Fail You" and "World War III Just the Highlights" are not from any Ashley opera. However, each is highly dramatic and theatrical. They were written as standalone pieces for Thomas Buckner. Buckner's distinct vocal cadence projects the sharp wit and wry storytelling of Ashley's librettos. A portion of the record was recorded live at Roulette in Brooklyn, NY, at an intimate memorial concert held for Robert Ashley in 2014. Spontaneous Musical Invention, in essence, functions as a tribute to both exceptional artists, and to their decades of collaboration. Includes 24-page booklet of Ashley librettos, scores, and program notes, with an introduction written by Alvin Lucier.
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R 097LP
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Sold out, no repress... Recital present As Above, So Below, a new album from French multi-instrumentalist Delphine Dora. Over the past decade, from poetry reading, chansons, organ performances, tape compositions and so on, each album in Dora's lush discography feels like a feather from a different bird. A keen ability to defy any singular "sound," always diving to different depths. As Above, So Below centers around mystic piano and voice recordings. In a distinct gothic landscape, each of the nine tracks float into one another. From verdant piano works that revolve like beautifully stretched out miniatures, expanding and bending like shadows across the floor, to foggy vocal arrangements hovering above beds of rural field recordings. Quiet synthesizers crawl in the backdrops, never disturbing the spirit of the piano motions. On the track "Cantique spirituel," Dora, from a cloud of her phantasmal caroling, recites a poem by German author, Novalis (1772-1801). "Blindly we strayed in night's confusion..." This poetic essence is found throughout the album... "gladness and grief alike consume." As Above, So Below was produced and mixed by the British musician Andrew Chalk, whose presence tints the air throughout Dora's album. Chalk ornaments the pieces with additional instrumentation, along with Jean Noël Rebilly playing clarinet. Four panel 12" insert with photographs and poems; edition of 250.
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CD+BLU-RAY
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R 101CD
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Recital present its first ever Blu-Ray edition, Eric Andersen's Margrethe Fjorden. Produced in 1996 by Fluxus artist Eric Andersen, the citywide Intermedia event included performances from Alice Damas, Willem de Ridder, Larry Miller, and other artists from around the world. Inspired by the mysterious tale of Queen Margrethe the First (1353-1412), the multi-sensory event was comprised of three major themes: Union, Woman, and Faith. Over four hours of video is presented, from a full organ concert held in the Roskilde Cathedral, replete with models on stilts and toy frogs hopping through the pews, to a helicopter "air ballet" dancing over the water at night. The whole town became the stage for the three performance evenings. The immersive handheld footage flows between the circus-like events, navigating the streets, spilling between events. A surreal home-movie quality. The original press release reads: "Margrethe Fjorden is everything; its near and far, quiet and violent. It smells, its wet, burning and at times foreign and disturbing. Often it feels secure and humorous. There will be live sheep, a child birth, a car crash, window-washers, wheelchairs and trekkers. People will unite and separate again. A world of conception where the audience enters another reality..." Also included with the Blu-Ray is a curated audio-CD with six elements from the videos, beginning with the entire Eric Andersen organ concert performed by Yuzuru Hiranaka, and ending with the "A piacere (Fog Drifts Across the Meadow)" by Ib Nørholm and Eric Andersen; a 100+ person choir positioned on the Roskilde Fjord with a solitary amplified flutist performing from a small boat. Blu-Ray discs are region-free data discs (complete with menus), and can play on any BluRay player. Includes 36-page pamphlet, red satin fabric; also includes digital download for audio and private links for streaming the videos online.
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R 100LP
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To celebrate the tenth anniversary of Recital, the label presents Autumn Fair. A group LP comprised of 44 guest players, curated and edited together by Sean McCann. Autumn Fair aptly embodies the feeling of Recital as a record label; the infusion of abstract sound art and sentimental beauty -- performed by both younger and older generations of artists. Personnel: Oren Ambarchi - guitar; Ed Atkins - paper shredder; Jason Bannon - family; Derek Baron - keyboard; Karla Borecky - upright piano; Andrew Chalk - guitar; crys cole - birds; Loren Connors - guitar; Philip Corner - grand piano; Maxwell August Croy - whistle; Sarah Davachi - electronics; Aaron Dilloway - SFX; Delphine Dora - voice; Giovanni Fontana - voice; Scott Foust - trumpet; Peter Friel - impression; Malcolm Green - camera; Judith Hamann - cello/voice; Mark Harwood - speech; Forest Juziuk - voice; Johnny Kay - tapping; Kajsa Lindgren - hydrophone; Rob Magill - guitar; Lia Mazzari - whip; Molly McCann - flute; Sean McCann - editing/voice; Nour Mobarak - voice sampler; Azikiwe Mohammed - interview; Charlie Morrow - MIDI piano; Kiera Mulhern - SFX; Zachary Paul - violin; claire rousay - SFX; Michel Samson - violin; Troy Schafer - strings; Eric Schmid - tone generator; Ben Schumacher - SFX; Tom James Scott - keyboard/SFX; Asha Sheshadri - reading; Patrick Shiroishi - winds; Sydney Spann - voice; Matthew Sullivan - instruments; Flora Sullivan-Kelly - percussion; Connor Tomaka - SFX/synth; Alex Twomey - upright piano. "I won't go into too much detail on the album itself, but after many twists and turns, the album concludes with 'Recital Program,' an intense track that manically collages two-second excerpts from every Recital album to date. I extend a sincere 'thank you' for all the incredible support for Recital over the past decade." Gold foil printing; program notes; numbered fair ticket; edition of 350.
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R 099LP
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Recital publish an album of lost Derek Bailey sessions recorded with his friend and collaborator Charlie Morrow. In 1982, Bailey and Morrow organized a series of live concerts and studio sessions around New York. This new LP is a boiled-down rendering of the master tapes that lived dormant in Charlie's archive, until now. Throughout the album, Bailey and Morrow are joined by a rotating cast of New Wilderness players including frame drum percussionist Glen Velez, sound poet Steve McCaffery, publisher and artist Carol E. Tuynman, composer Patricia Burgess, and multimedia artist Michael Snow. The results are surprising and marvelous. The energy of the live concert, which makes up the first half of the record is particularly exciting, with Morrow and McCaffery's visceral sound poetry and Glen's frame drum echoing off of Derek's fret stabs, and Carol, Patricia, and Michael's horns swirling through the air between. A very raw and intense recording. The second side of New York 1982, is a session recorded at The Record Plant, and is clearly more "produced" with panning and tape echo processing, plus experiments with water whistles and other devices. Derek Bailey stands out for personal achievements as a guitarist and for his way of bringing together performance meetings ranging from duos to large ensembles. Working across style and genre, his music and musical unions have inspired the breakdown of boundaries, embracing all flavors of musicians as improvisers. Players focusing on the moment, "without memory." Personnel: Derek Bailey - acoustic guitars; Charlie Morrow - trumpet, ocarina, voice; Glen Velez - percussion; Patricia Burgess - saxophone; Steve McCaffery - voice, saxophone; Carol E. Tuynman - trumpet; Michael Snow - trumpet. Includes eight-page booklet with program notes and artwork; edition of 400.
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R 091CS
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After years of preparation, Recital presents The 12th Annual International Sound Poetry Festival box set. Held in New York in 1980, this was the last festival of the pioneering sound poetry series started in Stockholm in the 1960s. This ambitious document holds nearly five hours of audio from 30 artists. A 240-page book with biographies, texts, and artwork from each artist supplements the edition, including program notes by Charlie Morrow and Sean McCann. Organized by Sten Hanson and Charlie Morrow, the 10-day festival gathered a battalion of sound poets from around the globe to share the stage at Washington Square Church in Manhattan. Both established sound poets are juxtaposed with more obscure artists, some more fervent than others. Carles Santos, John Giorno, and The Four Horsemen, for example, convey a verbal onslaught. And Bernard Heidsieck, you can hear his shouted and snarled words of "Democratie II" shimmer against the walls and ceiling, amplifying in intensity as if he is screaming at the French Parliament in the Palais du Luxembourg. Not all performances are aggressive; Alison Knowles presents a theatrical ensemble reading (with bean performance), and the subdued conceptual work of Robert Joseph and Pier Van Dijk's for voice and the sound of turning book pages is particularly interesting. The year 1980 seemed like a turning point for sound poetry: there were seemingly more new sound poets than ever, yet the genre began to dissipate and melt into a pool of other experimental sound practices with newer digital technologies. One can almost hear the generational change in these tapes, mid-exhale. But of course, at the end of the day sound poetry is still alive and well, and splitting hairs as fine as these becomes more a matter of personal taste/perception than anything else. There will always be a romanticization of the beginning of any project or movement, the pure state, and luckily this collection includes many of the pioneers. Artists included: Carles Santos, Jackson Mac Low, Greta Monach, Bernard Heidsieck, Katalin Ladik, Jerome Rothenberg, Mary Ellen Solt, John Giorno, Armand Schwerner, Charles Stein, Beth Anderson, Charles Amirkhanian, Richard Kostelanetz, Franz Kamin, Michael Gibbs, The Four Horsemen, Adriano Spatola, Paula Claire, Sten Hanson, Charlie Morrow, Glen Velez, Larry Wendt, Nina Yankowitz, Robert Joseph, Pier Van Dijk, Alison Knowles, Bern Porter, P. Clive Fencott, Bob Cobbing, and the Ocarina Orchestra. 240-page book, 6"x9" perfect bound. Housed in printed box. Includes download card. Edition of 200 (hand-numbered).
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R 096BK
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Night of Rain is the second art book by musician and artist Loren Connors, following 2021's Wildweeds (R 087BK). The book is comprised of two parts: "Night of Rain," which Loren describes as "seascapes, or expressions of the sea and shore. [They are] about the power of rain and the sea, lagoons, bays, tides." Taken from small pencil and black ink drawings enlarged again and again at a copy store. The pieces would often be drawn over and modified throughout this process -- ultimately reaching sizes of 8x6 feet or larger. In this series, Loren considers the digital images as the "originals" -- so this section of the book acts as a sort of swatch, a gallery exhibiting an element of this process. The second section of the book is "A Coming to Shore." Nineteen acrylic paintings on stretched canvas, which are often cast in hazy and dreamlike blues, greys, and yellows. They span across the page in stark simplicity. "They all have the feeling of horizon, but not all of them depict horizons," Loren remarks. Supplemented with a foreword written by artist and friend Aki Onda, Night of Rain is part of a continuing series of limited books published by Recital that explore Loren's visual art. 12"x8.5"; 100 color pages, perfect bound book; edition of 200 (hand-numbered).
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R 010LP
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Second pressing of Recital's vinyl edition from 2015. Over the 22 years since Loren Connors's Airs was first published, it has drawn a thick circle of fans. Gently recorded to cassette tape in 1999, (with wonderfully subtle multi-tracking). Airs is comprised of a series of brief electronic guitar poems. Intimately composed with the patience and purposeful hesitation that is reverently come to expect from Connors. Lyrical melodies recur in different forms throughout the LP, as shifting figures in a dream. Shadowy and sunken, the tone evokes an overcast landscape. The album feels singular; woven along as one flowing piece. Airs is perhaps the most approachable and beautiful in all of Connors's catalog, seducing strangers and familiars just the same. Forlorn wonderment; a human quality that makes this such an enchanting record. It is the humble simplicity and the directness of the guitar inflection that conveys such truth. The stark grace of Connors' playing resonates here for all to embrace. New transfer of the original four track cassettes. Includes an unreleased "lost" track, discovered during re-transfer. Remastered for vinyl by Taylor Dupree at 12k Mastering. 180 gram vinyl; Includes eight-page booklet of photographs and a not by Loren; second edition of 600.
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R 094CD
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Omaggio a Giuseppe Ungaretti, the second Recital album of composer Loren Rush (b. 1935), contrasts the orchestral grandeur of 2021's LP Dans le Sable (R 089CD/LP) with plaintive just intonation piano improvisations. Loren Rush has been active in the Bay Area new music scene since the late 1950s alongside composers such as Terry Riley, Robert Erickson, and Pauline Oliveros, and also co-founded Stanford University's Center for Computer Research in Music and Acoustics in 1975. His music has been performed by the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the New York Philharmonic Orchestra, and the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra. Though few of Rush's compositions have been published, he has garnered deep respect from his peers and colleagues over the decades. The album is directly inspired by poems from L'allegria (The Joy, 1914-1919), the collection of poetry by Giuseppe Ungaretti (1888, Egypt -1970, Italy) written in the trenches of World War I. During these brutal years Ungaretti struggled to maintain his humanity by creating the most beautiful images he could imagine and by recalling experiences of his earlier life in Alexandria and Paris. By this, he both revolutionized Italian poetry and demonstrated that the creation of beauty is a most effective life preserver and political statement. Veglia (Night Watch): "An entire night cast beside a comrade massacred, his snarling mouth turned to the full moon. In my silence I have written letters full of love. Never have I held so fast to life." Rush's melancholy preludes are treated with "The Enhanced Piano in Just Intonation", developed at Good Sound Foundation by the composer and Alfred Owens. The process electronically enhances and increases perceived resonance, sustaining, coloristic and expressive capabilities. Just intonation describes a system of tuning in which the greatest level of consonance and resonance is achieved by adjusting intervals to the whole-number ratios of the harmonic series, the natural mode of vibration. The suite concludes with the silken chamber piece "Mattina" (Morning), reflecting Ungaretti's stark words, "I illumine me, with immensity." The addition of violin and cello suspends the listener in a prolonged space of dread and beauty. Includes booklet of poems by Ungaretti; glass-mastered CD; Edition of 200.
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R 095BK
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A new book of scores by artist and composer Philip Corner (b. 1933). The Art of No-Art is a collection of 385 new graphic scores written between 2019 and 2022. Each score is a single-page meditation based around octaves. Though written mostly for piano, the scores could be arranged for other instrumentation (for those with fewer than an eight-octave range). The Art of No-Art explores the endless possibilities of one musical note (and its bounded harmonics). The pieces can be performed by people of any skill level; rudimentary or advanced navigations are possible. A supplemental audio download is included, which features recordings of many scores from the book, played on a variety of instruments by Agnese Toniutti, Rhodri Davies, Sarah Davachi, Derek Baron, Philip Corner, Matt Hannafin, Charlie Morrow, Zachary Paul, and Silvia Tarozzi. Additionally, Philip Corner wrote instructions for Sean McCann to collage all these recordings into a grand piece of No-Art. A numbered art print of the score "Life's A Joke" is included, a piece for voice which invites the reader to sing (or shout), "life's a joke and all things show it, I thought so once and now I know it." First edition of 100; 364 pages, 12x8" perfect bound book; "Life's A Joke" numbered print; audio download code of scores performed and collaged.
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R 093CD
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Cloud Shadows is the third album by the American gamelan composer, Daniel Schmidt. The pieces in Cloud Shadows, which are quite varied and more current than the work represented on his first two albums In My Arms, Many Flowers (R 017CD, 2016) and Abies Firma (R 070CD, 2020), mostly came about each in their own way. For example, the cloud shadows on the mountains of central Nevada, unimaginably old, invited Daniel into their realm, resulting in the opening composition, "Cloud Shadows". The composition "SEOR" developed from the daily repetitions of radiation and relief from his cancer treatments. Also, the death of a close friend plunged the composer into deep emotions but ultimately nudged him over a compositional hump, leading to the creation of the "Sandy Suite". "A River in Delta", dedicated to Lou Harrison and John Cage, utilizes chance operations and a poem written by Cage for Harrison's 60th birthday. Under the direction of Schmidt, these ten pieces were performed and recorded by Gamelan Encinal and students at Mills College between 2017 and 2019. They unveil a compositional evolution, most noticeably the weaving of voice and poetry with gamelan. The lyrics were written by poet Deborah Bachels Schmidt (Daniel's wife), often sung in the style of 19th century lieder. Recital presents Cloud Shadows as a celebration of Daniel Schmidt's 80th birthday, a rich album that continues the exploration of "American" gamelan music via one of its creators. First CD edition of 300; 24-page booklet holding program notes, scores, and photographs.
"Starting at perhaps age four or five, I would sit on the top step of our front porch, just under the overhang of the roof, and look at the rain. I was transported. I remember quite clearly the transcendent state I would enter. But I learned early to keep my experiences with the rain to myself. At church I would hear references to the 'spiritual.' It seemed to be defined as something beyond everyday life, and that puzzled me, because it sounded much like my own experience when watching rain. I ask you, as you listen to this album, to imagine the rain as I felt it as a child. Please allow this music to flow into you." --Daniel Schmidt
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R 090CD
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February 9th 2021 was the 80th birthday of composer Charlie Morrow. To celebrate the occasion, Recital announce Chanter, a new album collecting his voice works over the past 60+ years. Chanter features guests such as Annea Lockwood, The Western Wind Vocal Ensemble (who worked with Philip Glass), Carole Weber, etc. 80 minutes of voice for 80 years of Charlie's life. While Morrow's previous two albums on Recital Toot! Too (2017) and America Lament (R 081LP, 2020) focused on chamber and electronic compositions, Chanter covers over 60 years of vocal explorations. Spanning from Charlie's first ever tape recording Ella (1960) to two intimate chanting improvisations made in 2021 for this CD. Curated by Sean McCann, the dozen tracks which comprise the album include pieces like "Drum Chant" (1971), a roaring percussive crescendo with chanter hyperventilation; "A Chant With Watches" (1974), a spatial work of watches placed on top of microphones across the stereo field, oscillating in octaves. Composer Annea Lockwood appears on the album playing a glass water jar over the telephone at a 1984 New York concert where Charlie dialed in performers from around the world to collaborate with him on stage. A central portion of the album is the large-scale shamanic opera "Spirit Voices" (1971), based on concepts from Siberian shamanism. With tape playback of Charlie's handmade electronics and amplified chanting voices, the 1987 staging also included fire artists, metal sculptors, brass ensemble, saw player, and dance troupe. Elements of sound poetry are fused with minimalist drone and sometimes violent electronics. Two beautiful choral works are included: "Hymn Transformations" (1983), a style of composition that mutates Sacred Harp music with numerical repetitions based on geographical coordinates, here sung by The Western Wind vocal ensemble who famously performed works by Philip Glass. A euphonious passage from "Genesis Song" (1968), a Māori poem translated by Jerome Rothenberg, taken from Morrow's The Light Opera (1982), which included Min Tanaka's Butoh dancers and a trio of jack hammers. Silver-leaf foil printed CD, with 16-page booklet.
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R 092CD
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Mother of Pearl is the first duo album from composers Sarah Davachi and Sean McCann. Two people, a couple, recording together at home. A slow, autumnal album made with no preconceptions or planning. Intimate, intended for only Sarah and Sean. Sessions were captured simultaneously in two ways to build the shared space of perception. Sculpted hesitations made late at night. Short statements of melody are left space to rest and repose. The presence of room tone and the air are characters in all of these recordings -- weaving freely within the music. Four-handed piano, two electric pianos, two guitars, viola, bells, tape. Golden hour, late night. The first recording sessions bookend the album, made in an afternoon in 2020. Recorded at home in Glendale, California and at a farmhouse on Sean's birthday, nearby goats and wine and a supersonic jet launch. Take refuge in pleasure. Gatefold CD wallet with gold foil printing; includes 12-page booklet; includes 30 mins of additional music (Red Sky EP), available only on the CD.
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R 026LP
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Mary Mazzacane's son Loren Connors writes: "These recordings, no matter how rough the sound quality, capture the essence of the art of bel canto soprano Mary Mazzacane. Born in an Italian American neighborhood (Fairhaven) near Yale, she was one of the first women to graduate from the Yale School of Music. Ms. Mazzacane, who was active on the opera stage from 1947 through the 1970s, playing leading roles in Madame Butterfly, Tosca, Amahl and the Night Visitors and other works, left no commercial recordings. All we have is a shoebox full of muddy practice sessions and live performance recordings on barely playable cassette tapes, along with a few radio broadcast acetates... Throughout these pieces, her voice has a unique inner warmth and a beautifully clear tone, the closest I know to the pure clarity of bells."
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R 088CD
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Alex Twomey's Days Off, the second full-length album under his own name, pronounces his evolving compositional approach. Following The Entertainer (R 058LP, 2019), this album features a more intimate ensemble of piano, strings, bass, and guitar. Written between 2019 and 2021, the arrangements resemble pop-structured songs within the margins of sedate orchestral music. Twomey's use of electric guitar is also unique; more as a blurred harmonic brush propelling rhythmic cycles and key changes. The influence of Michael Nyman, Penguin Cafe Orchestra, and other English-minimalists is present -- but Twomey as one-man composer, performer, and producer delivers a rare intimacy, a sardonic view of days better spent. We're transported to a restful couch in Alex's living room. His cats sleeping around you like gods in relief as the album echoes from his studio in the next room. With repeating chords of matched exuberance and melancholy, Days Off evokes a familiarity both optimistic and sentimental.
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