These profound pieces, often based on observation, express something as yet unknown. By inventing a language, imitating field recordings, or pursuing the idea of visual works with sound, their makers create colourful, elegant, and light settings that are often realised at home.
38 minutes with Buffy Sainte-Marie, Gazelle Twin & NYX, Glynis Jones, Valentina Goncharova and others.
Featured cover art: Maria Teresa Luciani – Sounds of the City
Playlist
Glynis Jones – Schlum Rooli
The composer began exploring the boundary between service and art in 1973 when she joined the BBC Radiophonic Workshop to provide sound effects for the broadcaster’s programmes. (1975, BBC Records And Tapes / Re: The Grey Area)
Louise Huebner – The Emotional Bondage Spell
The official witch of Los Angeles County intones her magical powers with the help of Louis and Bebe Barron, composers of the first fully electronic film score for Forbidden Planet. (1969, Warner Bros. – Seven Arts Records)
Buffy Sainte-Marie – Poppies
With her album Illuminations, on which she blends experimental music and folk with synthesizers, the indigenous Canadian-American musician and visual artist became influential both in the goth scene and among followers of 21st-century New Weird America. (1969, Vanguard)
Maria Teresa Luciani – Courtyards Citizens
The Italian psychologist and musician uses her instruments to imitate sounds recorded in Rome and Florence, creating scenic snapshots of places in the city such as supermarkets, public parks and an airport. (1972, Fama srl / Re: Finders Keepers Records)
Anna Homler / Steve Moshier – Gu She’ Na’ Di
The Los Angeles-based performance artist sings in a language she invented while driving through the desert. She is accompanied by Steve Moshier’s sparse electronic sounds. (1985, Pharmacia Poetica / Re: Rvng. Intl.)
Michele Mercure – The Intruder
The composer describes her album Eye Chant as a visual work with sound that aims to evoke moods in the listener. It was recorded at home and supported by grants from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts and the Painted Bride Art Centre. (1986, Quick Shower Music / Re: Freedom To Spend)
Gazelle Twin & NYX – Fire Leap
Adaptation of the title, which originally appeared in the 1973 British folk horror film The Wicker Man, transformed into a pagan-inspired electronic chorus call for a transcendental purge of post-truth Britain’s dizzying chaos. (2020, NYX Collective Records)
Valentina Goncharova – Maitreya
Born in Kiev during the Soviet era and trained at the Leningrad Conservatory, the Estonia-based violinist and electroacoustic experimenter sought new timbres and rhythmic combinations when recording at home in the late 1980s. Here, she addresses the future Buddha Maitreya with a mesmerising piece that springs from her curiosity for structureless music. (1987-91, Shukai)
Ann Magnuson / John Cale – Helmut Newton Told Me
With laconic humour, the American performance artist imitates the rhythm of John Cage’s prose in her homage to him as she recounts her time with Helmut Newton. The piece is embedded in atmospheric sounds by John Cale and was created for the Venice Biennale in 1993. (1993, Cramps Records)
Doris Norton – Caution Radiation Norton
Having always believed in the benefits of solitude and convinced that being alone means freedom, the Italian musician has valued the personal computer as a tool for her musical creativity from the very beginning. It is therefore no surprise that the Apple logo is prominently featured on the cover of her album Personal Computer. (1984, Durium / Re: Mannequin)
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