savagnières |cs045

Szpinet i powerbook... to zestawienie mogloby sugerowac, ze muzyka szwajcarskiego duetu oparta bedzie na antynomii "stare - wspólczesne", ze bedzie to próba zderzenia brzmien klasycznych i nowoczesnych, ze byc moze powstanie postmodernistyczna hybryda stworzona z efektów klasycznej pianistyki poddanej
komputerowym manipulacjom.
Tak jednak nie jest. "Savagnieres" to dzielo niezwykle spójne i jednolite, zlozone niemal wylacznie z elementów wspólczesnych. Szpinet jest uzywany po prostu jako instrument strunowy, jawi sie dalekim kuzynem preparowanego fortepianu, instrumentem, którego barwa sytuuje go gdzies pomiedzy gitara, harfa oraz lutnia.
Elektronika tworzy zas dla niego oparcie, dopelnia, nieustannie pulsujac i migoczac. Muzyka duetu Baumgartner - Schiller to dialog dwóch improwizatorów, skupionych na dzwieku, badajacych go, smakujacych i lepiacych z niego ciagnace sie, nieznacznie zmieniajace sie ciasto.
Nagrania, które wspólnie tworza, rozwijaja sie niespiesznie, delikatnie ewoluujac. Zmiany sa powolne, jakby muzycy nieustannie zastanawiali sie, gdzie umiescic dany detal. Ta powolnosc, rozwaga i starannosc powoduje, ze w muzyce nie ma niezbednych szczególów, ze jest ona poukladana i uporzadkowana, ze w pewien sposób staje
sie aseptyczna i chlodna. To ostatnie okreslenia nie maja stanowic zarzutu, poniewaz ta plyta niezwykle mi sie podoba, to raczej próba oddania ducha tej muzyki. Muzyki, która jest bardzo przyjazna, raczej melodyjna i przy tym niebanalna. Gdybym mial porównac "Savagnieres" do jakiejs innej plyty, to pierwszym skojarzeniem jest "Schnee" duetu Stangl-Kurzmann, z tym tylko, ze uzycie szpinetu zamiast gitary powoduje, ze muzyka Baumgartnera i Schillera ma nieco inna aure. Tadeusz Kosiek (Gaz-Eta)

Also Peter Baumgartner (powerbook) and Christoph Schiller (spinet) are new names to me. If I remember well, a spinet is a sort of harpsichord, but I forgot what the exact difference is. In a Swiss place called Savagnieres, they recorded together. It's hard to tell wether this is a laptop transforming the sound of the spinet, or the two playing together. I assume the latter. The spinet, an instrument with strings, is played like a prepared guitar with ebows, objects, fans, but also loose objects. The laptop provides a nice backdrop of likewise continuous sounds. This brings quite an intense release, a combination of drone related sounds and the more free improvisation music, which could appeal to fans of micro-sound and improvisation alike. The first highlight so far. Frans de Waard (Vital)

Titled after the Swiss city it was recorded in one year ago, "Savagnières" features Baumgartner at powerbook and Schiller at spinett, quite an unusual instrument especially in the improvised field. Electronics are mostly kept at a quiet and very minimal level, consisting in modulated sinewaves and drones; quite the opposite for the spinett playing, which is hectic and energetic, while avoiding the noise peaks which are often present in the Creative Sources catalogue. Nonetheless, Schiller knows how to dose the plucking and picking of his instrument, so that the two elements (electronic and acoustic) actually merge very well, creating a suspended and mysteryous dialogue. As always, top-notch design by Carlos Santos. Eugenio Maggi (Chain DLK)

[…] Esta utilização alternativa dos instrumentos tem contornos particularmente deliciosos em “Savagnières”, no qual a espineta de Christoph Schiller contracena com o computador de Peter Baumgartner. Pesa na audição deste disco a circunstância de a espineta ser de origem medieval e o Powerbook o “canivete suíço” dos tempos modernos. A sua associação tem uma carga simbólica mais do que óbvia, mas o que se verifica é a desmontagem radical da mesma, com a espineta em processo de desidentificação e a informática a confinar-se apenas a um quarto das suas capacidades, pouco mais do que a articulação de sinusoidais. […] Rui Eduardo Paes (JL)

Peter Baumgartner is primarily a sound poet, working with language since 1989 and active in the sound installation field (he came to the computer in 1999), while Christoph Schiller has a fine arts/free jazz background, having also written many pieces for voice (he's the leader of Millefleur, an improvising vocal ensemble). Savagnières reveals both technical finesse and a healthy dose of curiosity, but the contrast between its laptop continuity and the unconventional acoustic source of Schiller's spinet is somewhat atypical compared to much of the Creative Sources catalogue. Schiller has been using the spinet in improvisational contexts since 2002, and its plucked, bowed and struck strings break the reassuring flux of Baumgartner's computer-generated waves. The musicians explore a few basic concepts, as if forced to play games in a tiny room, yet the dialogue between stasis and movement is rewarding and fruitful; what could easily become a fine wallpaper of digestible minimalism instead enriches and develops the introvert convolutions of the spinet, which at times resembles some Oriental instrument or a slowmotion version of Keith Tippett's prepared piano. The laptop's pulsating warmth radiates constantly, despite irregular collisions that move the surrounding air enough to make us breathe in warped, unreal easiness. Massimo Ricci (Paris Transatlantic)

Savagnières (CS 045) features the interesting instrumentation of Peter Baumgartner on powerbook and Christoph Schiller on spinet! Named for the Swiss live venue at which these five improvisations were recorded, this recording is a mostly successful study in contrast. Baumgartner is an interesting figure with his powerbook. Needless to say, he favors drone-based material; but there’s a warmth to his work that actually renders much of his contributions fairly organic sounding (indeed, I was frequently reminded of a hurdy-gurdy). By contrast, Schiller’s spinet work isn’t so much kin to Mukarji’s metallic abstractions as it is to a rougher, more industrial take on Denman Maroney’s hyper-piano. Particularly when the electronics oscillate most vigorously, Schiller attacks and is especially aggressive with the strings (sometimes yielding tonality, elsewhere sheer noise). And every so often, he even conjures up Derek Bailey! The long second improvisation (nearly 20 minutes) is the most languidly paced, but between Schiller’s use of an e-bow and Baumgartner’s metallic swirls, there’s a continual tension that elevates the music. Jason Bivins (One Final Note)

Peter Baumgartner e Christoph Schiller encontraram-se nos dias 10 e 11 de Dezembro de 2004, para tocar ao vivo em Savagnières, na Suiça, sessão gravada e publicada sob designação idêntica à da localidade. A instrumentação do duo é curiosa e rara, se não inédita: laptop e espineta, instrumentos que têm entre si centenas de anos de diferença, quanto ao momento em que historicamente apareceram, facto completamente irrelevante para a economia de Savagnières.
A espineta é um instrumento de tecla da famíla do cravo, com um som que lhe é timbricamente próximo, se tocado de forma convencional. Não é isso que aqui acontece. As cordas de Christoph Schiller são percutidas, dedilhadas e passadas a arco, esgueiram-se suavemente por entre as oscilações das ondas digitais geradas no Powerbook de Peter Baumgartner. Estas formam uma fina película que envolve a delicadeza do preparado acústico – o adequado pano de fundo dronológico sobre o qual se desfiam os acontecimentos, que tanto se inspiram em sonoridades orientais, na música contemporânea ocidental, como na livre-improvisação europeia.
A turbulência é mínima e a sensação de movimento é nítida e sempre presente. O volume geralmente baixo e sem picos de maior ao longo da jornada (apenas sobe uns furos consideráveis durante breves segundos na quinta e última improvisação) esconde uma luxuriante actividade de microfonia, que faz com que esta seja uma sessão que tanto pode agradar ao público da electrónica “pura”, como ao da improvisação acústica. Eduardo Chagas (Jazz e Arredores)

We live in a time where a powerbook — a laptop computer — is branded a legitimate musical instrument. Stating the obvious, perhaps, but it's almost bemusing, perhaps patently absurd, how casually this is taken for granted, particularly since the powerbook's performer is really playing software and manipulating a mouse rather than plucking a string, hitting a drum, or blowing into a horn. Yes, synth players have in essence operated with a similar maxim, but the laptop's infinite versatility belies its patent facelessness. Peter Baumgartner is the man on 'top here, paired with Christoph Schiller, who is credited with utilizing 'spinett' (sic), a harpsichord-like instrument which Schiller bends, arches, and tweaks in ways the spinet's maker likely never imagined. Thrust into the digital realms of Baumgartner's machine-made environment, Schiller's sonic tool handily complements his partner's latent hums and pensive soft-synth coagulations.
Five untitled tracks are plainly marked on the booklet by their individual lengths, each in tandem epitomizing where contemporary electroacoustic improv sits, and how it functions as an categorical entity, on the praxis of modern-day music. The near 20-minute title track is a veritable model of digital economy and acoustic means. Baumgartner and Schiller volley sounds at one another with little regard for simpatico gestures; the former either births dark-hued synth hums or plangent whoops and hollers for the latter to prattle and screech over, or leaves great gaps of silence for Schiller to mussy about in. Sonic nomenclature is largely abandoned; all is effect, residual or otherwise. Travelling in long, sustained vacuums ultimately does both artist's few favors; if anything, such pregnant pauses seem to reveal more a paucity of genuine ideas than overt acts of creation. When the two do gel, once that long second piece approaches the halfway point, at least the applecart appears moderately upset, Schiller strumming the spinet's upper body to achieve percussive attacks that are then sprinkled over the bell-like trilling Baumgartner lays down as foundation. As his partner tugs more and more sci-fi noises out of his p-book, Schiller responds with equally noxious sounds of his own; it's a shaky apotheosis, and not altogether convincing, but it satisfies nonetheless.
Even as the recording progresses, it must again be questioned how well sessions such as this one are mic'ed, recorded, and ultimately doled out for those listeners not present at the event itself. Schiller's random acoustics exude much within this context, but what little decay or sustain they have seems incongruous in the pristine overlay Baumgartner devises. Were it a more maximal music, the cracks between Savagnières' prickly ideals would be so emphasized as to provide the whole recording with more pronounced "force" and a certifiable heft - instead, the reductionism on tap here gets downright wonky, booking regularity rather than power. Darren Bergstein (The Squid's Ear)