"Target" CD: Daring, Hendrixian, Captivating, Powerful

I'm really pleased that favorable reviews continue to appear for Starkland's Keeril Makan "Target" CD.

In the new Fanfare, Robert Carl concludes that Makan's Resonance Alloy is "one of the best pure-sound pieces I've heard in some time." He finds the "near-psychotic" song cycle Target is a "terrifying" and "daring piece." And he notes the virtuosic solo-cello work Zones d'accord "creates near-overwhelming sounds" that move "from breathier harmonic sweeps to Hendrixian explosions."

Vital Weekly recently stated that the "Target" CD is "a great release" full of "captivating and engaging music." Critic Dolf Mulder especially savored the performances from Alex Waterman ("breathtaking"), Laurie Rubin ("beautiful"), and David Shively ("an amazing tour de force").

Lucid Culture praises the CD as "strange and powerful," "intriguing and diverse," and "minimalist yet often absolutely massive." Writer Alan Young was also stunned by the "viscerally mesmerizing" Resonance Alloy.

Even the venerable but staid Gramophone is attracted to the "extraordinary extremes" of the CD, writing:

"On a purely musical level, these first recordings of four works by Makan are about creating expectations out of chaos, tuning the listener’s ear and creating a sound world in which music emerges unexpectedly out of violent textures, gestures and cries."

Read more here.

CDs Will Top Digital Sales for the Foreseeable Future

 An interesting look at projections for physical vs. digital music sales emerges from recent data furnished by top sources. Combining sales data from PricewaterhouseCooper and Gartner, I created this graph:



"CDs still beat digital music, and will do so for the foreseeable future" is the conclusion reached by tech writer Dwight Silverman.

Physical sales (ie, CDs) income of about $15 billion in 2011 makes the latest urban myth that major labels will stop releasing CDs sometime in 2012 sound rather implausible.

I found my data here.

NPR Features Phillip Bimstein's "Bushy Wushy" Piece

The World Series has prompted NPR to rebroadcast a Hearing Voices show which features Phillip Bimstein's aural portrait of "Bushy Wushy," who sold beer in Busch Stadium, home of the St. Louis Cardinals, for more than forty years. If you missed the broadcast, you can listen here. Other segments offer Barrett Golding spending a season with the Rookie League and singer/playwright Terry Allen defining the many meanings of Dug-Out.

There's also now a Bushy Wushy video at YouTube.



Bimstein began the piece by visiting Busch Stadium, recording the crack of the bat from behind home plate, the ball slamming into the catcher's mitt, and other baseball game sounds. He then combined these sampled sounds with stories told by the charming Bushy Wushy, all tied together with a score for wind quintet performed by the Equinox Chamber Players.

Other aural portraits on this Starkland CD feature the harmonica player and storyteller Larkin Gifford, and the Las Vegas dice-caller Tom Martinet, who offers insights into the superstitions and psychologies of gambling.

In the CD's Introduction, John Adams writes, "Like their composer, the pieces on this album communicate a generous and good-natured spirit that is tempered with wry wit and a special sense of the western landscape and culture that he so loves."

In The New York Times, Steve Smith commented that "The irresistible charm of Mr. Bimstein's music has less to do with technology than with his uncanny knack for finding the music of everday life." Read the full review.

And Stereophile called Bimstein "an American original" whose "stunning and heartwarming" CD offers "quirky, moving, and delightful musical journeys." Read the full review.

This "Larkin Gifford's Harmonica" CD is available at Amazon, iTunes, CD Baby, etc.