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Transmutations: Music for Voice, Piano and Electronics

In Review

Transmutations: Music for Voice, Piano and Electronics
alcides lanza - Meg Sheppard
SHELAN label (eSp-9601-CD)

26 ii 1998

Reviewed by Paul von Wichert

Transmutations features the duo of vocalist Meg Sheppard and pianist/composer alcides lanza, in a program of six works by Canadian composers. Most of the pieces on this CD were written especially for the duo over the space of twenty years.

I appreciated the well-written and generous program notes (trilingual - in English, French and Spanish) that accompany this CD on the SHELAN label (eSp-9601-CD). The notes provide an outline of the text to lanza's vôo (1992)

vôo (1992)
for voice, tape and digital signal processing, his reflection on the 500th anniversary of Columbus' first voyage to America. lanza exploits the ambiguities within his text in a restless vocal line set against an accompaniment evocative of nature and primitive sound. The piece captures the wonder and terror of the New World, for both the European explorers and accompaniment evocative of nature and primitive sound. Vôo  captures the wonder and terror of the New World, for both the European explorers and the indigenous cultures.

Player Piano (1978) by John Celona was written originally for three pianos, here multi-tracked. The music is reminiscent of the continuous technique of pianist Lubomyr Melnyk, only more generic minimalist fair. Praescio VII (Piano... and then some) (1994)

Praescio VII (Piano... and then some) (1994)
by Bruce Pennycook picks up where Player Piano  leaves off. It is an impressive demonstration of interactive computer technology expanding the resources available to the solo pianist. Had Praescio VII  been recorded twice, with different parameter settings, this might have proved an enlightening comparison!

Arksalalartôq

Transmutations returns to 1971 with Arksalalartôq  for vocalist, tape and instrumentalist by Micheline Coulombe Saint-Marcoux. In some ways, this is the most successful work on the CD, with its quirky, "old-fashioned" tape part, proving that any sound a performer can produce is fair material for the composer's creation.

Udo Kasemets' Calendar Round: Megalcides (1989) for singer/speaker, piano and tape closes off the CD by returning to the New World for inspiration, in the form of the Mayan calendar. A work with considerable freedom of form, its timelessness and consonant harmonic underpinning borders on New Age. Sangeet (1990) by Robert F. Jones is also included, but is an entirely acoustic composition.

lanza and Sheppard are outstanding performers, and the quality of recording is excellent (some of the tracks were originally CBC broadcast recordings). Transmutations is well worth the listen, despite some unevenness of inspiration.

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