Customer Reviews

Crumb: Ancient Voices Of Children

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I just recently reaquainted myself with this work after about thirty years. Ancient voice of Children retains all of the mystery and magic that I heard when I first encountered the piece at the age of 11. The work resembles not so much a conventional piece of music as a mystic ceremony. Set to fragments from the poetry of Frederico Garcia Lorca, the music captures the magical nature of the poet's verse. The unusual instrumental effects are haunting. Amoung my favorite is the quotation from Bist Du Bei Mir played on a toy piano as a haunting elegy for a dead child. The work builds in it's last section to a shattering climax.

The perfomance is quintessential. Jan DeGaetani was marvelous in this style of music and is sorely missed as a performer. The ensemble is spirited and very precise. The only thing that you miss on this CD is the visual choreography of a live performance, which is hypnotizing.

Macrocosmos III was a new piece to me and is every bit as haunting as other Crumb music. The ending is luminous...en eternal spinning out of music in the Lydian scale.

Be aware, this is avant garde music, though I feel it is quite assessible to those who listen without preconceptions. It is certainly more assessible than Elliot Carter or Boulez. It is not Part or Gorecki...but then not everything has to be. For me, this is not about style but about substance. Crumb moves me every bit as much as more assessible composers. You just have to listen with different ears, that's all.

I truly enjoyed these works of the American composer George Crumb. I was 15 years old when I first heard the song-cycle Ancient Voices of Children. It has been a favourite of mine ever since.

Music for a Summer Evening from Makrokosmos III is also fabulous. Crumb uses many avant garde effects, both from the percussion and the two pianos. However, as with the Ancient Voices of Children, these serve a strictly music end.

While Crumb does use many avant garde techniques in his work, it is surprisingly approachable. It may make you want to hear more of his work.

I remember a time when I was at a flea market and was looking through some vinyl records (possibly about the time before I got my first CD player). One particular record got my attention. The cover sort of resembles a newspaper article with a picture insert of a nebula. What got my attention were "Makrokosmos" and that it was a Nonesuch record. I've heard a few Nonesuch records and notice how different the music tends to be. So I thought I buy it for $1 (if I recall correctly). When I listened to it at home, I knew I made a good choice. It had the strange 20th century music - rather atonal. It's a good thing the vinyl record was in good shape, especially when it came to the very quiet parts. I have that record today, still in good shape.

About a few years after buying the vinyl record, I was looking through some CDs in a store (after I got my first CD player). I've found the Nonesuch CD that had "Ancient Voices of Children" AND "Music for a Summer Evening (Makrokosmos III)." I didn't buy it because I wanted to get it on sale. Well, time passed. One day, I saw one up for bid on eBay. I think I was the only bidder on it. The jewel case may have a few scratches (which I wouldn't worry about) but the CD itself was like new.

I'm glad that I got it on CD. I could listen to the music without any clicks or pops you would hear from a vinyl LP (especially since the music gets very quiet at times). Although you wouldn't get the "warm analog sound" you get from the vinyl. Nevertheless, it does sound very good considering that it's AAD. Whoever likes avant-garde music may want to get this.

One thing I want to let you know. Whoever did the tracking on the CD must've misjudged about the beginnings of "Myth" and "Music of the Starry Night." "Myth" begins at index 8:02 on track 9. Tracks 10 and 11 are the last movement, "Music of the Starry Night." Take note of that when listening to this CD.

The first time I heard Ancient Voices of Children, I hated it. I didn't understand at all what Crumb was trying to do. But suddenly, I found myself listening to it repeatedly, and it came alive. It haunted me, struck the core of my soul with every syllable. It is now one of my favorite pieces. Music for a summer evening is another fine musical accomplishment by one of America's most talented musicians ever.

Those who know US composer George Crumb mainly from the terrifying musings of 'Black Angels' (made semi-famous by the Kronos Quartet) will probably be surprised by the haunting beauty of 'Ancient Voices'. Based on texts from Lorca, the rich but sparing instrumentation is complemented by evocative, floating soprano - sometimes sung into the piano to create an eerie, mystical ambient. My first exposure was at London's Roundhouse in 1976, where even the background rumbling of trains couldn't sublimate the extraordinary lure of Crumb's sound world. Truly gorgeous and thoughtfully composed.

This is truly an important modern music CD. Crumb's style is more accessible than many modern composers without compromising artistic integrity. Rather than work with complex pitches and textures, his main interest lies in tone color, which he explores masterfully in both works. He is especially sensitive to percussion and uses a whole host of largely unfamiliar instruments; as a pianist he has innovated piano technique to include any number of playing methods inside the piano (directly on the strings)--strumming them, striking them with various things, and the like. So that the audience can concentrate on these timbres, the textures are often very thin--quite often only one or two lines are playing at a time, and there is a lot of musical space between gestures. I love both of these works, but in particular, I think the last movement of Music for a Summer Evening is one of the most beautiful and haunting pieces *ever* written. This CD has my HIGHEST recommendation. Thanks to Nonesuch for re-releasing this, and in fact combining two of their old LPs. If only they would revive the majority of their old LP catalogue.

A mí me pasó lo mismo que al crítico anterior de USA, la primera vez que escuche la obra Ancient Voices of Children, me pareció espantosa y en la actualidad la encuentro con un gran valor artístico. Lo cual significa que es una obra que generalmente hay que oírla varias veces para llegarla a entender o sentir. Music for a summer evening, es una obra fascinante de punta a punta.

Recomendado.

Here I am, the skeleton at the feast of 5* reviews proving again the old adage that "One man's meat is another man's poison". I hardly believe that even a small percentage of people (let's leave aside Professors of Avant-Garde Music for the time being) would be able to listen to, let alone enjoy, more than a few minutes of this music (I use that term in it's very loosest definition). It is ridiculous, therefore, that this should have a preponderance of 5* reviews. Consequently I believe that I am doing a service by standing up and pointing out "bad" music just as I do in applauding "good" music.

I came at this CD - which I bought thanks to some of the aforementioned 5* which I was foolish enough to believe - with the expectation that it would be modern, avant-garde and probably rather ineffable initially. I am prepared for this, believing that often the best music is not instantly grasped and needs careful auditioning. When I listened to it, however, I found that my expectations were not nearly extreme enough. This is music trying so hard to establish its originality that it appears to have progressed well beyond my definition of what music actually is. It is music as art, as a statement and not music to listen to - think about this a little! Hence my opening line - this is the opposite of music.

Instead, this production seems to be comprised of irrelevant and inconsequential noises, none of them musical. To save you the money, and more importantly the time, I will precis this CD for you:

A womans shriek followed by about 20 seconds of silence.
A sound rather like a large rodent being let loose inside a piano.
Some blocks of wood being banged together.
More shrieking.
More silence.
A voice making a strange sound as if copying a phone ringing.
More silence.
More wood being banged together.
More silence

Etcetera, etcetera, ad nauseam

At some point in this avant-garde nonsense somebody is going to blow the whistle and irreverently point out that the "Emperors New Clothes" do not actually exist. In the service of music, as opposed to "art", I am prepared to do the pointing! This production is nothing more that a deeply unmusical joke against those pseudo-intellectuals who completely miss the concepts of humanity and accessibility in music. "Composers" who write this stuff do so as to hide their lack of musical creativity behind an intellectual argument. Don't believe the hype, leave this one on the shelf!

For those aesthetes and enthusiasts who are intent on heading down a progressive route of "classical" music which yet retains any humanity and sympathy, Part and Gorecki appear to have been able to create music of originality and humanity, proving that it can be done.

Leave this production to those pseuds more interested in wallowing in their own misconceived esoteric intellectualism than in actually enjoying music.