Pulse Shadows

Sir Harrison Birtwistle (Artist) | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (November 13, 2001)
• SPARS Code: DDD
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Teldec
• ASIN: B000050KFO
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #309,611 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Track Listings

1. Fantasia 1

2. Thread suns Fadensonnen

3. Frieze 1

4. White and Light

5. Fantasia 2

6. Psalm

7. Fantasia 3

8. With Letter and Clock

9. Frieze 2

10. An Eye, open

11. Fantasia

12. Todtnauberg

13. frieze 3

14. Tenebrae

15. Fantasia 5

16. Night

17. Todesfuge-Frieze 4

18. Give the Word

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A generally successful setting of Paul Celan's poetry mixed with virtuoso string passages, October 2, 2008

By 

Christopher Culver - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Pulse Shadows (Audio CD)

Wow. I've generally been no fan of the British composer Harrison Birtwistle. Most piece I've heard from him I've found to be grey and directionless, a sort of generic modernism little distinguishable from the work of many other composers. But in his epic work PULSE SHADOWS, Birtwistle has set the poetry of Paul Celan with great effect.

The Romanian-born, German-speaking and French-naturalized Celan was a survivor of Holocaust, but his parents and many Jewish acquaintances perished in the camps. His poetry is concerned with what language might mean after "that which happened" in the war, and his poetry seems to doubt the power to express anything with words at that same time that it moves into stunning linguistic brilliance. If you like 20th century poetry, there's a fine volume of Celan's poetry available with the same translations as found here.

Birtwistle's PULSE SHADOWS consists of two interleaved parts. On one hand, there are the Nine Settings of Celan for soprano and chamber ensemble (two clarinets, cello, viola and double bass), where Celan's poems are powerfully articulated in Michael Hamburger's English translations. On the other hand, we hear interspersed between them the Nine Movements for string quartet.. The ensemble pieces are light in musical content, with the vocal line always calm and singable and little instrumental ostentation, but the words of Celan they set are searing. I especially love the setting of "Todtnauberg", the sole poem sung in the original German, where the soprano speaks the English translation after each line as if underscoring it. The string quartet passages in some sense provide a release from the angst of the poetry, but are highly virtuosic and avoid any kind of stability. It's remarkable that PULSE SHADOWS is a combination of two independent works that, what's more, can be played in any order, for the work presented on this disc is entirely coherent.

The liner notes are quite informative, containing an essay on the work by Stephen Pruslin and comments by Celan translator Michael Hamburger giving his view of Birtwistle's blend of poetry and music. My only complaint is that they do not give the exact lineup of the Arditti Quartet which performs here.

This disc will probably not appeal to listeners who aren't comfortable with at least the music of the Second Viennese School--though it's not Darmstadt-era weirdness and listeners who are willing to go as far as Schoenberg and his vein of expressionism will find much familiar here. Still, if you like contemporary music, this is a disc worth hearing.

7 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Brilliant, November 19, 2002

By 

Graham J. Lawrence (Edmonton, Alberta Canada) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Pulse Shadows (Audio CD)

A wonderful CD and well recorded. This is the first recording of Birtwistle's that I've heard and I am well pleased with it. It ranks up there with the best of Ligetti, Carter, et alia. No wonder it won the Gramophone mag. "contemporary" award last year. I've already played it many times and it improves with every listen. It will not disappoint.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Point of entry, February 22, 2010

By 

Silenos - See all my reviews

This review is from: Pulse Shadows (Audio CD)

Culver's remarks are quite apropos here. Pulse Shadows is a set that arcs back to the expressionist pieces of the Second Viennese school, to the Schoenberg of Pierrot, and perhaps even more to Webern's vocal output. Clearly, those who have yet to find value in such works will have little to gain from Pulse Shadows. Which is unfortunate because this arresting and, yes, emotionally involving piece offers a remarkable point of entry not so much into Birtwistle's own oeuvre (I tend to favor Silbury Air for that purpose) as into that of Paul Celan. Celan's poems present difficulties, not to mention searing emotions, of a resolutely modern kind that would be poorly served by a neo-romantic setting, however much it presumably would please those whose musical evolution stopped somewhere at Mahler. I strongly urge those antipathetic to Birtwistle's set to become acquainted with Celan first: it might change their perspective and enlarge their world.