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LP
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W25 015LP
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"Sounds While Waiting documents the latest organ works by composer and musician Ellen Arkbro -- following her phenomenal debut, 2017's For Organ And Brass, and the more recent CHORDS for organ. Recorded at a centuries-old church in Unnaryd, Sweden in June 2020, these pieces reveal the enchanting qualities of sustained harmonic sound, how patterns of listening dissolve and emerge as textured space. On opening track 'Changes,' long radiant tones ebb and flow like divine breaths, while 'Leaving Dreaming' builds with dynamic tension to unlock a subtle, otherworldly ambience. Arkbro composes for acoustic instruments, for synthetic sound and for combinations of both, including music for orchestra and smaller chamber ensembles and large scale installation works. She currently performs in Catherine Christer Hennix's Kamigaku ensemble and has previously studied with La Monte Young and Marian Zazeela in New York. Recommended for fans of Sarah Davachi, Eliane Radigue, and Charlemagne Palestine."
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CD
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SUB 015CD
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With Chords, the Stockholm-based musician and composer Ellen Arkbro returns to Subtext, following her acclaimed debut album For Organ And Brass (SUB 011CD/021LP, 2017). This new long-player sees Arkbro adopt a more minimalist approach, focusing on the immediate qualities of sound and elegantly expanding the tonal capacities of acoustic instruments using precise, subtle synthesis. Composed of a carefully selected combination of tones, Chords stretches, extends and obscures the timbral character of the instruments it is performed on. Across both tracks, Arkbro examines the sonic materiality and harmonic quality of chords. She considers how the compositions occupy space rather than time -- transposing theoretical possibilities into the phenomenal realm. As a part of Arkbro's systematic investigation of harmonic sound, Chords proffers a divergence from conventional ways of listening. "Chords For Organ" was first envisaged in Stockholm's brutalist Västerort Church. With an interest in tuned intervals and chords, Arkbro sought out particular harmonicities before synthetically supplying additional harmonic content and texture. To pure fifths and octaves, she adds synthesized natural sevenths and thirds, creating a heightened sense of harmonic stability. While this incarnation of "Chords For Organ" was recorded in Malmö's St. John's Church, this work is site-specific, requiring Arkbro to seek out appropriate chordal orchestrations in registers and tunings on each respective instrument, when performing live. "Chords For Organ" has been adapted and performed in Martin Luther Kirche in Dresden, Civico Tempio Di San Sebastiano in Milan, First Unitarian Church in Brooklyn, Lutherse Kerk in Den Haag and Sint-Jan de Doperkerk in Leuven. In the corresponding "Chords For Guitar" Arkbro applies her process to a more widely accessible instrument. Employing a fine-tuned Karplus-Strong synthesis, she supplements additional tones to create a harmonically controlled blend of the acoustic and the synthetic. "Chords For Guitar" places the listener at the center of a cyclically repeating complex of harmonic strings in wave-like motion. Attention is synchronously fixed with the sound as this chordal harmony rises, vibrates, and purrs away, before rising again. As she transposes these ideas across organ and guitar, Arkbro teases out their affinities and dissimilarities, and, in doing so, effectively highlights the harmonic character of the work as a whole.
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SUB 029LP
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LP version. With Chords, the Stockholm-based musician and composer Ellen Arkbro returns to Subtext, following her acclaimed debut album For Organ And Brass (SUB 011CD/021LP, 2017). This new long-player sees Arkbro adopt a more minimalist approach, focusing on the immediate qualities of sound and elegantly expanding the tonal capacities of acoustic instruments using precise, subtle synthesis. Composed of a carefully selected combination of tones, Chords stretches, extends and obscures the timbral character of the instruments it is performed on. Across both tracks, Arkbro examines the sonic materiality and harmonic quality of chords. She considers how the compositions occupy space rather than time -- transposing theoretical possibilities into the phenomenal realm. As a part of Arkbro's systematic investigation of harmonic sound, Chords proffers a divergence from conventional ways of listening. "Chords For Organ" was first envisaged in Stockholm's brutalist Västerort Church. With an interest in tuned intervals and chords, Arkbro sought out particular harmonicities before synthetically supplying additional harmonic content and texture. To pure fifths and octaves, she adds synthesized natural sevenths and thirds, creating a heightened sense of harmonic stability. While this incarnation of "Chords For Organ" was recorded in Malmö's St. John's Church, this work is site-specific, requiring Arkbro to seek out appropriate chordal orchestrations in registers and tunings on each respective instrument, when performing live. "Chords For Organ" has been adapted and performed in Martin Luther Kirche in Dresden, Civico Tempio Di San Sebastiano in Milan, First Unitarian Church in Brooklyn, Lutherse Kerk in Den Haag and Sint-Jan de Doperkerk in Leuven. In the corresponding "Chords For Guitar" Arkbro applies her process to a more widely accessible instrument. Employing a fine-tuned Karplus-Strong synthesis, she supplements additional tones to create a harmonically controlled blend of the acoustic and the synthetic. "Chords For Guitar" places the listener at the center of a cyclically repeating complex of harmonic strings in wave-like motion. Attention is synchronously fixed with the sound as this chordal harmony rises, vibrates, and purrs away, before rising again. As she transposes these ideas across organ and guitar, Arkbro teases out their affinities and dissimilarities, and, in doing so, effectively highlights the harmonic character of the work as a whole.
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CD
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SUB 011CD
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2018 repress. For Organ And Brass is comprised of two works by the Stockholm-based composer Ellen Arkbro. Both works focus on tuning, intonation, and harmonic modulation. In previous projects, Arkbro composed for early music ensembles, wrote a series of durational pieces utilizing synthetic tones and processed guitars, and, most recently, presented a work lasting 26 days at the Stockholm Concert Hall. For Organ And Brass looks back to Arkbro's studies in just intonation with La Monte Young, Marian Zazeela, and their disciple Jung Hee Choi in New York, as well as with kindred spirit Marc Sabat in Berlin. The title composition was written for an organ with a specific kind of historical tuning known as meantone temperament. It was only after locating an appropriate instrument -- the Sherer-Orgel dating back to 1624 in St. Stephen's Church in Tangermünde, Northeastern Germany -- that Arkbro set about recording both for organ and brass and its counterpart, Three. "Hidden within the harmonic framework of the Renaissance organ are intervals and chords that bare a close resemblance to those found in the modalities of traditional blues music," explains Arkbro. "The work can be thought of as a very slow and reduced blues music." The work moves gradually through a series of long, sustained tones played by the organ and in parallel by a brass trio comprised of horn, tuba, and trombone. Arkbro's treatment of pitch resembles the tuning strategies of La Monte Young. The brass parts were performed by microtonal brass trio Zinc & Copper, a group whose repertoire has included works by C.C. Hennix and Christian Wolff. In Arkbro's words, "the brass instruments and the organ fall into patterns of interaction in which a new breathing instrument emerges." Three, which follows the 20-minute title work, deploys the same principles of harmonic relativity. In removing the organ from the instrumentation and switching to a different meter, Three acts as an intimate counterpoint to the ritual drone cycles of the title piece. For Organ And Brass was recorded in Tangermünde, Germany in September 2016. The performers were Johan Graden (organ), Elena Kakaliagou (horn), Hilary Jeffery (trombone), and Robin Hayward (tuba). Ellen Arkbro's work has been performed in Brooklyn, Stockholm, Norberg, Bologna, Gothenburg, Berlin, Birmingham, and Malmö, and on Swedish National Radio.
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LP
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SUB 021LP
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2018 repress; LP version. For Organ And Brass is comprised of two works by the Stockholm-based composer Ellen Arkbro. Both works focus on tuning, intonation, and harmonic modulation. In previous projects, Arkbro composed for early music ensembles, wrote a series of durational pieces utilizing synthetic tones and processed guitars, and, most recently, presented a work lasting 26 days at the Stockholm Concert Hall. For Organ And Brass looks back to Arkbro's studies in just intonation with La Monte Young, Marian Zazeela, and their disciple Jung Hee Choi in New York, as well as with kindred spirit Marc Sabat in Berlin. The title composition was written for an organ with a specific kind of historical tuning known as meantone temperament. It was only after locating an appropriate instrument -- the Sherer-Orgel dating back to 1624 in St. Stephen's Church in Tangermünde, Northeastern Germany -- that Arkbro set about recording both for organ and brass and its counterpart, Three. "Hidden within the harmonic framework of the Renaissance organ are intervals and chords that bare a close resemblance to those found in the modalities of traditional blues music," explains Arkbro. "The work can be thought of as a very slow and reduced blues music." The work moves gradually through a series of long, sustained tones played by the organ and in parallel by a brass trio comprised of horn, tuba, and trombone. Arkbro's treatment of pitch resembles the tuning strategies of La Monte Young. The brass parts were performed by microtonal brass trio Zinc & Copper, a group whose repertoire has included works by C.C. Hennix and Christian Wolff. In Arkbro's words, "the brass instruments and the organ fall into patterns of interaction in which a new breathing instrument emerges." Three, which follows the 20-minute title work, deploys the same principles of harmonic relativity. In removing the organ from the instrumentation and switching to a different meter, Three acts as an intimate counterpoint to the ritual drone cycles of the title piece. For Organ And Brass was recorded in Tangermünde, Germany in September 2016. The performers were Johan Graden (organ), Elena Kakaliagou (horn), Hilary Jeffery (trombone), and Robin Hayward (tuba). Ellen Arkbro's work has been performed in Brooklyn, Stockholm, Norberg, Bologna, Gothenburg, Berlin, Birmingham, and Malmö, and on Swedish National Radio.
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