RYAN CARTER Chamber Works
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RYAN CARTER Chamber Works JACK Quartet Yarn/Wire Calder Quartet Emanuele Torquati Duo Dillon-Torquati Keith Kirchoff RYAN CARTER (*1980) 1 too many arguments in line 17 (2010) 09:22 JACK Quartet 1 Emanuele Torquati, piano 4 Christopher Otto, violin 2 When All Else Fails (2017) 10:39 Ari Streisfeld, violin Duo Dillon-Torquati 5 John Pickford Richards, viola Francesco Dillon, piano Kevin McFarland, cello Emanuele Torquati, piano 3 grip (2006) 15:51 Yarn/Wire 2 Keith Kirchoff, piano 6 4 Errata (2010) 10:41 Laura Barger, piano Jacob Rhodebeck, piano 5 break; (2018) 16:34 Ian Antonio, percussion Russell Greenberg, percussion 6 On the limits of a system and the consequences of my decisions (2016) 09:22 Calder Quartet 3 Benjamin Jacobson, violin Andrew Bulbrook, violin Jonathan Moerschel, viola TT 72:29 Eric Byers, cello The Calder Quartet appears courtesy of Pentatone 2 3 compositional agency is not subverted so a break in the flow. Harmonics and micro- much as re-oriented. The stuff of break- tonal inflections shift the aural impression down resolves itself into new material to from variation to error. Carter has recon- be dissected, recast and rendered new. structed a glitch. Indeed, the title of the Carter’s insights into the form of techno- piece refers to an error message: the line logical mediation were not garnered from is a numbered line of code. a distance. He is a programmer who has produced a substantial amount of elec- A note in the score tells us that “this piece tronic music. This output includes pieces is inspired by an experience watching a A streaming clip stalls. The sound and im- involving novel electronic instruments and YouTube video that was not buffering prop- age start, skip, and loop. A program freez- phone applications that mobilize the func- erly, resulting in a chopping and looping of es, spinning in place. A pattern dissolves, tionality and ubiquity of the smartphone short video segments.” He goes on to say generating a network of variants in its to involve the listener in the composition- that “the material in too many arguments wake. In the compositions assembled on al process. The pieces on this album, then, in line 17 is also manipulated by processes this album, Ryan Carter attends to these are metadiscourse: chamber works about akin to granular synthesis, with an affinity rhyming instances of technological break- electronic sound. for glitches and unexpected results.” The down, among others. He mines their form unexpected is not limited to the improper- for insight into the nature and extent of too many arguments in line 17 is Carter’s ly buffered Fortspinnung and bent pitch. A the shaping effect that ever more perva- third string quartet and one of two on this glitch at measure 90 is punctuated by the sive and sophisticated technology exerts album. Written for the JACK Quartet in first violin getting up and walking to anoth- on our ears and on our lives. Tools mimic 2010, the piece is a study in meter and ar- er place in the performance space. the agency we express when using them ticulation. The performers are given a lexi- at the moment they fail, so it is no acci- con of articulations, including two types of When All Else Fails is a more recent com- dent that to the extent that Carter’s focus saltando, four types of col legno, and five position, written in 2016–2017 for the en- is on technology it is also on failure. One types of pizzicato (left hand, fingernail, and semble Yarn/Wire. It is scored for two per- is reminded of Martin Heidegger’s well- Bartók pizzicato in addition to the stan- cussionists and two pianists. Both pianos known observation about hammers, which dard variety). The first two bars do not out- are prepared with towels and coins affixed escape into independence from the right line a subject so much as set up a pattern. to the strings at specified partials. The hand at the moment they miss the nail and At the moment when that pattern threat- pianists are also instructed to play har- crush the left thumb. However, in those ens to become fully intelligible, the music monics inside the piano. The percussion- compositions that thematize breakdown, stalls. A momentary cross rhythm signals ists play triangle, woodblock, claves and 4 5 tuned gongs, but much of the determina- “layers of sound.” In a note in the score, tive timbre of the piece results from the vi- he categorizes sounds into four catego- braphone, alternately sounded with motor, ries that span the range from fully deter- rasping stick, Moleskin-wrapped Becker minate to utterly indeterminate. Carter’s blue mallet, and bow. The relatively sim- sounds can either be continuous, periodic, ple pitch idiom allows for timbre to artic- gestural or random. While the first two cat- ulate the formal construction. The result egories are more or less straightforward, in a sonic landscape downstream from the third and fourth present an interest- those of John Cage and Henry Cowell. ing contrast between a sound that “avoids Put in mind of American experimental- any regular pulse but expresses a delib- ists, the listener could well associate the erate intent” and a sonic moment of cha- haunted and hollow sound world here with os. At times, chaos is marked in the score: the bracing experience the American ex- Carter write a letter Z through a note stem periment was undergoing at the time this when he wants to indicate that a pitch sus- piece was written. However, the mood is tains a “random tremolo.” The players are not funereal. The at times asynchronous pressed to explore the point of indistinc- voices are brought together in stillness tion between formal intent and material near the close with a tempo marking that consequence. Large sections of the piece reads: “Taking a deep breath.” never allow the layers of sound to align, al- lowing the overall result to be an emergent grip, from 2006, is Carter’s second string property of developing relationships be- quartet, and the earliest composition on tween the instrumentalists. Each, however, the album. The composition predates has a grip on what they play. The form that both Carter’s move to New York City and emerges is not one that fails, but one that the new era in American life that began in routinely breaks into delightful, even mo- 2008. It was commissioned by the Calder mentarily danceable moments. Quartet and in 2007 won the Suzanne and Lee Ettelson Composer’s Award. Earliest, A developed variation of grip’s optimism it is also the most optimistic. The piece can be heard in Errata, for solo piano from is an experiment in the rhythmic interac- 2010. If the string quartet pressed the mid- tion between voices, or what Carter calls dle space between musical intent and 6 7 musical action, the theme of this piano so- ting a grip on what is to be played by prac- result is repeated sinking and sharpening That fact might sever its aesthetic from the lo is the mistake. He writes that his primary ticing slowly and gradually speeding back of the pitch. A C natural might succeed a other works in this collection, but the elec- instrument is the piano and that the limits up. The damper pedal is held during this C a quarter tone flat, or a D natural might tronics in this composition are a reimagin- of his technical proficiency do not diminish section. As the piece speeds back up and be followed by a D a quarter tone sharp, all ing of an acoustic phenomenon peculiar to his joy in playing. The motivic core is the finds its footing, the pedal is slowly re- in very quick note values. Soon the piano the piano. Carter explains that in the pro- gesture in the opening bars. The mistakes leased. If the tempo returns to that of the part gains speed and confidence and the cess of composing previous works for the that Carter himself made while attempt- start, the dynamics have reversed. The cello line attempts and fails to form a des- instrument, he would encounter faulty sos- ing to play it form the process through gestures fade into silence. And the repeat- cant above a droning D. As that new chal- tenuto pedals. At times, he would allow which the development occurs. Written in ed notes that were glitch-like in the open- lenge gives way to a sustained harmonic, this technical flaw to become a structural the same year as too many arguments in ing bars reappear in the final bars as delib- the piano begins a pattern in even notes feature of the piece. In this work, the elec- line 17, the pianist’s mistake appears as a erately conclusive. that elongates measure by measure, from tronics serve as a “second, virtual sostenu- glitch in the flesh. The material often stalls, 5 notes to 7 to 9 until it reaches 21 and to pedal.” The electronics both sustain and repeats or doubles back. Glitches here, The most recently composed piece on the breaks off. The following section involves transform pitches, forming a kind of haunt- though, are altogether humane. Pauses album, break; , is a duo for cello and piano the piano developing a rhythmic motive ed acoustic environment in which the pia- and repeated notes are warmly ponderous. from 2018. While there is no genre classifi- against the cello’s variously uneven artic- no part moves. That movement is regulat- In a piece in which movement in generated cation for the work, in the company of two ulations through each bar.