William Russell: The Complete
Works
William Russell was, along
with his friends John Cage, Henry Cowell and Lou Harrison, one of the
seminal figures in modern percussion music. Russell composed his
landmark percussion during the 1930s, eventually abandoning
composition to work in jazz and settle in New Orleans. He was the
first composer in the western tradition to integrate African,
Caribbean and Asian instruments along with found objects and the
influence of jazz into his work, all the while maintaining a
distinctly exuberant "American" sound.
Cage was so fond of Russell
and his music that he kept the idea of reviving Russell's neglected
music alive. He offered assistance towards a retrospective concert of
Russell's complete works in New York in 1990 a gala event attended
by many leading figures in new music and jazz. Russell came to New
York to work with Essential Music in the preparation of these works;
some of which had their world premiere there, others had not been
heard in almost 50 years.
Subsequently, Essential
Music toured the U.S. and Europe with Russell's works to great
acclaim. This CD marks the first complete recording of Russell's
joyful compositions for percussion ensemble.
William Russell's artistic
importance stands in inverse ratio to the size of his output. His
eight pieces for percussion - most of them recorded here for the
first time - are milestones in the history of the genre. Russell
predated Cage in imaginatively combining African, Caribbean, Asian,
and Western instruments, and in using the piano primarily as a
percussion instrument. Consistently disparaging about the quality of
his own music. Russell stopped composing in 1940, having decided that
New Orleans jazz was infinitely superior to anything he could create.
His importance in the history of percussion music has gone largely
unrecognized, and his contribution has been eclipsed by the more
prolific outputs of Cage, Cowell, Varèse and Lou Harrison. He
died in 1992.
Only two of the works
featured here have been previously recorded. Three Cuban Pieces
(1939) and Three Dance Movements (1933) appeared on the LP Concert
Percussion (Time TLP 5800), by the Paul Price Ensemble. Three Dance
Movements is typically compelling in its rhythmic style. The first is
a foxtrot in 7/4, the second a march in 3/4, and the last a foxtrot
in 5/4. In all three movements the basic rhythms are obscured by
jazz-like syncopations and clouded in ethereal timbres. The pianist
sweeps the strings and plays massive tone clusters throughout. The
climatic sequence is punctuated by smashing a ginger ale bottle with
a hammer - precisely at sFFz.
The Three Cuban Pieces are a
havenera, a rhumba and a son. The instrumentation comprising
cencerro, maracas, guiro, bongos, claves, and quijda (the jawbone of
an ass, the teeth of which rattle when struck). The rhythmic patterns
are typically complicated, bearing only a nominal resemblance to the
Cuban models which inspired them.
The Trumpet Concerto (1937)
sounds like a real fusion of jazz and Balinese Gamelan. Its central
motif is a descending three-note figure (E-flat, D, C) borrowed from
Louis Armstrong's 1929 version of Fats Waller's That Rhythm Man. In
that original, the motive was repeated three times in different
octaves as the band sustained its final chord. Here the motive is
repeated 300 times, shrouded in trance-like ostinato patterns which
prefigure the minimalism of Reich and Riley.
Made in America (1936) is a
similarly eclectic fusion of ideas. In its celebrative use of found
objects, borrowed rhythms (modelled on those of trains and concrete
mixers), and swing rhythms, one can hear the advent or the American
avant-garde. Made in America is a joyful, mechanistic cacophony, a
hymn to industrialism. Its spiky metallic counterpoint evokes the
noise of a railway under construction, its angular rhythms tellingly
underscored by the melancholy wail of a lion's roar.
mode 34
Made In America: The Complete
Works
Prelude, Chorale and Fugue
(1932, revised 1985) First recording
Four Dance Movements (1933,
revised 1990)First recording
Three Cuban Pieces
(1935).
Trumpet Concerto (1937, revised
1990) First recording
Chicago Sketches (1940) First
recording
Laurie Frink,
trumpet
March Suite (1936, revised
1984) First recording
Ogou Badagri (1933) First
recording
Made in America (1936, revised
1990) First recording
Performed by Essential Music
John Kennedy & Charles
Wood, artistic directors
MODE
recording
NEW SEALED
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