Music that makes no noise of intrusion


My world and my music are never one and the same. Which means my music of the moment varies from day to day. Last night dependent arising dictated that it was the Ukrainian Valentin Silvestrov's Stille Lieder - unmissable sample here. These songs deserve better than my own clumsy prose; so here is the opening from Paul Griffiths' masterly sleeve note for ECM's recording of Stille Lieder:
We may feel we have always known these songs, and in a sense we have. The first hearing will not seem the first, though we will remember it for that slow shock of familiarity, how it awakens memories - those we knew we had, and those we did not. This is part of these songs' silence, that they make no noise of intrusion.
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Comments

Lyle Sanford, RMT said…
Thanks for that link - most striking music I've heard in a long time - maybe because it so resonates with this winter we've been having. The emotion and the style of the singer remind me strongly of the man Theodorakis always had sing his music - and the language is reminiscent of Greek to my ear.
3:37 am
Pliable said…
Lyle, the haunting folk-song like melody heard in the YouTube sample of Stille Lieder also appears in the fourth movement of Silvestrov's Requiem for Larissa.

You will know I hate the cliche "neglected masterpiece". But I can think of no words to describe Silvestrov's Requiem other than a neglected masterpiece - http://www.overgrownpath.com/2010/04/his-works-revive-past-music.html
8:34 am
JMW said…
Silvestrov's Requiem was a contender for the Grammy ultimately won by Adams' Transmigration. Silvestrov was robbed.
7:23 pm
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