Morton Feldman: "Why Webern?" - H. C. E.’s first Post

Hello. Regular visitors to "A Closet of Curiosities" may have noticed a new name on the contributors-list: H. C. Earwicker. That’s supposed to be me, and this is my initial post here. First of all, many thanks to grey calx for letting me aboard. We’re both looking forward to this collaboration.

I’ll be posting something between two and four recordings per month, somewhere along the line of what you’re already used to on this blog: New, Electronic, and Ethnic Music, plus some borderline stuff - mostly rare, hard-to-get, deleted or unreleased recordings from radio broadcasts.




One of the commentors to an earlier post by grey calx asked for more Feldman, so here we go - with a seldom-performed piece by MF in the recording of its world premiere, taken from a radio broadcast: Morton Feldman - Violin and Orchestra (1979), played by Paul Zukofsky and the Radio-Sinfonieorchester Frankfurt, conducted by Christóbal Halffter.
Feldman’s working title for "Violin and Orchestra" was "Why Webern?" and it represents a link between his earlier non-repetetive styles and his later, pattern-oriented "minimalism". It’s one of his first VERY long (60 plus minutes) pieces. He started his series of contemplative and hypnotic large scale works with "Why Patterns?" in 1978 and refined this style of writing continuously to his last composition, "Piano, Violin, Viola, Cello" from 1987.
"Violin and Orchestra" was written for Paul Zukofsky and is scored for a big orchestra, featuring two harps, two pianos and a rich assortment of percussion. It is a mesmerizing microcosmos of changing and shifting figures/patterns and colours/shades. The solo part is carefully woven into the orchestral arrangements. One can hear the solo instrument distinctly, but it is always part of the ensemble. Zukofsky’s interpretation of Feldman’s microtonalities is outstanding and marvellous. "Violin and Orchestra" may sound somehow "chaotic" from the surface, but a dive deep into it will surely be most rewarding for the listener.
"I prefer to think of my work as: between categories. Between Time and Space. Between painting and music. Between the music's construction, and its surface."
Morton Feldman, in: "Between Categories" (1969)

Next post; tomorrow: a WERGO LP from 1971, with two essential piano pieces by Christian Wolff, and a kick-ass version of his "Burdocks", played by a veritable All-Star-Band of legendary composers-slash-performers.

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