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Fages, Ferran : Detuning Series For Guitar (Edition Wandelweiser Records)

The 2nd part of a trilogy for guitar and sinetones composed between 2015-18, alongside "What Might Occur (Rereadings of Triadic Memories by Morton Feldman for guitar and sinewaves)" (2015-17) and "Un Lloc Entre Dos Records" (2017); this work, originally written in 2016, and revised in 2018, is heard in a recording at GMEA, France, with guitarist Benjamin Maumus.
 

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Personnel:



Ferran Fages-electric guitar

Didier Aschour-electric guitar


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UPC: 4011778041054

Label: Edition Wandelweiser Records
Catalog ID: EWR 1809
Squidco Product Code: 26749

Format: CD
Condition: New
Released: 2018
Country: Germany
Packaging: Cardstock 3 page foldover in vinyl sleeve
Recorded at GMEA, in Albi, France, on June 11th to the 14th, 2018, by Benjamin Maumus.

Descriptions, Reviews, &c.

"The Barcelona-born guitarist, turntablist, electronicist, improviser and composer Ferran Fages has been releasing albums since the turn of the millennium. If his profile has not been as high as it might have been that may be because many of those albums have not been credited to him but to ensembles of which he is a member such as Cremaster, Atalón and Octante; in such groupings he has tended to be featured on turntables or electronics rather than guitar.

The years 2014 to 2017 were rather lean for Fages; having released twenty-one albums in the years between 2010 and 2013, in the next four years he only released seven. So, it is a pleasure to report that 2018 saw an upturn, and shone some light on what had been occupying Fages during those quieter years. The start of 2018 saw the release of K(no)t on Intonema, a fine, exploratory collaboration between the label's proprietor Ilia Belorukov, on alto sax and electronics, and Phicus, a Barcelona-based trio in which Fages plays electric guitar. Later in 2018, the arrival of the two albums below, within weeks of each other, clinched it as Fages' best year for some time...

[...]

By comparison, the second part of the trilogy, recorded over four days in June 2018, contrasts with the third part in several ways. Firstly, where Un Lloc Entre Dos Records consists of just one continuous track, Detuning Series for Guitar features five separate tracks, ranging in length from seven-and-a-half minutes to twelve-and-a-quarter; their titles are decimal numbers which suggest they could be parts of a larger selection-"3.1," "3.5," "4.2," "3.3" and "2.1." Secondly, the tracks are played by Fages and France's Didier Aschour, each playing electric guitar; no sinewaves are featured. Significantly, Aschour previously distinguished himself on Wandelweiser member Michael Pisaro's Resting in a Fold of the Fog (Potlatch, 2017), playing guitar alongside the composer himself on laptop.

Nowhere is information given about this composition or the recording, so the significance of those track titles remains open to interpretation, as does this music's relation to the other parts of the trilogy. Based on the aural evidence, the key word of the piece's title seems to be "detuning" as each track consists of a series of guitar notes which are bent slightly, by whatever means. From the start of the first track notes are played singly or as pairs in close succession and are allowed to resound for a considerable time, until they have fully faded away, before the next one is sounded. When two notes are sounded close together, the detuning of them produces fascinating and unpredictable interactions between them.

Gradually, a third note is also introduced-sometimes played more softly than the others-which further increases the possible interactions between them. As the album progresses, other subtle changes are introduced without radically altering this basic methodology. Throughout, the combinations of notes are well-chosen so that they sound right together, even when bent slightly. Extended silences between clusters of notes mean that the boundaries between tracks are never obvious and the transition from one track to another is seamless; so, a listener could easily be absorbed in the album's fifty-five minutes from beginning to end and not know it was subdivided into five tracks.

Considered as a whole, the simplicity of Detuning Series for Guitar is as engaging and beguiling as it is daring, far more so than one might imagine from the stark description of it, "two guitarists playing a series of bent notes with silences in between." As such, it is an ideal complement and companion-piece to Un Lloc Entre Dos Records, the two working well back-to-back. Now, does anyone plan to release the first part and complete the trilogy? Whether they do or not, the release of these two parts ought to make people sit up and take notice of Fages, and give a considerable boost to his reputation."-John Eyles, All About Jazz

See also Un lloc entre dos records

This album has been reviewed on our magazine:

The Squid
The Squid's Ear!

Get additional information at All About Jazz

Artist Biographies

"Ferran Fages (1974, Barcelona, Catalunya)

Ferran Fages is an improviser and composer, and an international reference in the sphere of electroacoustic improvisation. Since the end of the 1990s, he has published over fifty discographic references on national and international labels. He has undertaken tours, performed concerts and led workshops around Europe and South America as well as in Canada and Japan.

He plays guitar, resonant objects, acoustic turntable and electronics: "feedback mixing board", pick-ups and oscillators.

From 1999 until 2006 he was a member of the IBA col·lectiu d'improvisació, with whom he organised over one hundred concerts as well as the festivals Improvisa (2000-2003) and the Experimental Music Week at Metrònom (2005), among others.

Besides his projects, he has shared a stage and made collaborations with musicians such as Christine Abdelnour, Sophie Agnel, Núria Andorrà, Derek Bailey, Pascal Battus, Tom Chant, David Chiesa, Albert Cirera, Sébastien Cirotteau, Angharad Davies, Rhodri Davies, Michel Doneda, Axel Dörner, Lluïsa Espigolé, Agustí Fernández, Jean-Philippe Gross, Will Guthrie, Robin Hayward, Barbara Held, Jason Kahn, Martin Küchen,Eduard Márquez, Wade Matthews, Mattin, Manuel Mota, Ivan Palacky, Ramon Prats, Eddie Prévost, Pablo Rega, Àlex Reviriego, Ernesto Rodrigues, Alejandro Rojas-Marcos, Ivo Sans, Joan Saura, Pilar Subirà, Vasco Trilla, Birgit Ulher, Taku Unami, Nikos Velliotis, Dafne Vicente-Sandoval, Mark Wastell, Christopher Williams and Ingar Zach among others.

He has also worked with the choreographers and companies of Olga Mesa (1999), Lanónima Imperial (2003-2004), Carme Torrent (1999-2005), Ktonycia (2007), Constanza Brncic (2008-2009) and Merce Cunningham Dance Company (2009).

He has performed the following pieces of contemporary music: Guitar two, for four, by Phill Niblock (2004); Cobra, by John Zorn (2006); Meditations for Orchestra, by Pauline Oliveiros (2007); Guitar Trio, by Rysh Chatham (2007); Trio I from Trios WHITE ON WHITE, by Robert Ashley (2008); Poem 1960, by La Monte Young (2008); Diferencias familiares sobre las cuerdas, by Christopher Williams (2009); Little by Little, by Sam Sfirri (2011), and Cartridge Music, by John Cage (2012)."

-Ferran Fages Website (http://www.ferranfages.net/index.php?/bio/)
3/13/2024

Have a better biography or biography source? Please Contact Us so that we can update this biography.

"After studying the guitar at the CNSM of Paris, Didier Aschour was awarded a prize from the Yehudi Menuhin Foundation and a scholarship from the Darmastadt Ferienkurse für Neue Musik (1992 and 1994). A committed soloist fond of contemporary music, he premieres many works written for him and performs with Ensemble 2e2m, TM+, Aleph, L'Instant Donné, Zellig and Montpellier Philharmonic Orchestra. In 1996, he founded Ensemble DEDALUS, specializing in minimalist music and free instrumentation scores, with which he stands in favour of experimental contemporary music. He plays with Sejiro Murayama, Kristoff K.Roll duett, La Fanfare E. and Kasper T. Toeplitz.

As a composer, he works for dance - with choreographers such as Mathilde Monnier, Germana Civera, Patrice Barthès - and performance, imagining acoustic devices that question the relationship between music and sound phenomena.

Since 2007, he has been taking part in the Montpellier Sonorités Festival collective activities."

-Ensemble 2E2M (http://www.ensemble2e2m.com/en/page-4/bio-78-17/didier-aschour.html)
3/13/2024

Have a better biography or biography source? Please Contact Us so that we can update this biography.


Track Listing:



1. 3.1 11:59

2. 3.5 10:21

3. 4.2 12:33

4. 3.3 12:24

5. 2.1 7:33

Related Categories of Interest:


Compositional Forms
Guitarists, &c.
Duo Recordings
European Improvisation and Experimental Forms
Ambient & Minimal Music
New in Compositional Music

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