The Squid's Ear Magazine


Houben, Eva-Maria: Together On The Way (Another Timbre)

A brooding work for pipe organ, piano and percussion, created by composer Eva-Maria Houben and the GBSR Duo of Siwan Rhys & George Barton, commissioned by the 2021 Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival and recorded in concert in the resonance of of Huddersfield's St. Paul's Hall using the organ built by Wood's of Huddersfield.
 

Price: $15.95



Quantity:

In Stock

Quantity in Basket: None

Log In to use our Wish List
Shipping Weight: 2.00 units

Sample The Album:





product information:

Personnel:



Eva-Maria Houben-pipe organ, composer

Siwan Rhys-piano

George Barton-percussion


Click an artist name above to see in-stock items for that artist.




Label: Another Timbre
Catalog ID: at186
Squidco Product Code: 31496

Format: CD
Condition: New
Released: 2022
Country: UK
Packaging: Cardboard Gatefold
Recorded live at the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival, in Huddersfield, UK, on November 18th, 2021, by Simon Reynell.

Descriptions, Reviews, &c.

"Another Timbre Interview with Eva-Maria Houben

How did 'Together On The Way' come about, and had you worked with George and Siwan before?

'Together On The Way' was commissioned by the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival, and I composed it especially for this festival. I already knew Siwan Rhys. We had met each other for the first time on the occasion of the world premiere of my piece 'a peaceful silent place' for organ and piano. This performance took place on 8th December 2019, at the University of Westminster in London as part of the London Contemporary Music Festival. Siwan and I came together mysteriously during our rehearsal: we never had seen each other before, so at first we planned to have several hours rehearsing. But as soon as we began to play we knew: our practice was coming into being on its own, and there was no need to worry about needing a lot of time for rehearsal. This was a wonderful experience, I think for both of us. As Siwan is George Barton's duo partner in the GBRS Duo it was our aim to perform all together. And I am entirely happy with our performances in Huddersfield - there were many! Each performance had a value in itself. The last performance (with an audience) was only one element in a chain. I hope to continue our common practice in the future - with or without an audience.

Is the piece through-composed, or is it a loose structure which the three of you have to interpret?

I do not use the terms "through-composed" and/or "loose structure", I could not even define them. They are not part of my thinking about music. I know that several musicologists work with these terms, but these terms correspond to a view of music that concentrates on the score. My focus is the musical practice. Everyone may have a look at my book 'Musical Practice as a Form of Life' (transcript, Bielefeld). And look at my scores on wandelweiser: each score reflects its own notation. The single notation in each case corresponds to the performers' special situation, to their relationships, their activities - to the special musical practice. For me the composer is not the last authority in a process of discussion and rehearsal.

The terms "through-composed" and "loose structure" denote a dual system that does not refer to the musicians' musical practice. They highlight extremes on a scale, invented by musicology to gain terminological classification while thinking about music. The score is not the music. With this in mind I can easily say: No music is "through-composed", no music has a "loose structure". This is the reason why I ban these terms from my thinking about music.

Can you describe how you worked with Siwan and George on 'together on the way'?

Fortunately we had two whole days for our rehearsals. That was fine, we could really live together. We did not always talk about music, we also just spent time together. And we became a real trio simply being there and living together. Our rehearsal time was a kind of "holiday season", each one of us working very attentively and intently, at the same time leisurely and calmly. We had a lot of longer periods of playing together - listening to each other, trying to find out the path the composition would lead us. Then, after a period of playing, we discussed our impressions. At the end of the first day we played for a long time. The following rehearsal time during the next day was rich in former experiences. I felt that we could continue playing the piece, repeating our 'making music' with the help of the piece again and again, like doing a ritual. And, speaking for myself: I became more and more familiar with George Barton and Siwan Rhys as friends. Making music together had done this, had this overwhelming energy for me. For me it's a great gift that I could experience this.

You have composed a lot for the organ. Can you tell us about your relation with the instrument? When did you start playing it, and do you feel a particular affinity with it?

Yes, I have composed a lot for the organ, although fewer compositions than for the piano. My first piano lessons began when I was 5 years old. At the age of 10 I discovered my unbroken love of the organ, and during the following years I had organ and piano lessons alternately. I had my first job as an organist aged 12 - at a small old organ (builder: Weidtmann, Ratingen) in a very small church. Then during my studies at the music conservatory in Essen (Folkwang) I made the organ my first instrument.

In the following years I discovered "her" more and more, and I use a personal pronoun to announce my very individual connection to each particular instrument. Before a recital I love to discover the space, the organ "herself", asking: What is your character? How can we come together? I think in personal terms about different organs, one very small organ (1734!) with meantone temperament is "sweet" for me: You can listen how hard she works and breathes during the performance, you can hear the wires and strings from key to pipe!! And I love the organ's breath. In recent years I have found a lot of ways of working with the organ's breath, to include it into my scores. And before I perform a concert on the organ I'd never say that I am playing, I always think and say: "We" (two) are now playing.

The organ is for me a "Hoffmannesque instrument", by which I'm referring to the ideas of the great Romantic philosopher, writer and musician E. T. A. Hoffmann. I could imagine during a kind of somnambular walk watching Hoffmann sitting in the organ gallery amid a heap of wires, pieces of wood, fragments of pipes, and so on.... What becomes important is the organ as a machine, as an extension of human bodies. "She" can do what we cannot do, "she" has an endless breath, "she" reigns over a universe of partials and tone relations.... Imagine the doll in the opera "The Tales of Hoffmann", singing beautifully, but - as a machine - being exhausted after some time. And the doll-maker has to wind the doll up again (crack, crack, crack...), and the singing begins again with a great glissando upwards. Everybody knows that she is a machine, but we forget this in the moment of elevation. In the moment when music passes the threshold of our everyday life into wonder, into the magical world, into heaven on earth. Look at Kleist's marionette, his puppet dancing with an overwhelming grace. No human being can achieve this - and, importantly, she does it without being conscious of what she is achieving; it simply exists!

Today some musicologists regard the artists of the Romantic era as political boneheads who lived private lives, not caring about anything in the world. I disagree strongly. The Romantic era opened our ears and eyes to the miraculous, fantastical world within our everyday life. The Romantic composers and writers gave us a sense of how important this is: the capacity to feel awe and wonder. And for me this is a political act. It's not boneheaded at all; on the contrary, it opens our senses, makes us alive and attentive to our surroundings.

And the organ helps in this. "She" supports us with new possibilities, provides us ways of extending our senses and bodies. She makes our ears become antennae!

That's great. Were there any peculiarities about the organ at St Paul's Hall?

The organ at St Paul's Hall cannot blow sounds with a certain amount of noise or wind if you try to achieve this by pulling variable stops. The stops are "off" or "on", there is no degree between these two possibilities. But you can achieve a sound "between" wind and clearly pitched sound by variable key pressure. But you can only do this for single sounds, not for a chord. Usually you need both hands for one single sound. So we had to take some weights, but we could also use small wedges of gum, which Siwan also uses sometimes for certain piano sounds. With the help of these wedges I could fix some keys simultaneously and achieve a very fragile, restraint, and vibrating sound, even as a chord. The organ in St Paul's Hall has wonderful colors; you can explore a richness in possibilities to combine several colors. I enjoyed the organ very much. "She" responded very quickly to my questions, "she" tried at once to comply with my efforts. A flexible, smooth individual: "she" provided us with a lot of amazing ideas for the rehearsal and for the performance with an audience.



This album has been reviewed on our magazine:

The Squid
The Squid's Ear!

Artist Biographies

"Eva-Maria Houben (born 1955) studied Music Education at Folkwang-Musikhochschule Essen and the organ with Gisbert Schneider. Following her exams she taught both German and Music Education at Secondary School. She received her doctorate and postdoctoral lecturing qualification in musicology and was called for lectures at Gerhard-Mercator-Universität Duisburg and Robert-Schumann-Hochschule Düsseldorf. Since 1993 Professor Houben has been lecturing at Dortmund University`s "Institut für Musik und Musikwissenschaft", with both music theory and contemporary music as her focus. Up to now many books were published, concerning contemporary music, contemporary composers and traditional music, listened to with 'new ears'.

Eva-Maria Houben has been performing works for the organ for more than 30 years. As she is related to the "wandelweiser-group" of composers, her compositions are published by "edition wandelweiser", Haan. Her list of compositions up to now includes works for the organ, piano, clarinet, trombone, violoncello and other solo instruments, works for voice and piano, for wind and chamber ensembles, for orchestra and for voice and orchestra, works for choir (www.wandelweiser.de). She publishes on subjects of contemporary music (Steiner, PFAU, Edition Howeg, bis-label Oldenburg)."

-Eva-Maria Houben Website (http://www.evamariahouben.de/)
3/13/2024

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

"Welsh pianist Siwan Rhys enjoys a varied career of solo, chamber, and ensemble playing, with a strong focus on contemporary music and collaboration with composers.

She has played at prestigious British venues such as the Barbican Hall, Wigmore Hall, Royal Festival Hall, St David's Hall, Symphony Hall, and abroad at the Elbphilharmonie Hamburg, Le Tambour Rennes, and Shanghai Symphony Hall amongst others. She has also appeared at the Aldeburgh Festival, BBC Proms, Principal Sound, Occupy the Pianos, Lille Piano(s) Festival, and has recorded many times for television, radio, and labels such as NMC, all that dust, and Prima Facie. Her recent recording of Stockhausen's KONTAKTE (with percussionist George Barton) was released in October 2019 on the all that dust label.

Recent concert engagements include performances of Charles Ives' 'Concord Sonata' in France as part of the Oeuvres Monstres series, Nono's ...sofferte onde serene... at the Principal Sound festival, Feldman's For Philip Guston and Why Patterns?, Stockhausen's KONTAKTE, and appearances at Occupy the Pianos and Lille Piano(s) Festival playing music by Vivier and Eastman.

Also a regular ensemble and orchestral pianist, Siwan has worked with the London Sinfonietta, Birmingham Contemporary Music Group, Colin Currie Group, Aldeburgh Festival Ensemble, Mahogany Opera Group, Music Theatre Wales, Philharmonia Orchestra, London Symphony Orchestra, and City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, with conductors Oliver Knussen, François-Xavier Roth, and George Benjamin among others.

Siwan works regularly with mezzo-soprano Lucy Goddard, and is a member of GBSR piano-percussion duo with whom she was a 2017-18 St John's Smith Square Young Artist.

She is an honorary member of the Welsh Gorsedd of Bards and an Entente Cordiale alumna. She teaches at the London Contemporary School of Piano."

-Siwan Rhys Website (https://www.siwanrhys.co.uk/siwan-rhys-piano-biography)
3/13/2024

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

"George Barton is a solo, chamber and orchestral percussionist and timpanist based in London.

He is a member of the Colin Currie Group and has also worked with the London Symphony Orchestra, Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, Nash Ensemble, Britten Sinfonia, Aurora Orchestra, Birmingham Contemporary Music Group, Endymion, Music Theatre Wales, BBC Singers, Mahogany Opera Group, Notes Inégales, Riot Ensemble, London Contemporary Orchestra, the Royal Opera House, and the Multi-Story Orchestra, among many other ensembles and orchestras.

As a solo artist George has performed at the Southbank Centre's "The Rest is Noise" festival, the "Occupy the Pianos" festival at St John's Smith Square, and at a number of Nonclassical events across London, among other venues across the UK. His collaboration with Turner Prize -winning artist Jeremy Deller at the Barbican's Station to Station festival was featured on BBC2's Artsnight, and his playing has been recorded and broadcast many times for BBC Radio 3 and NMC. He was featured soloist at Filthy Lucre's The Sounding Body concerts and clubnight - footage available on the media page.

As an ensemble and orchestral player he has performed at all the major London concert halls, including at the BBC Proms every year since 2014, as well as such venues as the Cologne Philharmonie, Elbphilharmonie Hamburg, Tokyo Opera City, and many others.

He has performed chamber music at various venues around the UK and abroad, including the Concertgebouw Grote Zaal, Amsterdam, Cité de la Musique, Paris, Delft Chamber Music Festival, Royal Festival Hall, and Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival.

With duo partner Siwan Rhys he has performed at St John's Smith Square, Barbican Hall, the City of London Festival, XOYO, Scala and The Forge, among other venues. Committed to commissioning new music, the duo became New Dots artists in 2014; in 2017 they took part in the Stockhausen biennial at Kürten, performing Kontakte and solo works. The duo was selected to become one of three St John's Smith Square Young Artists for the 2017-18 season. Their programme for the season included the premiere of a 40-minute work from Oliver Leit and the UK premiere of Eric Wubbels' doxa, alongside music by Stockhausen, Kagel, Cage, Fran le Lohé and John Luther Adams, as well as unpublished music by Morton Feldman."

-George Barton Website (https://www.georgebartonpercussion.com/about)
3/13/2024

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


Track Listing:



1. Together On The Way 1:07:02

Related Categories of Interest:


Compositional Forms
Piano & Keyboards
Percussion & Drums
Recordings Utilizing the Natural Resonance of a Space
Ambient & Minimal Music
New in Compositional Music

Search for other titles on the label:
Another Timbre.


Recommended & Related Releases:
Parkinson, Tim / Apartment House
An Album
(Another Timbre)
Collecting five chamber works from prolific London-based composer Tim Parkinson, written between 1998 and 2017 and performed by the Apartment House ensemble: one piece for solo violin performed by Mira Benjamin, two duos for violin & piano (by Benjamin & Siwan Rhys), a quintet for winds and strings and a septet, both featuring flute and bass clarinet.
Parkinson, Tim / Apartment House
An Album
(Another Timbre)
Collecting five chamber works from prolific London-based composer Tim Parkinson, written between 1998 and 2017 and performed by the Apartment House ensemble: one piece for solo violin performed by Mira Benjamin, two duos for violin & piano (by Benjamin & Siwan Rhys), a quintet for winds and strings and a septet, both featuring flute and bass clarinet.
Houben / Rodrigues / Rodrigues / Santos
Falling into wide spaces
(Creative Sources)
Four improvisations recorded iteratively during the pandemic and assembled into this exquisitely subtle two-part composition with Eva Maria Houben's piano & organ recorded in Berlin in 2020, Guilherme Rodrigues's cello recorded in Berlin and Ernesto Rodrigues's zither recorded in Lisbon in 2021, merged with nocturnal recordings from Carlos Santos captured in Spain & Portugal.
Schlothauer, Burkhard
Harmonies And Structures
(Edition Wandelweiser Records)
When the Zeitkratzer Ensemble was asked to perform a late ensemble work by John Cage, director Reinhold Friedl turned to composer Burkhard Schlothauer, who reworked one of Cage's Number Pieces to create this rich piece using Cage's methods; plus a composition for the dance piece "Bewegte Bauhausbilder"; and an octet commissioned for the Klangzeit-Festival Time Is On My Side.
Houben / Rodrigues / Rodrigues
The Haecceity Of Things
(Creative Sources)
A mysterious album of viola, viola d'amore, organ, and field recordings, merging the compositional minimal approach of Wandelweiser artist Eva-Maria Houben with Creative Sources performers Ernesto & Guilherme Rodrigues, the field recordings creating a virtual setting of environmental stillness, evoking slow motion in the unique "thisness" of haecceity.
Houben, Eva-Maria
Voice With Harp
(Edition Wandelweiser Records)
Five works for harp and voice from composer Eva-Maria Houben and soprano Tatiana Kuzina, opening with a lovely "Aeolian Harp", and including two works from her "Voice and Piano" album recorded for harp--"Adagio" in 3 movements, and "Songs for the Island" in 5 movements--alongside "Hatid" and "Two Songs with Piano" in two movements.
Houben, Eva-Maria / Rebecca Lane / Sam Dunscombe
Observing Objects
(Edition Wandelweiser Records)
Composer Eva-Maria Houben in a collaborative work with bass flutist Rebecca Lane and bass clarinetist Samuel Dunscomb, the composer performing on piano and orgran, for two renderings of "Observing Objects", a patient work of long notes and tones interspersed with silence, lower registers in the winds balanced by the piano or organ's upper register.
Other Recommended Releases:
Houben, Eva-Maria
4 For Four
(Edition Wandelweiser Records)
A work for percussion in thirty-four succinct movements from German composer Eva-Maria Houben and performed by the Frantic Percussion Ensemble of Markus Behn, David Gutfleisch, Simon Gutfleisch, Gunnar Kötke and Jonathan Szegedi, each section using broad and patient spacing to highlight a fascinating mix of traditional and unusual percussive devices.
Ellestad, Mark
Discreet Angel
(Another Timbre)
Three chamber works by Calgary, Canadian composer Mark Ellestad composed between 1988 and 1994 and recently retrieved by the composer, including the title track, a graceful solo guitar work performed by Christián Alvear; a meditative piece for pump organ & Hardanger fiddle performed by the composer; and a large work for violin and cello performed by Apartment House.
Akama, Ryoko
Songs For A Shed
(Another Timbre)
Six beautiful, fragile and mysterious works for piano in combinations with other orchestral arrangements and solo, including pitch-based compositions and a graphic work directed by photographs, performed by members of Apartment House in duos, quintets & sextets; works initially commissioned by Another Timbre and Philip Thomas and here performed on piano by Siwan Rhys.
Houben, Eva-Maria
3 Trios
(Edition Wandelweiser Records)
"Trios" refers to the relationship of two keyboards and the pedals of an organ, as performed by accomplished American composer Carson Cooman as he patiently unfolds Eva-Maria Houben's three minimal compositions exploring the relationships between three melodic lines or three-tone chords, presented on the Organ Probsteikirche St. Ludgerus, in Billerbeck, Germany.
Feldman, Barbara Monk
Verses
(Another Timbre)
Known for her chamber and piano works, Canadian composer and widow of Morton Feldman presents five beautiful chamber works performed by the trio of George Barton on percussion, Siwan Rhys on piano and Mira Benjamin on violin, introspective and contemplative pieces of rich color & reflection that reveal the gravity between sound and silence.
Leith, Oliver
Me Hollywood
(Another Timbre)
Five chamber works written by composer UK Oliver Leith, the debut CD release from the creative music group Explore Ensemble including a piece they commissioned--Me Hollywood--, the compositions spanning four years of work and reflecting a sort of portrait of the composer as he experiments with unusual arrangements, sampling sounds, and new instruments.
Weeks, James
Summer
(Another Timbre)
Five chamber works from UK composer James Week performed by Explore Ensemble, developing works extending the poetic idea of a piece as an imaginary or remembered space by exploring combinations of instruments such as the mixed instrumental duos, the use of slow-moving or static background harmonics, and intimate instrumental idioms based on long, breath-length sounds.
Leith, Oliver / George Barton / Siwan Rhys
Good Day Good Day Bad Day Bad Day
(Another Timbre)
UK composer Oliver Leith presents a work in 8 movements for piano, keys and percussion performed by Siwan Rhys (keys) and George Barton, an invocation of everyday life through a personal and often idiosyncratic orchestration reflective of personal ritual & habits; our good and our irrational, often contradictory impetus, portrayed through quirky and embraceable episodes.
Grady, Kraig
Monument Of Diamonds
(Another Timbre)
Microtonal composer Kraig Grady in a work for specially adapted brass instruments (Kris Tiner, trumpets; Subhraag Singh-saxophones; Emmett Kim Narushima-trombones) and organ (Terumi Narushima) using a the Meta-Slendro tuning, an obscure 17-tone scale, to create an expansive and organic work assembled from recordings of each musician playing meditations on single notes.
Houben, Eva-Maria
Ensemble Works [2 CDS]
(Edition Wandelweiser Records)
Three detailed and fragile compositions from German minimalist composer Eva-Maria Houben reveal themselves over two CDs, performed by the Boston-based experimental music ensemble, Ensemble Ordinary Affects, with Houben herself on organ recording at Memorial Chapel, in Wesleyan University, CT: three movements from "echo fantasy"; "gesang XI"; and "unter anderen".
Smith, Linda Catlin
Wanderer
(Another Timbre)
Eight sophisticated chamber pieces composed by Linda Catlin Smith and realized by the Canadian Apartment House ensemble, including a solo piano performed by Philip Thomas, a piano duo with Thomas and Mark Knoop, and works for percussion & cello, 2 quintet pieces for strings, percussion and winds, and two 7-piece conducted works with two percussionists, strings and brass.
Houben, Eva-Maria
Voice With Piano
(Edition Wandelweiser Records)
Three compositions for voice and piano from German composer Eva-Maria Houben, also performing on piano with soprano vocalist Irene Kurka--"Adagio" in three pieces; "Lyri"; and "Lieder Fur Die Insel (Songs for the Island)--with texts from poet Felix Timmermans (adagio) and Hilde Domin (lyrik); beautiful, stark, haunting music that presents at its own pace.
Kurka, Irene
Chants
(Edition Wandelweiser Records)
Soprano vocalist Irene Kurka performs two works works by Antoine Beuger, and one each by Christopher Fox, Eva-Maria Houben, and Thomas Stiegler, accompanied by Antoine Beuger on flute for his composition "Chants de Passage"; 5 beautiful, unhurried works that bring the delicate beauty of each compositions, and of Kurka's refined voice, to a resonant foreground.



Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought:
Lely, John / Apartment House
Meander Selection
(Another Timbre)
A diverse set of compositions by London composer, performer and improviser John Lely performed by the UK ensemble Apartment House, demonstrating the spectrum of Lely's work across string quartets, solo piano works, a solo electronic piece, and a work for violin, two violas & cello; works of cohesive direction across a variety of approaches and interests.
Cage, John / Apartment House
Hymnkus / Thoreau Drawings / Two
(Another Timbre)
The UK avant ensemble Apartment House performs three of John Cage's later works: Two (1987), a number piece using randomly-determined time brackets specifying pitch & dynamic; Hymnkus for up to 14 instrumental parts each of 17 elements blending the concepts of a hymn and a haiku; and Thoreau Drawings, the score twenty unnumbered pages on which Cage drew shapes onto a grid of six systems, each divided into 5+7+5 parts, following the form of a haiku.
Cameron, Allison / Apartment House
Somatic Refrain
(Another Timbre)
A diverse set of compositions from Canadian composer Allison Cameron showing the breadth of her interests across experimental and compositional forms, including a solo multiphonic work for bass clarinet; a guitar trio with the Allison Cameron band of Cameron, Eric Chenaux & Stephen Parkinson; and Apartment House performing quintet and sextet compositions.
Reeder, Kory / Apartment House
Codex Vivere
(Another Timbre)
A beautifully unfolding story in connected works forming a codex from Texas composer and Wandelweiser artist Kory Reeder, a long form work performed by the UK Apartment House Ensemble in a septet of strings, winds and piano, each section creating a loose narrative ark through several notational strategies envisioned with characters, scenes, diversions, and digressions.
Riley, Terry played by John Tilbury
Keyboard Studies
(Another Timbre)
There is uncertainty of when pianist John Tilbury recorded these three solo keyboard works by his associate and friend, legendary minimalist composer Terry Riley, performing "Keyboard Study #1" and #2, along with "Dorian Reeds" using piano, electric organ, harpsichord & celesta, captured with excellent quality in superb performances from Tilbury at the height of his powers.
Clark, Katelyn / Isaiah Ceccarelli
Landmarks
(Another Timbre)
Eight powerful and often cinematic pieces for organ and percussion, jointly composed and performed by long-time collaborators, Montreal composers and improvisers Katelyn Clark and Isaiah Ceccarelli, these 8 compositions developed around improvisations on the historic instruments continuo & portative organs, with percussion including a 40" bass drum, bell plates, and almglocken.



The Squid's Ear Magazine

The Squid's Ear Magazine

© 2002-, Squidco LLC