The Squid's Ear Magazine


Sguera, Luca: Piano, Exploded (Shhpuma)

Performing on both piano and bass drum, Italian improviser & composer Luca Sguera presents six works based around the physical sounds of the piano, traditional acoustic piano progressions and rhythmic arrangements fitting the development of each piece's sound, as much sound art as piano composition through sophisticated hybrids of acoustic and sonic environments.
 

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Personnel:



Luca Sguera-piano, bass drum


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UPC: 5609063800791

Label: Shhpuma
Catalog ID: SHH079CD
Squidco Product Code: 33153

Format: CD
Condition: New
Released: 2023
Country: Portugal
Packaging: Cardboard Gatefold
Tracks 1 - 6 recorded at RMC in Copenhagen, Denmark, on July 7th - 19th, 2020, by Luca Sguera.

Track 6 recorded in Colle val d'Elsa,Italy, on September 7th, 2022, by Francesco Toninelli.

Descriptions, Reviews, &c.

"Piano, Exploded is a different solo piano record, unique in its kind. Starting from simple and clear compositional ideas and limiting its materials on sounds coming from the piano, it portrays five sound sculptures built on ambient acoustic drones, living pulses, harmonic cascades and microscopic sounds. A rhythmic arrangement of the material, sometimes very loose and subtle, sometimes more evident and pushed up to hyperactive grooves, underlies the whole work."-Shhpuma



"Two years after the release of the collaborative album CTB, Few Hypotheses much appreciated by the press, Luca Sguera is back with a solo piano work, one of a kind.

Published on February 16, 2023 via Shhpuma, Piano, Exploded mastered by Giuseppe Ielasi, is presented as a collection of six songs based on the sounds of the piano developed starting from simple and clear compositional ideas.

Piano and bass drum are used in their entirety, making full use of their materials and the possibility of making them play as a rhythmic part of the songs, sometimes making the tinklings more evident, others disguising them in the harmonic textures of the tracks.

Environmental acoustic drones, vivid pulsations, harmonic cascades and sound variations move between minimalism and avant-garde, modeling minimal design compositions.

Counterpoints, scattered percussion and plucked strings condense in the first track Polpo, a concentration of concrete music and free pianisms. The piece presents itself as a flow in different directions accompanied by a variable intensity created with a great expressive intensity. In Calcio the sound is decomposed obtaining a reverberated atmospheric drone on which rests the delicate and crystalline melody of the piano punctuated by the material tolling of wood. In the second part of the track, a resonant pattern is triggered which collides with the soft sounds of the piano, generating an interesting game of contrasts.

Iso is a short movement made from plucked strings and jingles transformed into a hypnotic electronic pattern. One of the most captivating moments of the disc, full of micro-variations, which grow until they flow into an organized chaos of repeated sounds.

In closing Il resto as always is a cascade of hypnotic harmonies, layers upon layers of piano lines on which the notes placed as a counterpoint highlight the grandeur of the instrument.

Luca Sguera passed with full marks: Piano, exploded is an irreproachable work, a listen to which to abandon oneself completely."-Mario Ariano, Radioaktiv (translated by Google)


Get additional information at RadioAktiv

Artist Biographies

" (1992, Milan, Italy) is a piano player, composer and improviser.Besides improvisation he investigates composition as layering of signs and meanings, through a practice in which rhythm and timbre play a main role. He is active in several projects (AKA, She's Analog) with which he released records (Aut, Auand) and performed in festivals and clubs among Italy and Europe."

-Discogs (https://www.discogs.com/artist/6422954-Luca-Sguera)
3/27/2024

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


Track Listing:



1. Polpo 3:34

2. Calcio 8:01

3. Ruggine 7:07

4. Iso 3:22

5. Closet 7:54

6. Il Resto Come Sempre 9:08

Related Categories of Interest:


Improvised Music
Free Improvisation
Electro-Acoustic
Organized Sound and Sample Based Music
European Improvisation, Composition and Experimental Forms
Piano & Keyboards
Organized Sound and Sample Based Music
Solo Artist Recordings
New in Experimental & Electronic Music

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