Hudson Valley Events Vlog: [HvEXAS] new pogus

pogus
50 ayr road chester, ny 10918
fax 509 357 4319 l email pogal@pogus.com
www.pogus.com
www.myspace.com/pogusproductions
www.myspace.com/ifbwana

September 2008 Release

NOAH CRESHEVSKY / IF, BWANA
FAVORITE ENCORES
(Pogus 21049-2)
UPC: 760342104926

" ŠCreshevsky's music is cosmopolitan and streetwise post-modern
expressionŠI do not exaggerate when I say that I have never heard anything
like Creshevsky's music beforeŠIf you're up for an aural adventure, here's
your ticket." (Josh Mailman, American Record Guide)

"ŠIf, Bwana is some sort of evil genius working with raw materials which are
never adapted to a genre or a context, because they create one in that very
moment. Those sources are radically altered up to an utterly unrecognizable
state, anarchic manifestations moving in compact determination." (Massimo
Ricci, Touching Extremes)

A split cd of works by Noah Creshevsky (4 tracks) and If, Bwana (3 tracks).
While on the face of it this may seem a somewhat odd pairing, the pieces
recorded here comment on and highlight each other. And as the above quotes
suggest, an aural adventure is indeed in the offing.

Trained in composition by Nadia Boulanger in Paris and Luciano Berio at
Juilliard, Noah Creshevsky has taught at Juilliard, Princeton University,
and Brooklyn College. He was director of the Center for Computer Music
(1994-2000) and is currently Professor Emeritus at Brooklyn College of the
City University of New York. His musical vocabulary consists largely of
familiar bits of words, songs, and instrumental music that are edited but
rarely subjected to electronic processing. The result is a music that
obscures the boundaries of real and imaginary ensembles though the fusion of
opposites: music and noise, comprehensible and incomprehensible vocal
sources, human and superhuman vocal and instrumental capacities.
Creshevsky's most recent hyperrealist compositions explore the fragmentation
and reconstruction of pre-existing music in combination with original
synthetic and acoustic materials. Moments suggest musical environments of
indeterminate ethnicity--simultaneously Western and non-Western, ancient and
modern, familiar and unfamiliar.

Hyperrealism is an electroacoustic musical language constructed from sounds
that are recognizable parts of our shared environment ("realism"), handled
in ways that are exaggerated or excessive ("hyper"). Hyperrealist music
exists in two basic genres. The first uses the sounds of traditional
instruments that are pushed beyond the capacities of human performers in
order to create superperformers--hypothetical virtuosos who transcend the
limitations of individual performance capabilities (e.g., Mari Kimura Redux,
Intrada, Favorite Encores). Hyperrealism of the second genre aims to
integrate vast and diverse sonic elements to produce an expressive and
versatile musical language. Its vocabulary is an inclusive, limitless sonic
compendium, free of ethnic and national particularity (e.g., Shadow of a
Doubt). Hyperrealism celebrates bounty, either by the extravagant treatment
of limited sound palettes or by the assembling and manipulating of
substantially extended palettes.

Al Margolis has been working under the musical pseudonym If, Bwana since New
Year's Day 1984. There are often collaborators in this project‹both
knowingly and unknowingly. Both are represented on this recording. Xyloxings
was a concept-based work that in the end had the concept discarded for
compositional considerations. Lisa Barnard's vocals were recorded with her
direct knowledge. Scraping Scrafide uses a portion of Tony Scafide's piano
part from a prior work of mine‹3 Out of 4 Ain't Bad‹and processes it. Cicada
#4: Barnard Mix is part of my "discipline" series‹an open set of works‹and
uses Barnard's vocals from other sessions to create one of many possible
versions of this work.