Ketil Bjornstad and David Darling - The River (1997)

This is a splendid ECM album recorded as a side project, during the sessions of The Sea, the quartet album of Ketil Bjornstad (with Terje Rypdal, Jon Christensen and David Darling).

In the 12 tracks of this album, we can listen to a very inspired dialogue of Bjornstad's piano and Darling's unique cello sound. One of the starting point of these sessions was William Byrd's and Orlando's Gibbon's melodic invention, translated into a modern idiom. Improvisation and unexpected creative moments offered the materials for the other tracks.

Chamber music, experiments in harmonic ambient music, exploration of all the creative possibilities between two gifted musicians, research in the blending of sounds and climates...

The River is an emblematic recording (among hundred of others) of what ECM is about... Intimate, deep, conceptual and emotional at the same time, crossing all the borders, creating its own place, its own identity at the crossroads of so many roads...

Ambient music at its best, music to swim through, if you love to dive into deep sound...

Link / mp3 320

KBDD.zip

password: olduvai

Alexander Knaifel - Svete Tikhiy (2002)

This is a splendid album released on ECM New Series: where else could one find such an ethereal music, slow and minimalist, ambient and lightly experimental at the same time ? "Svete Tikhiy" means in Russian "O Gladsome Light": it is one of the three oldest Christian hymns included in the Russian Orthodox Vespers. It provides the album with its title but defines also its general mood, spiritual, introspective, contemplative.

A first piece, "In Air Clear and Unseen" is played he Keller Quartett and Oleg Malov (piano).

Then, the Russian soprano Tatiana Melentieva sings "the Song of the Most Holy Theotokos" (Svete Tikhiy) and her voice is treated by a digital  sampler (Andrei Siegle) in order to create beautiful choral patterns.

This beautiful album is a masterpiece, and it is very difficult to compare it with anything else.

One could say, as a rough definition, that it might be located at the crossroad of Brian Eno and Arvo Pärt...

link: mp3 / 320

AK-ST.zip

password: olduvai

Terje Rypdal - Waves (1978)

Electronic soundscapes of ARP Synthesizer,  RMI Keyboard Computer,  Tac Piano and Ring Modulator; melodic lines of the trumpet and fluegelhorn of Palle Mikkelborg; the drums of Jon Christensen; the 6 & 4 string electric basses of Sveinung Hovensjo... and the space guitar of Terje Rypdal, between fire and ice, earth and sky, rock and jazz, atmospheres and melodies....

Waves is another landmark in the history of ECM and in the musical journey of Terje Rypdal. 

The shades and haze of the Northern landscapes are illuminated by the music of this quartet, ambient jazz with a light electronic touch, where vintage instruments add their unique colours to this beautifully produced album (Manfred Eicher producer, Jan Erik Kongshaug engineer).

Splendid and nostalgic...

link: mp3 / 320

TRWv.zip

password: olduvai

Jan Garbarek - Visible World (1996)

Jan Garbarek is obviously one of the artists who contributed to define ECM sound and unique aesthetics. His discography is a part of the history of European jazz and new music and it follows a free and creative path, between solo and band projects, and through many adventurous collaborations, with the Hilliard Ensemble or with Keith Jarrett to name but a few...

Visible World is a splendid CD and it is impossible to categorize it... Jazz and ambient, contemporary and world music, avant-garde and tradition... 

Jan Garbarek plays soprano and tenor saxophones on all the pieces, indeed, but also electronic keyboard and additional percussion on some and Meraaker clarinet one one. He is accompanied by other ECM stars, such as Marilyn Mazur (percussion, drums, shakers), Manu Katché (drums), Eberhard Weber and his unique bass sound, Rainer Brüninghaus (piano), Trilok Gurtu (tabla and spiral), Mari Boine (vocal on one track).

This music blends grooves and atmospheres, it is lyrical and intimate at the same times, it is very inspired and produced with a lot of subtlety (Manfred Eicher, who else ?, produced this album).

Inspired by traditions of the Chiricahua Apache traditions, commissioned for movies soundtracks, ballets or music videos, the 15 tracks of Visible World explore new islands in the archipelago of new instrumental musics... 

It is the perfect soundtrack for all your inner movies...

link: mp3 / 320

JGVW1.zip

JGVW2.zip

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Paul Bley - Fragments (ECM, 1986)

Paul Bley is among my all times favorite jazz pianists. I just love the moods and atmospheres he creates, his lyrical and poetical playing, the way he is playing with silence, a unique musical creativity that makes all his recordings unique, either as a solo artist or within a trio or a quartet.

As an introduction to Paul Bley's musical universe, I chose this gorgeous ECM historical recording, featuring some of the finest ECM artists: John Surman (Soprano and Baritone Saxophones, Bass Clarinet), Bill Frisell (guitar), Paul Motian (drums). 

Is it still or is it only jazz ? Musical categories are not relevant here, as it happens frequently with ECM releases... 

Pure magy of studio sessions, under the inspired direction of Manfred Eicher... "Etats de grâce", where musicians can understand each other and play together without exchanging words, just following the path, listening to the sound, writing music while they play it.

Fragments of pure beauty, of deep feeling, of such an ambient soundscape that this recording does not seem to be more than 20 years old...

Did I say it already ?

ECM is my favorite record company... ECM music makes my daily soundscape for almost thirty years...

Since a long time, I wonder how I could tell Manfred Eicher and his artists how much their music matters for me...

Perhaps introducing a few of you to ECM could be an answer...

link: mp3 / 320

Fragments1.zip

Fragments2.zip

password: olduvai

Terje Rypdal - Descendre (1980)

"Descendre", that is "going down", "cooling down", "chilling out".  The title of this album sets the mood for the listener: atmospheric music for the free flight of thoughts, feelings and memories...

Terje Rypdal (b. 1947) is a Norwegian guitarist and composer and is an icon, among others, of ECM, the innovative record company of Manfred Eicher. Terje Rypdal appears on ECM records since 1970 !

Descendre is a splendid album of ambient and floating music, for guitar and keyboards (Terje Rypdal), for trumpet and flugelhorn (Palle Mikkelborg and his unique sound and feeling) and for subtle drums and percussions (Jon Christensen, who is an emblematic ECM drummer). Intimate mood of a trio of chamber music, slow jazzy groove, aerial guitar, dialogue of the guitar with the trumpet, ghostly organ and string ensemble in the background: this music evokes landscapes of Norway, cold seas and white mountains, and a crepuscular light, after sunset or before sunrise...

The beauty and the mood of this album are intemporal...

Link: mp3 / 320

TRDesc.zip

password: olduvai

J.S. Bach, Fuga a 6 voci / Cantata n°4 (Christ lag in Todesbanden" (ECM / 2003)

ECM is my favorite label. Either their jazz series or their Contemporary and classical series are pure masterpieces, with a very high standard of sound quality, musical production and artistic innovation. ECM is "the best next sound to silence", as Manfred Eicher, ECM founder and main producer, used to say.

I will probably not post whole ECM albums in this blog, but rather selected tracks that could be considered as an introduction to ECM aesthetics.  It will be like a personal compilation, in order to share with you some of the most beautiful atmospheric music produced by a record company since 1969 ! 

I would be very happy if even a very few visitors of my blog could be introduced to ECM and buy their CDs, as a way to support a truly independent and innovative record company....

To begin with, I chose some tracks from Ricercar, offering pieces by Johann Sebastian Bach and Anton Weber, played by the Münchener Kammerorchester (directed by Christoph Poppen) and The Hilliard Ensemble.

The first track is Bach's Fuga (Ricercata) a 6 voci, as orchestrated by Anton Weber. 

The six following tracks are  the Cantata N°4 "Christ lag in Todesbanden" BWV 4. The interpretation of this Cantata is sublime, so expressive and deep, with truly celestial voices. The Cantata was recorded in a München's church.

Other tracks of Ricercar (not posted here) include Anton Weber's String Quartet (1905) and Five Movementd for String Quartet op. 5. 

The contrast between Bach and Weber makes this ECM album very special and unique: it is available on the Itunes Store...

Link: mp3 / 320

JSB.zip

password: olduvai