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About Basso Profundo
Review In the new release by Buell Neidlinger, we experience the thrill of hearing some of the most progressive and virtuosic chamber music performances of the 20th century. The CD is a collection of previously unreleased material recorded between 1964 and 1976. The pieces are thorny, compelling, surprising, and masterfully executed. The disc features six compositions: rare gems of modern music from composers Bussotti, Ceely, and Kagel. In addition, we find two seldom heard masterworks: Bass Concerto Chamber Music 4 by Leonard Rosenman, and Morsima-Amorsima by Iannis Xenakis. Rosenman is best known for his pioneering film scores of the 1950s: Rebel Without a Cause and East of Eden. He also was a student of Schoenberg, Sessions, and Dallapiccola. His modernist slant is on display in his Bass Concerto Chamber Music 4, scored for four string quartets, amplified solo bass, and tutti bass. The piece uses microtones in a wonderfully musical way. In his notes for the piece, Rosenman describes: the microtonal aspects, utilizing sixth, third, and quarter tones in addition to traditional harmonic devices are not ordered, or serialized in any overall scheme. Rather, they constitute an enhancement of musically expressive resources by use of intonation and timbre. Rosenman uses plenty of traditional sounds along with his experimentation. The piece begins and ends with a triad A-flat minor at the opening and a defiant G major on the final chord and features several unison cadences. Xenakis is a name that is well known to any aficionado of 20th century music. In Morsima-Amorsima, he uses a computer algorithm (amazing for 1962!) along with Probability Theory to construct the piece. Xenakis wrote of the work: Today the calculus of probabilities, the theory of large numbers, together with the problems of choice, of causality, of determinism, connect and clarify the ancient idea of Fate. The disc features helpful and informative liner notes written by Mr. Neidlinger. Thanks to Buell Neidlinger for releasing these historic and fascinating recordings. The bass world is expanded. --Mark Urness - International Society of Bassists ISB Magazine Boy, this takes me back! Remember the 1960s, when music was totally exploratory and dissonant? Well, this is a relatively amusing way of experiencing that period with a double bass player who was there. These works were all recorded in the 60s and 70s under varied circumstances, from rehearsal to concert, and in different places, from Buffalo to Los Angeles. Half of the fun is following Neidlinger's liner notes through the forest of sounds. We are reminded of people we may have forgotten, like Robert Ceely, whose two short pieces run the gamut between consonance and dissonance, and Leonard Rosenman, whose work blends four string quartets, held together by two double basses (don't ask how). Then there are composers of wider fame. Sylvano Bussotti writes a piece for double bass with viola squeaks in the background, Iannis Xenakis puts his together by computer, and Mauricio Kagel ends his with a general discussion by the players of what they are playing. The music, though mainly abstract, is not hard to listen to and not as threatening to the psyche and the ears as I remember from names like Xenakis, Bussotti, and Kagel. I guess in those days it seemed as if music was in danger of going permanently mad, whereas now it merely seems to be going permanently to sleep. No, that's not fair there's more stylistic variety today. Then it seemed that if you wanted fame, you had to be abstract, or at least atonal. It took real guts on the part of composers like George Rochberg to start writing romantic music again. This program may not appeal to everyone, but it is a relatively human introduction to a particular period of the 20th Century that is not much heard today. The playing is good, and you'll hear musicians that you'll recognize, even if you never heard them play like this before. --D. Moore - American Record Guide
