Richard Carrick: lanterne

American Richard Carrick’s phenomenal artistic abilities, including composer, pianist, artistic director and educator, are showcased in his sparsely orchestrated compositions.

Title track laterne, for solo bass flute, performed by Margaret Lancaster, is an exciting listen, with breath and voice vocalizations, booming sounds, repeated rhythms and held notes driving the intense climax and the final faster fade with closing yelp. Carrick joins her on piano in une, a short and sweet roughly one-minute musical delight! Carrick performs with bass clarinettist Vasko Dukovski in the Korean vocal-music-influenced Sarang Ga. A quiet start leads to abrupt low piano chords and wide-ranging bass clarinet accents, melodies with dramatic squeaks, and a very modern tonality “echo” ending. Three works draw on the traditional Korean Gugak music. Highlight is the unique ensemble colours that surface in sandstone(s), as Western (New York New Music Ensemble) and Korean traditional instruments (Musicians of the Gugak Contemporary Orchestra) perform together.

The four-movement Space:Time – String Quartet # 2, performed by the Mivos Quartet, is musical space travel. Movement I, Claustrophobia, recreates spaceship solitude, with high-pitched, almost painful tight dissonances, accents at the end of ascending lines and tension-breaking brief use of lower lines. Low pulling down grounding tones and floating high counterpoint drive the storytelling in movement II, Gravity.

Four additional works and other great performers complete this Carrick collection of beautiful intimate sounds to appreciate even in pandemic isolation!

— Tiina Kiik, 2.06.2021

Composer Richard Carrick studied in the US with Brian Ferneyhough (New Complexity) and further studies at IRCAM in Paris and the Koninklijk Conservatorium in The Hague. He has taught in many countries and nowadays, he teaches at the Berklee College of Music, combined with his activity as a composer, conductor and pianist. His work as a composer appeared so far on New Focus Recordings and New World Records with albums that feature ensemble Either/OR (‘The Flow Cycle for String’) and musicians from the New York Philharmonic (‘Cycles of Evolution’) as performers. Also, he has a solo guitar album out: ‘Stone Guitars’. He is co-founder of the Either/Of Ensemble with whom he recorded a program of works by Romanian composer Iancu Dumitrescu about five years ago. On his new release ‘Laterne’ Carrick presents eleven of his compositions, short and some ultra-short works for very different instrumentations. But they differ also in other aspects. The opening work ‘La touche sonore sous l’eau’ for solo piano – played by Marilyn Nonken – reminded me most of all compositions of a time past: early 20th-century classical music from France. Other compositions are linked with other places and cultures. This counts for the miniature work.

‘Sanga’, featuring John Popham on the cello and Carrick on piano. And also for ‘Seongeum’ for solo violin that has Korean connotations, inspired on Pansori vocal gestures and is vibrantly performed by Lauren Cauley. ‘Une’ is an example of the ultra-short compositions found on this CD; a short duet for flute and piano, performed by Margaret Lancaster and Carrick himself, closely chasing another in a melodic setting. The title track ‘Lanterne’ is for flute performed by Margaret Lancaster and is an intimate piece that stays in the lower regions and is accompanied by vocal expressions by Lancaster. Carrick is also inspired by literature: ‘La Scéne Miniature’ for flute, piano, bass clarinet and cello, performed by ensemble Either/Or, is inspired on a murder scene from the novel ‘The Stranger’ by Albert Camus. Overviewing all the compositions, this release gives an excellent opportunity to discover the diverse chamber music of Carrick. The dedicated musicians perform the works with energy and intensity, which makes this an inviting release to become acquainted with the musical world of the composer.

— Dolf Mulder, 3.09.2021

Right from the first piece, the piano La touche sonore sous l’eau (2015), it is clear that there is an emphasis on beauty here. Definitely Modernist at heart but with, perhaps as the French title indicates, a bent towards Impressionism, this piece represents Richard Carrick’s response to Debussy’s ground-breaking Jeux (after a period of intense study of that work). Layering is part of Carrick’s vocabulary here; it is actually the first movement of a projected suite to be entitled la touche sonore. (I have retained the lower-case initial letter, as that is how the score is listed; the New Focus recording gives a capital.) It’s good to hear it performed with such authority by Marilyn Nonken, who commissioned the work, and who also premiered it in January 2016 at the University of Pennsylvania.

The title Phosphéne (2001) refers to a phenomenon in which light is perceived without any light entering the retina: as Carrick says, “one might say it is a biological trompe l’oeil.” There is a version of the piece with video; the idea is to imply the experiences of seeing “moving red colors when facing the sun with closed eyes.” The performers here, String Noise (Conrad Harris and Pauline Kim, violins), absolutely make the most of the gestural nature of this piece in a performance of supreme confidence; the fairly close recording aids the visceral nature of the sonic imagery. Again for two violins, Natural Duo (2017) is based on the percussion piece Natural Behavior for solo percussion (1998); the atmosphere is lighter as each instrumentalist cuts into the flow of the other: chamber music sparring, perhaps.

Returning to the elusive side of Carrick, une for flute and piano (2011) takes a single melody (hence the singularity of the title) and presents it with a series of musical “obstacles.” Carrick has stated he wants the flute and piano to sound as one “meta-instrument.” That’s no small request, but Margaret Lancaster and Carrick himself succeed in no small measure. Playing now on bass flute, Lancaster offers a fabulous reading of the piece that gives the album its title, lanterne (2018; Lancaster herself premiered it in NYC in March of that year). The piece is underpinned by a quote from French poet René Char: “L’impossible, nous ne l’atteignons pas, mais il nous sert de lanterne” (“We do not reach the impossible, but it serves as a lantern”; my translation, offered with apologies). The core qualities of the bass flute—its mystery, its mellowness, and its effectiveness with breathy sounds—are all capitalized upon by Carrick. Lancaster offers a more than virtuoso performance, by which I mean that while one marvels at her playing, it is the atmosphere that is all-enveloping.

“Pansori” is a type of Korean musical storytelling. Based on a spectral reinterpretation of the Pansori melody Sarang Ga, the piece of that name is scored for bass clarinet and piano and was premiered by the present performer, Vasko Dukovski, in January 2019 at Miller Theater, NYC. The title refers to a South Korean type of musical storytelling by singer and drummer; here, the “voice” is the bass clarinet. Dukovski’s playing brings the piece to life, and his control at lower dynamic levels is remarkable—and how that contrasts with the grungy passages. This is a particularly exciting piece; one is soothed thereafter by the softer sounds of La seine miniature for ensemble. Here the literary catalyst was a scene in Albert Camus’s L’étranger in which the character Muersault’s impulsive action results in a sequence of unforeseen consequences. As the work is an imagined opera scene translated into an instrumental idiom, one wonders if there is a parallel to be made with Henze’s imaginary theater works. Decidedly gestural, Carrick’s graphic depictions of the struggle of the human spirit make for quite a ride.

Another piece that seems to prefer a lower-case opening, danga (2017, premiered that year in Fontainebleau, France) again takes us to South Korea: the end of the first measure in the cello part is indicated as “vibrato molto with Pansori style.” “danga” is the Korean word for a short warm-up song often used before Pansori. Carrick’s composition is short; its end leaves us hanging, with the space being filled by Seongeum (2015) for solo violin. Lauren Cauley is a simply superb interpreter, ever engaged with the discourse (and, indeed, with the frenzied dance-like sections).

The coexistence of traditional Korean music and Carrick’s Modernist expressive vocabulary culminates in sandstone(s) (2017) for flute violin, cello, haegeum (Korean fiddle), 12-string gayageum (Korean plucked zither), and eight-string ajaeng (another Korean zither-type instrument, but with strings of twisted silk). It was premiered by the current performers in October 2017. The title refers to a duality between sandstone (the rock) and sandstones (sand in the shape of stones one might make on the beach, and therefore much more temporary in nature). Dualities therefore lie at the heart of this piece, where the ancient Korean instruments meet our modern Western ones; similarly, melodies may be embellished in either traditional Korean or in Western ways. It is a fascinating score, not least because of how it plays with our expectations as listeners: The Korean instruments have encoded within their very sound an oriental quality that pulls us in one direction, while the Western instruments pull us back towards our rituals of the concert hall.

The quarter-hour String Quartet No. 2, Space:Time (2015) also exists in a version for electric guitar and string quartet (2018). It is performed here by the same ensemble, the Mivos Quartet, that premiered it in 2015 in NYC. In it, Carrick explores space travel (which is actually the title of the third movement). The four movements move from “Claustrophobia” through “Gravity” and “Space Travel” before ending with a “Coda into the Light.” The first movement concentrates on the stratosphere (in registral as well as symbolic terms); a more pointillistic aspect suffuses “Gravity” (brilliantly captured by the Mivos Quartet) before the palindromic “Space Travel” accelerates then decelerates, rising naturally to a climax and back again, dominated by a “keening” gesture. The last movement is designated as a “Coda” and pays homage to the music of Horațiu Rădulescu, gently expressive, before heading to a climax of complete chaos.

This is one time where tracing a composer’s formative influences is not particularly helpful. The two names that crop up are Mario Davidovsky and Brian Ferneyhough, but Carrick’s mature voice is a long way from either. The chamber music of Richard Carrick could hardly be better represented; all in excellently judged sonics, too. Recommended.

— Colin Clarke, 1.25.2021

French-born composer, conductor, and pianist Richard Carrick has had exposure in these pages on several prior occasions, receiving generally positive reviews. Art Lange in 35:3 gives some biographical details, so I won’t rehash those here. Carrick’s bio in the CD in hand states, “Richard Carrick … writes music of spatial depth and robust stasis, characterized by the evocation of profound human experiences.” I confess this didn’t really give me much of an idea of what to expect when I put this disc into my player, so I’m happy to report that he is indeed a composer with something important to say. The 11 works contained here are mostly rather brief (three of them are under two minutes in duration), although the closing four-movement String Quartet No. 2 is fairly substantial, running to about 16 minutes.

Marilyn Nonken, well-known as a pianist specializing in new music, opens the concert with La touche sonore sous l’eau. Given my extremely limited knowledge of French, I mentally translated this as “the sonorous underwater touch,” but Google translation yields, “the sound touch underwater.” I’d trust Google instead of me, if I were you, not that the exact translation of the title will affect your enjoyment of the piece one way or the other. It opens with a lot of filigree in the upper register of the keyboard, creating a rather scintillating atonal effect which I found quite mesmerizing. The airy figuration is frequently interrupted with dissonant and very effective chords, equally atonal and mostly down an octave or two. There is absolutely no metrical pulse in this work, and I wonder if it even employs bar lines. With the very minimal program notes and lacking access to a score, there is no way I can ascertain that. The work sounds devilishly tricky to play, but Nonken knocks it off with seeming ease.

For some equally unknown reason, Phosphène, a two-minute work for solo violin, lists no performer. Perhaps it is Lauren Cauley (who performs Seongeum later on), but that’s merely a guess. Whoever is playing is one impressive violinist. There are about three times the number of notes in this brief work as there are in any similar span of the Bartók Violin Concerto No. 2. Some of it even sounds impossible to play by just one player, but apparently there is only one person involved here. The notes state that the piece contains a “biological optical illusion,” but whatever that is in relationship to what I hear, I haven’t the faintest idea. I commend the composer for not just writing difficult music for the sake of difficulty, however: the piece has logic and direction and persuasively carries the listener along.

Natural Duo played by a duo named String Noise consists largely of a descending glissando and sequence of notes in one violin “accompanied” by pressure scratches in the lower register of the other. Whatever point the composer was trying to make is made succinctly. Another miniature is une, a duo for flute and piano. In its brevity, a unison line in the two instruments gradually diverges in interesting fashion. This one could have gone on a good bit longer, as it ended just as I was getting into it.

Much longer is the seven-minute lanterne, a solo for bass flute playing extended sequences of short repeated tones where the soloist is frequently instructed to overblow to produce harmonics. In a couple spots, flutist Margaret Lancaster seems to be gasping for breath, but I imagine that’s written into the score, as are other kinds of vocalizations. I’m pretty sure that you will have never heard any work quite like this one (a comment that could be applied to most of the other works on this disc as well). Contrary to my comment about the previous work, I think this one could be trimmed a bit to good effect. Or, perhaps I should say it is a bit overblown….

Sarang Ga begins with some very flute-like sounds that are actually performed on a bass clarinet if the tray card can be believed—and it does eventually become apparent that indeed it is this instrument. The piano part, played by Carrick himself, only is heard about three minutes into the work. Prior to that, the gradually descending solo line twists and turns in a fashion redolent of lines found in Middle Eastern music. Just before the four-minute mark, the piece takes a decided turn to rhythmic complexity, and a driving pulse comes to the fore. The cleverly constructed work, full of interesting non-standard techniques, is one of my favorites in the program, and its nine-minute length seems just right.

La scène miniature was written for the Either/Or ensemble that Carrick founded and conducts. The opening is reminiscent of that of une, a contemporary updating of the medieval practice of heterophony in which a basic unison line played by more than one instrument diverges here and there from the unison line. As in the previous works, there are unearthly sounds emitted by the ensemble. The piece is based upon a scene from l’étranger (The Stranger) by Albert Camus in which some impulsive action produces unforeseen consequences. Carrick’s work here is certainly anything but predictable, and I found it quite fascinating. Danga for cello and piano takes a more tonal approach, as it is based on the concept of Pansori, a Korean storytelling with music. In its brief duration of just over a minute one hears many Korean-sounding inflections in the cello line.

I also hear these in Seongeum, a six-minute work for solo violin, to the point that it took a few seconds to realize that a new work had begun. Learning the advanced techniques to bring off these glissandos of varying speeds must have taken some time, but violinist Lauren Cauley performs them with compelling assurance. In sandstone(s), the listener also hears the hybridization process Carrick has been using with Korean music, accomplished through the work’s skillful integration of Korean and Western instruments. His imagination is also particularly fertile in this work, making it another highlight on the disc for me.

The concert concludes with his Space:Time – String Quartet #2. Its four movements are given the intriguing titles of “Claustrophobia” (an eerie movement replete with high-pitched fear-inducing sounds), “Gravity” (indeed, a weightier movement full of musical “tugs”), “Space Travel” (another eerie movement with ghostly sounds), and the restless and unearthly “Coda – ‘into the light’.” The quartet is performed in splendid fashion by the Minos Quartet, for whom the technical challenges of the piece pose no problems.

This well-performed and -recorded disc is definitely oriented to the adventurous, those for whom the advanced techniques and sonorities it contains are welcome. If you’re in that select group, check this CD out as it ought to bring you as much enjoyment as it did me.

— David DeBoor Canfield, 5.28.2021

Inspired by the claustrophobic settings that Covid quarantining has given us, the progressive classical composer rounds up a bunch of like minded players to give airing to his latest works. A perfect Sunday afternoon wine and cheese recital recording, live it up and slice up some Wemslydale and quaff something better than Maddog to let the vibes properly flow on this mind expanding trip.

— Chris Spector

If all the composers on the Rossi/Cheng disc draw inspiration, one way or another, from Chile, another New Focus Recordings CD works in the opposite way, with a single composer pulling inspiration from multiple sources and using a wide variety of instruments to communicate his explorations. There is no doubting the cleverness of Richard Carrick’s chamber works on this disc, but being clever does not equate to being communicative: a lot of the music is of the “look how interesting this is” variety, calling attention to itself through approach or instrumental combination but not offering enough substantive content (in emotional or pure-musical terms) to repay multiple hearings. La touche sonore sous l’eau for piano is vaguely French Impressionistic in sound. The violin duos Phosphène and Natural Duo focus on ascending and descending glissandos, respectively – Carrick is fond of glissandos – and are repetitive enough to seem drawn-out even though each lasts only two minutes. At that, they are longer than une, which juxtaposes flute and piano and, of course, lasts one minute. The flute solo lanterne is seven times that length but wears out its welcome rather early, since again it is largely driven by repetition. Sarang Ga, for bass clarinet and piano, is conceptually more interesting, using various Korean influences in a progression from the woodwind’s higher reaches to its lower ones. It has an “experimental” feel to it, as if Carrick is trying to see what he can do with this sort of material using instruments of this type – without paying any particular attention to whether the piece conveys anything meaningful to listeners. La Scène Miniature is a more interesting instrumental blend, using flute, piano, bass clarinet, and cello. It is supposedly inspired by Camus’ The Stranger, but does not seem to be trying to extract anything in particular from that work. Then there is more Korean influence in three pieces for various players: the very short Danga for cello and piano, the much more extended Seongeum for solo violin, and the oddly titled but very interestingly scored sandstone(s) for an ensemble that includes both Western and Korean instruments and mixes them in some intriguing ways and to good effect. This is the most distinctive work on the disc and the one in which Carrick appears to show the greatest interest in audience communication, since he is at pains to blend and contrast the different instruments and their distinctive sounds in ways that will make listeners think about, and feel, the very dissimilar but equally expressive nature of Western and Eastern musical thinking. The final work on the disc is quite conventional in instrumentation. It is Space:Time – String Quartet No. 2, for the usual four string players. But the music once again delves into experimentation that is likely of interest to the performers, at the expense of producing audience involvement. The movements are called “Claustrophobia,” “Gravity,” “Space Travel,” and “Coda – ‘into the light,’” and each offers its own form of compositional cleverness: lots of Carrick’s favored glissandi in the first, counterpoint at various registers in the second, a palindrome in the third, and slow motion beneath swelling sounds in the fourth. Listeners who bother to discover, before hearing the quartet, what Carrick is intending to do, will find it far more interesting than those who simply want to listen to it as music. In fact, that is the case for much of the material here.

— Mark Estren, 10.01.2020