Annea Lockwood
(Copyright © 1999 Piero Scaruffi | Legal restrictions - Termini d'uso )
The Glass World (Tangent, 1970) **
A Sound map Of The Hudson River (Lovely, 1990) ***
Thousand Year Dreaming (What Next, 1993) ***
Sinopah (XI, 1998)
Breaking the Surface (Lovely Music, 1999)
Thousand Year Dreaming/ Floating World (2007), 7/10
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Sound sculptor Annea Lockwood, born in New Zealand (1939) but relocated to New York (1973), began to explore natural sounds with her Glass Concerts (1966-1972), as documented on The Glass World (Tangent, 1970).

A Sound map Of The Hudson River (Lovely, 1990), una composizione del 1982, è una registrazione documentaria dei suoni naturali e delle voci umane che si incontrano lungo il fiume Hudson.

Thousand Year Dreaming (composta nel 1991) è una suite per conchiglie conciate, didjeridu, corno inglese, oboe, clarinetto, trombone, voce e percussioni in cui gli strumenti sono suonati al minimo volume e fra frequenti pause. L'esotismo dei timbri e della sceneggiature ricorda quello di Steve Roach, ma molto più dimesso. Fra gli esecutori si contano Jon Gibson, Peter Zummo e Charles Wood.

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Sinopah (XI, 1998), a split album with Ruth Anderson, contains Lockwood's 46-minute World Rhythms (1975), a live improvisation that broadcasts natural sounds, from volcanic eruptions to earthquakes to geysers to bonfires to waves to human breathing. The continuum thus spans the dimensions of the human experience.
The album also contains Ruth Anderson's 23-minute Come Out Of Your Sleep (1997).

Breaking the Surface (Lovely Music, 1999) contains Duende and Delta Run.

Lockwood has also composed Shapeshifter (1996), microtonal concerto Western Spaces, Tongues Of Fire Tongues of Silk for eight sopranos and percussion.

Early Works 1967-82 (EM Records, 2007) contains the LP The Glass World (Tangent, 1970) and the 19-minute Tiger Balm (1970).

Thousand Year Dreaming/ Floating World (Pogus, 2007) collects the 35-minute electroacoustic piece Floating World (1999), created in studio from "spiritual" field recordings by her friends, and the 43-minute four-movement suite Thousand Year Dreaming (1991) for conch shell, trombone, multiple didjeridus, oboe, English horn, vocals (Annea Lockwood herself), clarinet and percussion, her sublime exercise in slo-motion subliminal glissandi and microtones bordering on both post-classical chamber music and creative jazz music. The languid and funereal timbres of trombones and didjeridoos sound like coyotes barking at the moon in the first movement. The wailing horns permeate the second movement at a volume that is barely audible, their black and white tapestry wrapped onto itself like a Moebius strip. The third movement increases the sense of musical alienation by staging a subdued melodic line in a swamp of fluttering patterns. The fourth movement continues to evolve the mono-dimensional tapestry with the clarinet's Stravinsky-ian motif, the didjeridoo's massive raga-like vibrations, the trombone's controlled deflagrations. The piece closes with a few anguished notes by the clarinet after a cryptic burst of polyphony.

Floating World (1999) belongs to a different genre of music altogether, a collage of electronically manipulated sounds of nature.

The triple-disc A Sound Map of the Danube (2008) is a 162-minute reevocation of life along the Danube via field recordings and interviews with ordinary people. Hence the journey (in space and time) begins with Bregquelle To Immendingen for German spoken-word (multiple men), running water and birds, especially majestic running water. Domesticated animals enter the picture in Fridingen To Ulm, then the water takes over again, but this time in a duet with church bells. Lockwood seems to complicate the picture a bit at the time, as the 14-minute Lauingen To Weltenburg is even less linear and more varied (people, water, animals, churches). Passau To Jochenstein Dam focuses on the water again, with the voice and church bells simply setting the stage for the final roaring crescendo of water. The problem, of course, is that there is only so much one can do with these elements. Therefore the 16-minute Inzell To Traismauer sounds uneventful and the 13-minute Donauwirt To Samor¡n since they simply recycle sounds that were already in the previous pieces (unless your ear is really sophisticated). A steam train engine (a train?) successfully lifts Orth To Haslau from the routine of water sounds. Esztergom To Keselyus opts for calmer waters and invisible sounds (perhaps of people nearby). The 15-minute Batina To Vukovar evokes one of the most pastoral vignettes before indulging in the usual loud gurgling. The 15-minute Backo Novo Selo To Dobra is another rural vignette. The 17-minute Kazan Gorges To Tutrakan invests more interviews, the voices gracefully blended with the natural sounds. Popina To Rasova finally explores more of the "other" sounds, sounds that are difficult to interpret and constitute the subconscious of life along a river. The 19-minute Nufaru To The Black Sea reaches the sea, and we hear the waves replacing the usual flow. This is all evocative and charming. One only wonders if it could have been edited down to a less sprawling dimension.

In Our Name collects Jitterbug for tape and live performers (2007), In Our Name (2010) for voice, cello and tape, and Thirst (2008.

In Our Name (2012) collects Jitterbug (2007), for six-channel tape, a mixer and two live performers, In Our Name (2010) for voice, cello, and pre-recorded sound on tape, and Thirst (2008), a four-channel electro-acoustic work.

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