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Ben Neill was born in North Carolina and moved to New York to pursue a
musical career within the school of minimalism. He joined La Monte Young's
ensemble on "mutantrumpet", an electro-acoustic instrument with
a modified trumpet enhanced with an electronic circuit (originally designed
by Robert Moog, and later evolved into a much more complex device), an
invention that prompted comparisons with
Jon Hassell's legendary trumpet.
Besides featuring on recordings by La Monte Young,
John Cage, Rhys Chatham, David Behrman, Nicolas Collins,
Fast Forward, Paul Schutze, Pauline Oliveros, and even John Cale,
Neill became a staple and an organizer of the New York avantgarde scene.
His early compositions surfaced on
Mainspring (Ear-Rational, 1988): Mainspring (1985),
Two Dances, Dis-Solution (1986), No More People (1988).
In the Shadow of Forward Motion (New Tone, 1993),
also known as ITSOFOMO, documents
a 1989 multimedia collaboration with
visual artist David Wojnarowicz and percussionist Don Yallech.
Aggregation, Intermezzo and The Industrial Section
are the key pieces.
Neill also played on guitarists Dave Soldier's
Smut (Avant, 1994) with
trombonist Rob Bethea,
guitarist Bob Bannister,
percussionists Jim Pugliese and Samm Bennett,
vocalists Wilbur Pauley, Napua Davoy and Tiye Giraud.
Torchtower (New Tone, 1994) collects pieces composed between 1987 and
1992 for the Mainspring ensemble
(two trombones, pedal steel guitar, electric guitar and percussions)
The standout is Money Talk, that samples a salesman over rapid-fire
trumpet phrases. Abblasen House merges classical (baroque) and popular
music.
Green Machine (november 1994 - Astralwerks, 1995) is the soundtrack to
a multimedia installation, and the most atmospheric of his recordings for
"mutantrumpet".
It was in the mid-1990s that Neill began to
develop a fascination for dance music.
Triptycal (april 1996 - Antilles, 1996) featured collaborations with two disc-jockeys
of the "illbient" movement
(DJ Spooky and DJ Olive)
and blurred the borders between popular, dance and classical music.
Neill indulged in techno, hip-hop and drum'n'bass beats while employing
sophisticated mathematical techniques to compose his pieces.
The result was lush and atmospheric,
whether feasting on the drum'n'space of "Propeller" or drifting in the
world music of Triptycal or indulging in the
acid-jazz textures of Twelfth Flight.
Helped by
Helmet's guitarist Page Hamilton, cellist Jane Scarpantoni and DJ
Spooky, on Goldbug (Antilles, 1998) Neill delivered
more uptempo dance-floor numbers such as Tunnel Vision,
Route Me Out, Shirt Waste and
Goldbug (that samples Berlioz's "The Damnation of Faust").
The hysterical digital beats are antithetic to the trumpet's long drones on
Night Science (2009), creating an unnerving atmosphere.
Posthorn (completed in 2005) is based on
the Posthorn solo for trumpet in Gustav Mahler’s Third Symphony.
Schizetude 3,
a series of variations on a 12-tone theme, with specific pitches assigned to different acoustic and electronic timbres,
was composed in 1991 but only released in 2022.
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