Layale Chaker & Sarafand Inner Rhyme
Flying Lotus Flamagra
Shafiq Husayn The Loop
Kaytranada Bubba
Anne-Sophie Mutter / John Williams Across the Stars
Anderson .Paak Ventura
Caroline Shaw / Attacca Quartet Orange
Solange When I Get Home
James Tenney Changes: 64 Studies for 6 Harps
Dwight Trible Mothership
Honourable mention: Marvin Gaye You’re the Man
My interview for I Care If You Listen.
Brandon Coleman Resistance
Tigran Hamasyan For Gyumri
Zaki Ibrahim The Secret Life of Planets
The Internet Hive Mind
JACK Quartet Everything That Rises (John Luther Adams)
Kuniko Drumming (Steve Reich)
Kukuruz Quartet Julius Eastman Piano Interpretations
Kendrick Lamar/Various Artists Black Panther: The Album
Kelly Moran Ultraviolet
Georgia Anne Muldrow Overload
Steve Reich/International Contemporary Ensemble/Colin Currie Group Pulse/Quartet
Esperanza Spalding 12 Little Spells
Kali Uchis Isolation
Kamasi Washington Heaven and Earth
Tierra Whack Whack World
Aretha Franklin The Atlantic Singles Collection 1967-1970
“Rhythm So New” began as a song on my demo-style album Suburbanite (1988). In 2008, it was made into an experimental DJ-style remix using CD transfers of the original song mixes as well as the aged 4-track cassette stems. I used looping and filtering to focus on small, rough-edged details and enhance the saturated colours of the vintage medium. The remix was 22 minutes long; this 2018 edit reduces that by half. The original recording featured a Hohner Clavinet, Korg CX-3 organ, Roland S-50 sampler, Yahama DX-27 synthesizer, bass guitar (direct) and overdubbed vocals, all recorded in a single overnight session with no programming.
Composed and recorded November 1988, cassette 4-track
Remixed August 2008, Pioneer CDJs, Allen & Heath mixer
Edited December 2018
Top: The Monarch Tavern, July 2007 (Petri Glad)
Below: detail of Pioneer CDJ-1000 MK2, December 2018 (Bruce Russell)
Music and composer’s notes copyright Bruce A. Russell 2018
The Turret (1993) was commissioned by choreographer Dave Wilson for a dance solo performed by Viv Moore. It uses a non-equal temperament tuning. It was quickly sketched and left in raw form; however, I had been developing my palette and techniques on the M1 for several years by this point. I titled it for the recessed area where I would compose in the apartment I lived in at the time.
Composed and recorded February 1993, Korg M1
Photo: Ancient Theatre of Fourvière, Lyon
Music and composer’s notes copyright Bruce A. Russell 2018
in a name (1998) mixes naïveté and rigour; it was one of my earliest pieces where this was an intentional approach, at least. It is based on a musical cipher of the name of the recipient in a gift exchange. A three-note cell of B – E – A is derived from this, generating all the melodic and harmonic content for the piece by forming hexachords with other three-note cells that are parallel with the first: G-sharp – C-sharp – F-sharp; G – C – F and D – G – C, resulting in the keys of E major, A minor and G major respectively. As an example, a two-voice canon on the notes G-sharp – C-sharp – F-sharp – B – E – A is heard near the beginning, immediately after which it becomes the accompaniment to the repeating melodic pattern of the cipher.
The focus is always on one group of six notes or another, voiced predominantly in symmetrical patterns of fourths, fifths and sevenths and seconds, sometimes stacked, sometimes nested. The main three-note cell remains a constant. The overall structure is symmetrical.
This recording features a digital approximation of a just intonation tuning of the piano, while the score specifies the option of performing in this tuning or in equal temperament. The piece was also heard as part of the musical program (which also included my piece for solo kalimba For Findley, also 1998) for an evening-length improv by Dave Wilson’s Dream Dancers, at Dancemakers in October 1999.
Composed and recorded January 1998, Korg 01WFD
Photo: impromptu dinosaur by Kenza Russell, age 4
Music and composer’s notes copyright Bruce A. Russell 2018
“The Longing” (1987) was my dazed, departing glance at the battleground of adolescence. It was created at the beginning of my studies in electroacoustic composition—my first composition class of any kind—at York University, although not as part of my school work. Even by then, tonality was still a no. Then, as now, I didn’t fit neatly into any one musical box. Enter the DIY cassette: Earthtones, completed over several illicit late night sessions with a mix of school equipment and my own. I had the good fortune of being able to stroll from my dorm room indoors to the studio in the same college. An all-nighter that ended just as my floormates were leaving for their classes allowed for a period of undisturbed rest.
There are four musical lines: a percussive synth phrase on a reel-to-reel tape loop; the same tape loop manipulated and processed, eventually disintegrating in a wash of digital reverb; an improvised synth pad recorded backwards, i.e. the first notes heard were the last played and vice versa; and a piano part which was improvised in response to the retrograde harmonies of the synth.
As with other tracks on Earthtones (“The Longing” being the finale), I composed as I recorded, coasting on the nonrenewable fumes of naïveté. Considering I had taught myself piano and started to play in pop bands only three to four years before, this is a very early snapshot of me self-identifying as a composer.
Recorded November 1987
Four-track cassette, mixed to stereo cassette
Photo: December 25, 1987
Music and composer’s notes copyright Bruce A. Russell 2017
My interview for I Care if You Listen.
“Storm” is an excerpt from the 30-minute score for WhISH, an interdisciplinary fairy tale performed by Liminal Gryphon Theatre (director Derek Mohamed, choreographer Tracy Renee Stafford). WhISH premiered in February 1997 as part of the Rhubarb! Festival at Buddies in Bad Times in Toronto. The score was also released on cassette. “Storm” was the accompaniment to an ensemble dance, and is of a piece with my lo-fi, distorted MIDI 90s work. The double-layer canons—one high, one low and in canon with each other—are also found in my Two Dances for Two Pianos (1996) and string quartet Madra (1999). Here this material is heard in a just intonation tuning.
The time signature is a slow 3/2. There are two kick drum parts; one heartbeat-like, one with low bass notes doubling accents in the canons. The echo/reverb effects and lazy beat are inspired by dub and trip hop.
(Edit – February 21, 2018)
“Voices” is the finale music from WhISH. It is a short, cloudlike piece, scored for workstation and multiple voices overdubbed, and uses the same just intonation tuning as above. It passes through a series of dominant-like harmonies by gradually expanding the register of the voices, while the bassline moves generally by leaps; with a bit of tritone-itis toward the peak. The tuning would ideally involve a properly workshopped, practice-based acoustic ensemble and chorus.
Composed and recorded January 1997
Korg 01/WFD and Yahama cassette 4-track (on “Voices”)
Photo: detail from cassette cover, drawing by Carsten Knox
Music and composer’s notes copyright Bruce A. Russell 2018
“Coupling” (1996) is a section from the score to Woo: Cases of Bloodletting and Natural Selection, a multimedia work by Liminal Zoo Theatre (Derek Mohamed and Tracy Renee Stafford, co-creators). It was heard as a live mix and provided the accompaniment to silent onstage action as well as prerecorded spoken word passages. It is a drone collage, restored here using three elements from the original version: a digital track created on the Korg 01W/FD with a custom just intonation tuning; portions of an older theatre score, “The Monster” (1992), for 4-track cassette and Yahama DX-27; and various excerpts or loops from other pieces of mine that were added in performance.
The original “Coupling” ran 30 minutes in performance; I have removed 10 minutes for this edition. The piece begins with a slow canon in G and from the two minute mark onward remains fixed on D. While the drone root does not change, many different upper pitches, sound colours, textures and moods are encountered along the way.
Composed July 1996
Restoration December 2016
Equipment: Tascam Portastudio cassette 4-track, sound sources Roland S-50 sampler and Sony home CD player with loop function, across several generations of tape and Yamaha DX-27 synthesizer, Roland reverb;
Photo: detail from NOW Magazine, August 1996, newsprint, low res scan December 2016
Music and composer’s notes copyright Bruce A. Russell 2016
