JOHNSTON, BEN: String Quartets Nos. 2, 3, 4 & 9 CD (NW 80637)

Spotted this in the Forced Exposure new releases email on this wet grey morning, I always wanted to here these:

NEW WORLD RECORDS

JOHNSTON, BEN: String Quartets Nos. 2, 3, 4 & 9 CD (NW 80637) 14.00
Performed by Kepler Quartet. "Ben Johnston's (b. 1926) music has reached a wide and diverse audience, both at home and abroad, without compromising its high seriousness or its depth of philosophic purpose. His music shows the confluence of several traditions of music-making that have flourished within the United States. In the 1950s his output was characterized by the neoclassicism of his teacher Darius Milhaud. In the 1960s he explored serial techniques and, at the end of the decade, indeterminacy. From 1960 onward the overriding technical preoccupation of his music has been its use of just intonation, the tuning system of the music of ancient cultures as well as that of many living traditions worldwide. Johnston is a pioneer in the use of microtones and non-tempered tuning, rationalizing and going beyond Harry Partch's achievements in this domain. His ten string quartets are among the most fascinating collections of work ever produced by an American composer. And yet, like similarly imposing peaks in the American musical landscape -- Ives's Universe Symphony, for example, or the Studies for Player Piano of Conlon Nancarrow -- these works have, for decades now, remained more known about than known, more talked about than played. The scores have been analyzed by musicologists and theorists fascinated by their fusion of advanced compositional techniques (serialism with just intonation, for example; microtonality with a kind of neoclassical revisionism), but they have been too little heard. The Kepler Quartet's recordings -- this disc is the first of a series of three, prepared with Johnston's active support and supervision -- offer lively and scrupulously accurate readings that unlock the door to these marvelous pieces. Like Ives and Nancarrow before him, there is the sense that Johnston's time has finally come."

--
* David Beardsley
* microtonal guitar
* http://biink.com/db

It's unfortunate that #5, my favorite, was not included in this
release, but it sounds like future discs will include it. Thanks for
the exciting news!

--- In MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com, David Beardsley <db@b...>
wrote:
>
> Spotted this in the Forced Exposure new releases email on this wet
grey
> morning, I always wanted to here these:
>
>
> NEW WORLD RECORDS
>
> JOHNSTON, BEN: String Quartets Nos. 2, 3, 4 & 9 CD (NW 80637) 14.00
> Performed by Kepler Quartet. "Ben Johnston's (b. 1926) music has
reached
> a wide and diverse audience, both at home and abroad, without
> compromising its high seriousness or its depth of philosophic
purpose.
> His music shows the confluence of several traditions of music-
making
> that have flourished within the United States. In the 1950s his
output
> was characterized by the neoclassicism of his teacher Darius
Milhaud. In
> the 1960s he explored serial techniques and, at the end of the
decade,
> indeterminacy. From 1960 onward the overriding technical
preoccupation
> of his music has been its use of just intonation, the tuning system
of
> the music of ancient cultures as well as that of many living
traditions
> worldwide. Johnston is a pioneer in the use of microtones and
> non-tempered tuning, rationalizing and going beyond Harry Partch's
> achievements in this domain. His ten string quartets are among the
most
> fascinating collections of work ever produced by an American
composer.
> And yet, like similarly imposing peaks in the American musical
landscape
> -- Ives's Universe Symphony, for example, or the Studies for Player
> Piano of Conlon Nancarrow -- these works have, for decades now,
remained
> more known about than known, more talked about than played. The
scores
> have been analyzed by musicologists and theorists fascinated by
their
> fusion of advanced compositional techniques (serialism with just
> intonation, for example; microtonality with a kind of neoclassical
> revisionism), but they have been too little heard. The Kepler
Quartet's
> recordings -- this disc is the first of a series of three, prepared
with
> Johnston's active support and supervision -- offer lively and
> scrupulously accurate readings that unlock the door to these
marvelous
> pieces. Like Ives and Nancarrow before him, there is the sense that
> Johnston's time has finally come."
>
>
> --
> * David Beardsley
> * microtonal guitar
> * http://biink.com/db
>