Beatriz Ferreyra - GRM Works & Michel Redolfi - Pacific Tubular Waves / Immersion (Recollection GRM)

Two fine new addictions to the Recollections GRM series; Beatriz Ferreyra's electroacoustics and Redolfi's Synclavier digital synthesizer pieces.

Ferreyra's GRM Works starts with Demeures aquatiques (1967) prowling 'round your brain as if stalking your senses from ear-to-ear. You know the tricksy stuff that Rock bands got up to when multi-channel studio desk mixology was born? It's better than any of that. Remember how they'd pan and scan to signify 'cosmic', or 'do drugs!', or something? Ferreyra's music isn't like that, though a few listeners have been 'on something' whilst listening over the years. I've taken a packet of Haribo Tangfastics washed down with caffeine - whooooeeee! - I'm buzzing! Beatriz' music is actually taking the edge off the trip, but in a good way, because it's meditative but stimulating and - OW! - Un fil invisible (2009) just shocked me...what's happening....brain scrabble! She hasn't lost it, not in 40-odd years, no, sir. 'Inspired by the various stages of Medieval Alchemy', that description could fit all this music, the process of transforming sounds and ideas into gold for us to enjoy its deep, rich, shiny (sometimes spiky) luxurious allure. Les Larmes de l’inconnu (2011) features what sound like F1 cars whizzing past, amongst many other sounds, of course. Sound makers like Ferreyra specialise in fluid constructions of many parts and they make replays endlessly worthwhile. The trip is the thing and it's not on any autobahn...it's a wobbly rail over hills and down dales, through long tunnels and high above the clouds...and you love it, don't you?



Michel Redolfi's Pacific Tubular Waves is inspired by 'the kinetics of the Pacific breakers', so you could call it Surf Music but, yes, you guessed, Dick Dale it ain't. These waves appear more like water dribbling onto the sand in the first movement, then the big ones crash to shore - like WHOOOSH! - a wonderful wake up call in case you were doing any California dreaming. The Pacific Motion section is especially good, as if there might be some Mutant Gillmen swimming in this ocean, on their way to Positron Island. In other words, a Drexciyan-techno connection springs to mind although this is beatless. As a solo instrumental work it differs from Ferreyra's music but the pure electronics offer simpler pleasures and, yes, it would be suitable for the beach. Immersion is Pacific Tubular Waves underwater, literally, having been dipped beneath the waves via a sonar loudspeaker and moved around by them. That's something, isn't it? The results were then treated in the studio and combined with sequences on the Synclavier. Welcome to Redolfi's 'ocean of sound'.