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Rock That Flute
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Barnes and Noble
Rock That Flute
Current price: $23.99
Barnes and Noble
Rock That Flute
Current price: $23.99
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It's a bit hard to tell what you're getting in this recording by recorder virtuoso
, but rest assured, it's delightful. Rock music is only tangentially involved (there are no guitars or drums, just a small orchestra), and the cover is a mix of names, numbers, and an unfamiliar term. To start with the instrument: the Eagle Recorder is a contemporary creation of Dutch instrument builder
. It is, in a word, a turbo recorder, with expanded capabilities designed to bring it to parity with an orchestra with no amplification. It has a large bore, several keys including an octave key, an expanded range, and "a new metal labium...which facilitates the attack and makes the sound even stronger." The basic sound isn't dramatically different from that of an ordinary alto recorder, but in the music here by composer Chiel Meijering (whose fondness for strange titles is fully on dislpay), it shows itself capable of quite a wide dynamic range. The 15 short pieces here are for recorder and orchestra, and
refers to them as concerto movements, but that gives an incorrect idea of what they're like. The recorder parts are quite difficult in spots, but they don't emerge as individualistic utterances in opposition to the orchestral tutti; instead, the recorder insinuates itself into the music and twines itself around the orchestral lines, sometimes emerging ecstatically as in track 10,
(sample this one for an idea of the effect). The style is perhaps that of
with a slender layer of contemporary pop (not really rock, and there are no pop rhythms). The orchestral writing is as subtle as that for the flute, and to put these intricate structures together requires an effort from the chamber orchestra
and conductor
that is as rigorous as
's playing.
' sound engineers get wonderfully transparents results from Norway's Stavanger Concert Hall. Highly recommended for lovers of contemporary extended-technique composition. ~ James Manheim