The Discovery Of A World Inside The Moone

As far as I know this is the only album in my collection named after a 17th-Century treatise on speculative astronomy: specifically John Wilkins' The Discovery of a World in the Moone: or, A Discourse Tending to Prove that 'tis probable there may be another habitable World in that Planet (London, 1638). It's not at all obvious to me why the band chose that title: some of the songs' lyrics hint at otherworldly shenanigans, but I don't recall the moon being mentioned anywhere in them.

My belated exploration of the œuvre of the Elephant 6 artists had led me to The Apples in stereo ca. 2004. I bought Tone Soul Evolution (1997) which I enjoyed, and then Her Wallpaper Reverie (1999) and Velocity of Sound (2002 - thereby skipping over The Discovery...) neither of which held as much appeal for me, so my exploration of their catalogue stalled at that point. Only a few years ago did I return to their music, discovering that I very much enjoyed The Discovery..., and outright loved their 2007 album New Magnetic Wonder.

I suppose one could call it subtly psychedelic retro pop music. Beatles and Beach Boys influences are obvious, with a dash of added Motownesque flavouring. The production, courtesy of main man Robert Schneider, is clean and vivid. Drummer Hilarie Sidney wrote (and sang on) two numbers, the remainder being Schneider's handiwork. My favourite tracks include the opening three: 'Go', 'The Rainbow' & 'Stream Running Over' and, further along the running order, 'Allright/Not Quite' & 'The Bird That You Can’t See'. If it weren't for a couple of weaker tracks, this would be an outstanding album, rather than just a very good one.

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Complete String Quartets

While the string quartets of Nikolai Yakovievich Myaskovsky (1881-1950) were all published in the Soviet era, a few of them had pre-revolutionary origins. Two quartets he wrote in 1911 and '09 while a conservatory student re-surfaced some twenty years later designated as Quartets Nos. 3 and 4. An even earlier "schoolboy" piece was later re-worked more radically as Quartet No. 10, premiered in 1945. Myaskovsky partook of an ample share of the turmoil and tragedy of his times: he was wounded and shell-shocked after service on the front line in World War I, and his father, who had been a high-ranking military engineer, was brutally murdered by a revolutionary mob. Despite that, his music, even at its most sombre, hasn't the black bile or biting sarcasm of Shostakovich's, or of his friend Prokofiev's. Of the works collected here, in excellent early '80s performances by the Taneyev Quartet, only Quartet No. 1 has any significantly metallic tang of early S...

Onslow

George Onslow was an odd-man-out among 19th-century French composers. Born into wealth and privilege, the grandson of an English Earl, he had no need to follow the operatic gravy train, with string quartets (of which he wrote 36) and string quintets (there are another 32 of those) forming the bulk of his compositional output. The present disc contains his 28th, 29th and 30th quartets, in compelling performances by the Quatuor Diotima. These quartets were written toward the end of a prolifically-creative period for Onslow in the years 1829-35. Viviane Niaux, in her informative booklet notes, ascribes this to the composer's having heard performances of two of Beethoven's late quartets for the first time in 1828, at their Paris première. Like many of his contemporaries, Onslow was at once "fascinated and disconcerted", and, although he considered them "extravagant", they seem to have been powerfully inspirational. A further spur to creativity may have been his ...

Influencías

In my original blogging days, I would occasionally run giveaways to offload unwanted books or CDs to whomever claimed them. Sometimes the recipients would offer to send me something in return. It was in this way that, ca. 2007, a Catalan correspondent sent me Influencías: a CD of perfomances by the Barcelona-based Cuarteto Casals. The CD begins with Maurice Ravel's renowned string quartet: I hadn't known the piece before receiving this disc, but I was sold on it by this fresh & bright performance. Next is a quartet called 'Vistes al Mar' by the Catalan composer Eduardo Toldrá. Its evocative maritime movements are prefaced by recitations of poems by Joan Maragall, a Catalan author whose works directly inspired the piece. Lastly there's an arrangement of Joaquín Turina's atmospheric 'Oración del Torero', originally composed for a lute quartet. I'm on the fence about the cover photo: it's a well-composed picture & not a bad idea, but with 2...

This is a Recording

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