Jazzy D's Soul Notes

Found two execllent LP's today in London whilst in the Kennington area , both in the avant-grade classical mode for £2 each in a classy local charity shop connected to the council here (that being Lambeth council),and i guess not being too far from where These Records use to have their shop,that these two slabs of vinyl found their way into this shop. First off "Mouthmuisc" by Singcircle (Hyperion) - three composers featured here Trevor Wishart "Anticredo" ,Denis Smalley "Pneuma" and Simon Emmerson's "Ophelia's Dream". Singcircle did a great version of Karlheinz Stockhausen's "Stimmung" which may still be available on CD.
There is a potted biography of Trevor Wishart at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trevor_Wishart

Secondly an LP by Ensemble 2e2m directed by Luca Pfaff of music by Giacinto Scelsi (Fy Records 1982), his "Quattro Pezzi", "Pranam II", "Okanagon" and "Kya" . It was when i got home i realised I had these tracks (except for "Okanagon" ) on a CD on the French Adda label.  However i will keep the LP for Okanagon alone as it is a terrific percussive piece with some very deep resonant bass lines and is reminiscent of some of the material Iannis Xenakis composed. Also the LP is a nice gatefold sleeve with details of the music on the inside sleeve in English and French.

The Adda CD came out in 1990 and features eleven compositions by Scelsi featuring the same Ensemble 2e2m. However the director in these recordings between 1888/89 is Paul Mefano, so maybe the LP is earlier recordings entirely. I will have to listen to the CD again and compare.

Finally for Beckett fans there is a downloadable video of "Not I" from www.ubu.com  (with Billie Whitelaw in the role of the speaking mouth)'
Also.there is video  for Robert Ashley fans from a live performance of his "Landscape" opera - but i warn you now it is a long download even at broadband speeds and is AVI format but i converted it to MPEG format for eventiual burning.