SIGMAR MATTHIASSON - Meridian Metaphor
Stef: SM002
Åsgeir Åsgeirsson: oud, tamboura; Haukur Gröndal: clarinet; Ingi Bjarni Skülason: piano; Matthías Hemstock: drums; Sigmar Þór Mastthiasson: upright bass; Ayman Boujlida: konnakol, percussion; Taulant Mehmeti: çifteli.
Recorded 14th – 16th October 2020 by Birgir Jön Birgisson at Sundlaugin.
From the opening bars of ‘Don’, it is clear that this is music steeped in the traditions of the Middle Eastern home of its primary solo instruments. However, there is also a detour that the music takes through the traditional musics of Eastern Europe and, perhaps, to traditions of music in Iceland. I say the latter because Iceland is Matthiasson’s home and I am not familiar with Icelandic folk music. I note that Mehmeti is from Kosovo and plays the çifteli, a two-stringed plucked instrument (rather than his usual guitar) and percussionist Boujida is from Tunisia. Across the compositions, Gröndal’s clarinet and Skülason’s piano sketch lyrical patterns that would not be amiss in European chamber music. However, I felt that there was, in the compositions, a tension in the ways in which ‘folk’ music was used by Romantic composers, such as Dvorak, and such Romanticism was reacted against in the ‘miniatures’ of Les Six. Each of Matthiasson’s compositions takes a journey through musical styles from Europe and the Middle East while also battling the tension between romanticising these styles and reacting against them (so, in addition to journey across countries, one also has a journey across musical history). The pieces have striking melodic inventions, supported by supple bass playing through which Matthiasson is willing his band-mates to not only inhabit his compositions but also to improvise in musical languages that are unique to their own traditions and practices. For example, ‘Fordómalausir Timar’ (which GoogleTranslate tells me in Icelandic for ‘unprejudiced hours’ – but I can’t quite work out what this means), track 3, has solos on oud and clarinet over the same, undulating rhythm, where the end of one solo segues easily into the other It is this camaraderie, particularly between oud and clarinet that lies at the heart of the recording and the understated ambition that one senses in Matthiasson’s compositions and the playing of this band – to create a context in which music ignores boundaries and borders and blends into a seamless and satisfying whole.
Reviewed by Chris Baber
Stef: SM002
Åsgeir Åsgeirsson: oud, tamboura; Haukur Gröndal: clarinet; Ingi Bjarni Skülason: piano; Matthías Hemstock: drums; Sigmar Þór Mastthiasson: upright bass; Ayman Boujlida: konnakol, percussion; Taulant Mehmeti: çifteli.
Recorded 14th – 16th October 2020 by Birgir Jön Birgisson at Sundlaugin.
From the opening bars of ‘Don’, it is clear that this is music steeped in the traditions of the Middle Eastern home of its primary solo instruments. However, there is also a detour that the music takes through the traditional musics of Eastern Europe and, perhaps, to traditions of music in Iceland. I say the latter because Iceland is Matthiasson’s home and I am not familiar with Icelandic folk music. I note that Mehmeti is from Kosovo and plays the çifteli, a two-stringed plucked instrument (rather than his usual guitar) and percussionist Boujida is from Tunisia. Across the compositions, Gröndal’s clarinet and Skülason’s piano sketch lyrical patterns that would not be amiss in European chamber music. However, I felt that there was, in the compositions, a tension in the ways in which ‘folk’ music was used by Romantic composers, such as Dvorak, and such Romanticism was reacted against in the ‘miniatures’ of Les Six. Each of Matthiasson’s compositions takes a journey through musical styles from Europe and the Middle East while also battling the tension between romanticising these styles and reacting against them (so, in addition to journey across countries, one also has a journey across musical history). The pieces have striking melodic inventions, supported by supple bass playing through which Matthiasson is willing his band-mates to not only inhabit his compositions but also to improvise in musical languages that are unique to their own traditions and practices. For example, ‘Fordómalausir Timar’ (which GoogleTranslate tells me in Icelandic for ‘unprejudiced hours’ – but I can’t quite work out what this means), track 3, has solos on oud and clarinet over the same, undulating rhythm, where the end of one solo segues easily into the other It is this camaraderie, particularly between oud and clarinet that lies at the heart of the recording and the understated ambition that one senses in Matthiasson’s compositions and the playing of this band – to create a context in which music ignores boundaries and borders and blends into a seamless and satisfying whole.
Reviewed by Chris Baber
