Changes Chances by Elena Càsoli, Stradivarius 2006

After the magnificent debut with StrongStrangeStrings (Stradivarius 2001) Elena Càsoli comes back with the ideal result of Changes Chances still published by Stradivarius in 2006. The disc already confirms yet from the first hearing her exceptional talent as guitarist and performer, this time made available to "three American composers, who I only met once but whose work I listen to a great deal before and after I met them. "
Elena Càsoli made an interesting and challenging record, it requires time and dedication in listening to and a slow process of maturation that permits to discover it little by little. Three are the composers with whom Elena Càsoli measures her guitars and they are three big names like John Cage, Elliott Carter and Terry Riley
“Changes, for guitar solo, is music of mercurial contrasts of character and mood, unified by its harmonic structure. Various aspects of the basic harmony are brought out in the course of the work, somewhat like the patterns used in ringing changes. The score was written during the summer of 1983 and is dedicated to David Starobin, who commissioned it and generously gave me advice about the guitar." Elliott Carter
We begin with the song of Elliott Carter "Changes", played with the guitar Fritz Ober. It’s a very energetic piece, with a complex rhythmic,very tight, that leaves no room for loss of tension and attention.
“A sound does no view itself as a thought, as a ought, as needing another sound for its delucidation, as tec.; it has no time for any consideration – it is occupied with the performance of his characteristics: before it has died away it must have made perfectly exact its frequency, its loudness, its length, its overtone structure, the precise morphology of these and of itself.” John Cage (1)
The composition of Cage is the less "guitar"piece of the cd, but at the same time it is one in which Elena Casoli has played the whole "arsenal" of her guitars. The piece "for every instrument or way of producing sounds" is composed of 4 different phases, each interpreter chooses twelve different sounds and then he plays the piece placing each object in precise sound temporal areas, the composer in practice controls the duration and the time of' appearance of sounds, while their nature is left to the interpreters. (2) Elena creates a dilated piece, almost in suspension, which grows every time you listent to it, is not an easy song and can be a nice shock for those approaching the first time to the ideas of Cage, but patience and persistence will introduce you in a new music world that have greatf possibilities for new discoveries and surprises.
Last but not least, the cd ends showing the colors of the sound of the Panormo guitar played for the three pieces of Terry Riley, rather surprising for whom may knows "In C", "A rainbow in the curved air", "Persian Surgery Dervishes" or other minimalist works of the american composer. These three pieces belong to a cycle of more than 20 pieces for guitar called Book of Abbeyozzud made for his son Gyan and recorde toghter with the guitarist David Tanenbaum in 1999 for New Albion. These pieces sound strangely "Spanish", Iberians, so far from the often hypnotic, dreamy and minimalist sounds which Riley usually use. Listening to the songs, however, slowly shows us a wealth of music made of braids, compositive solutions, almost counterpoints ideas that frees the space and "scent" about jazz, minimalism, Indian music, folk reflecting all the background music of their composer. Registration extremely accurate and precise.
(1) pag 50 Experimental Music Cage and Beyond – Michael Nyman
(2) interview on BlowUp Magazine April 2007
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