Mixed Messages
New Focus, 2022
8/10
The cellist and composer Tom Flaherty brings us an electro-acoustic listen that welcomes an all-star cast on strings and keys, as Flaherty handles electronics with a versatile vision that draws inspiration from extra musical events and phenomenon.
“Shepard’s Pi” starts the listen with Genevieve Feiwan’s playful toy piano alongside Flaherty’s mysterious electronics in the very creative octave manipulation and atypical rhythmic gestures, and “Threnody” follows with Maggie Parkins on cello as Flaherty weaves his craft into a meditative and chilling display.
Packed in the middle is the 3 segments of “Recess”, where violins, viola and cello from the Eclipse Quartet brings orchestral ideas into electronic moments that recruits a rare energy and strategic repetition, while “Violelation” makes great use of Cynthia Fogg’s plucked violin that pairs with live electronics and tips its hat to Balkan music.
“Release” exits the listen, and in 11+ minutes it blends Jeff Gauthier’s violin and Parkins’ cello in tense, cathartic moments that can be bare and then later dense with harmonic and timbral appeal.
Flaherty has enjoyed a lengthy and successful career that includes a Grammy nomination, and along with the exceptional help he births a highly unique electro-acoustic experience that few, if anyone, could replicate.
Travels well with: Bergamot Quartet- In The Brink; String Noise- Way