Extracurricular Listening: Bedroom Community and Friends /  by Liquid Music

Members of Bedroom Community

Members of Bedroom Community

Music from the Nordic region has had and continues to have an extraordinary presence in the United States. From the long history of Swedish popular music, like ABBA, Robyn, Lykke Li or Max Martin (who has written dozens of Top 40 U.S. songs over the last 20 years) to the more experimental and ethereal music of prominent Icelandic artists, such as Sigur Rós, Múm, Björk and many more. The cultural exchange between this part of the world and the U.S. is also well represented in the programming and presence of the American Swedish Institute in the Twin Cities community. On May 9, Liquid Music is excited to join ASI in a co-presentation of new contemporary chamber music from Icelandic record label and composer/performer collective, Bedroom Community. (Tickets and info)

As purveyors of contemporary chamber music with a growing and increasingly adventurous audience, we are wholeheartedly committed to the creation and cultivation of new and diverse types of music. An essential part of this process is providing bridges and context for new listeners to discover and appreciate what could sometimes be considered "challenging" music – context that we will attempt to provide through our 'Extracurricular Listening' blog series. Below is a sampling of music from the artists performing on Liquid Music's Bedroom Community & Friends concert, as well as a taste of other contemporary Nordic chamber music.

Valgeir Sigurðsson

In addition to founding Bedroom Community and engineering/producing albums for Icelandic artists like Sigur Rós and Björk, Valgeir Sigurðsson is also a prolific composer and producer of his own albums and compositions. His recently released album, Dissonance, takes inspiration from Mozart’s String Quartet No. 19, known as the “Dissonance” quartet. Sigurðsson takes the chaotic opening bars of Mozart’s work and stretches them out over the course of 23 minutes, creating a vivid and profound meditation on clashing dissonances.

Amiina

Comprised of classically trained multi-instrumentalists, just one song from Amiina can use violin, xylophone, tuned wine glasses, dulcimer, guitar, electronics and a musical saw. Initially known for their arrangement work with Sigur Rós, Amiina’s music has taken on a life of its own. Their soft and unique timbres draw listeners in, creating an intimate experience of a subtle yet broad sonic landscape.

Jodie Landau

Although he’s L.A.-based, composer, percussionist, and singer Jodie Landau has strong ties both professionally and sonically to Bedroom Community. His debut album with them, you of all things, was recorded in Iceland with musicians from new music collective wild Up and the Icelandic women’s choir Graduale Nobili known for their work on Björk’s Biophilia tour. On this track, titled as we sway, Landau’s gorgeously plaintive melody floats over a rumbling, slowly expanding texture of muted piano strings, harp tremolos and ethereal electronics.

Sam Amidon is another U.S. based musician on the Bedroom Community label. Drawing directly from traditional Appalachian folk tunes, Amidon creates contemporary interpretations and arrangements of these humble melodies and lyrics. Amidon’s voice can range from melancholy and raspy to calming or joyous, simultaneously sounding from the past and present.

Daniel Bjarnason

The title track of Icelandic composer Daníel Bjarnason's album of orchestral music reacts to the art of two abstract expressionists of the New York school. Commissioned by the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the first movement, "Over Light Earth" takes its name from Mark Rothko’s painting Dark Over Light Earth, the second from Jackson Pollock’s Number 1, 1949. Bjarnason gives an evocative description of the music and his inspirations below.

“For this piece I wanted to make music that was somehow frozen in time, like a painting.  So that you would not feel like you had been experiencing a narrative that is moving chronologically from A-Z, but rather that you are looking at the same object from different angles and in different light. For me this was a challenge because it is more natural to me to make music that is dramatic and has a forward thrust. But recently, and especially as I was thinking about the work of Rothko, I started to yearn for music that was not ‘doing’ anything. Music that was simply present, that you could spend time ‘inside’ and belong to without emotional attachment.”

Anna Thorvaldsdottir

Another established Icelandic contemporary classical composer is Anna Thorvaldsdottir. Her album Rhízōma, was recorded by the Iceland Symphony Orchestra and conducted by Daniel Bjarnason. The Icelandic title of the opening orchestral work, Hrím, refers to the gradual growth of ice crystals, a notion paralleled in this piece not only by the frosty shimmer of individual sounds, but also in the ways these sounds cling together: as clusters of activity outlining moments of greater structural importance and as threads of memory echoing throughout the work’s duration. This music sits more on the modernist/spectralist side of the classical music spectrum when compared to Bjarnason’s more minimalist and pop sensibilities, yet composers use great nuance and detail to craft elaborately lush textures.

Four Questions with Nick Zammuto /  by Liquid Music

by Jeffrey Niblack

Photo by Drew Brown

Photo by Drew Brown

On April 5, Liquid Music along with partner institutions Walker Art Center and Schubert Club Mix will present an evening of collaboration between Nick Zammuto and Roomful of Teeth, including a piece commissioned for the occasion entitled ToBeGinAGain. Zammuto received accolades for his duo The Books last decade and has since been releasing music with the band Zammuto (which includes his brother Mikey). Running through all of his music is a keen ear for the multitude of sounds around us and a playful willingness to experiment.  

In advance of his performance with Roomful of Teeth in Minneapolis, Zammuto answered a few questions for the Liquid Music blog.  

Tell us more about composing ToBeGinAGain.  What does it mean to you?

I've made a series of short songs from rhythmic repetitions of simple phrases accompanied by an analog synthesizer. In each song a soloist sings through a stereo pitch/delay unit that shifts their performance in time and melody against their real voice in various ways. The rest of the group supports the soloist and their impostor copies in real time. A counterpoint is created between the 'original' and the 'copy' much as we are constantly trying to catch up with our virtual identities in the digital world. I find that the copied and shifted voices are somewhere between supernatural and unnatural in a way that makes me simultaneously fascinated and discomforted. For me, the repetition of phrases within the chorus forces a normalization of these unnatural voice sounds in a way that makes them almost acceptable over time, but not quite. The analog synthesizer mirrors this tension by constantly shifting its role and identity from song to song.  Analog synth has always been a deep love of mine for its ability to create both a buttery emotional warmth and total alienation at the turn of a knob. This range is something Roomful of Teeth is particularly good at as well. 

Roomful of Teeth and Nick Zammuto performing "ToBeGinAGain" Source: WQXR Radio

What was the process of developing ToBeGinAGain? What was exciting about working with Roomful of Teeth? What was surprising about the development of the piece?

It was a real honor to be asked to write for Roomful of Teeth last summer. They spend part of their summers every year at MASS MoCA in North Adams, Massachusetts, and I live nearby in Southern Vermont, so I was able to spend a week getting to know them as musicians and people. They are all such unique voices that blend in such unique ways, and they are all so willing to be adventurous, the possibilities are endless. I floated the idea of having them sing through a pitch shifting delay pedal and had them take turns experimenting with it. I think they enjoyed the real time circus mirror feeling of singing through it and getting such unexpected sounds back, it became the basis for ToBeGinAGain. To have a layer of technology between the soloists and the audience was something they haven’t tried before, and it was a good challenge to build a system that could work in real time to add a new texture to their repertoire. 

What is most fun and most challenging about composing for Roomful of Teeth?

They are fun people and very willing to try out my crazy ideas. They approach what they do with a fearlessness that I really admire. The challenge has been dealing with the rigidity of incorporating a digital element into their organic flow. The soloists have to exist in a weird kind of bubble while they’re singing, so they need to close themselves off from the rest of the group in a way that makes them feel a bit strange. But really that’s part of the meaning of the piece for me. 

What music has been inspiring you recently?

I’ve been introducing my three sons to my musical loves recently on the drive to school, so I’ve been revisiting a lot of music from my past. We’ve been on a big Zappa kick recently.  The boys especially love 'St. Alphonso’s Pancake Breakfast.'  They also love Weird Al, of course.  The ‘Biggest Ball of Twine in Minnesota’  is a really brilliant song.  My oldest boy gravitates towards A Tribe Called Quest's ‘Scenario’ while my youngest loves the knee movements from Phillip Glass’s ‘Einstein on the Beach.’  

All seated tickets for Nick Zammuto and Roomful of Teeth are sold out. A limited number of standing room tickets are currently available.

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