Composer David Crowell Announces New Album Point / Cloud Out May 3 on Better Company Records – Featuring Sandbox Percussion, Dan Lippel, Mak Grgić, & eco|tonal
David Crowell Announces New Album Point / Cloud
Out May 3 on Better Company Records
Featuring Sandbox Percussion, Dan Lippel, Mak Grgić,
and eco|tonal (Iva Casián-Lakoš and David Crowell)
“[David] Crowell focuses his integrity most upon what he can shape most effectively, where his ear goes, where the sound goes, [and] on how he develops a sonic community.” – Arteidolia
“The clangor of the vibraphones especially, allowed to ring with the pedal, created organ-like sonorities that vibrated through the brain long after the piece ended.” – Washington Classical Review on the World Premiere of Verses for a Liminal Space
CDs or press downloads available upon request.
davidcrowellmusic.com | www.bettercompanyrecords.com
New York, NY – Composer, saxophonist, and guitarist David Crowell announces his new album, Point / Cloud, to be released by Better Company Records on Friday, May 3, 2024. The album features Crowell’s music performed by the GRAMMY®-nominated Sandbox Percussion, the versatile and gifted guitarists Dan Lippel and GRAMMY®-nominated Mak Grgić, and the musically meditative duo eco|tonal – David Crowell and cellist/singer/improviser Iva Casián-Lakoš.
Crowell brings a “singular vision that transcends genre” (Exclaim) to diverse forms of composed and improvisational music, and has been praised for compositional work that is "notable for its crystalline sonic beauty" (The Boston Globe) and which “pulses with small, ecstatic fibrillations” (The New York Times). His music has previously been released on the New Amsterdam, Innova, National Sawdust Tracks, Coviello Classics, and Skirl labels.
Point / Cloud’s four sonically intricate and imagery-laden works written for percussion, guitar, and the hybrid artistry of singing cellist Iva Casián-Lakoš, prompt the idea of embracing respite while on journeys of travel and change – from the familiarity of highway drives, to enigmatic excursions, to pipe organs played by the ocean’s tides, to reprieve from musical progressions.
In her liner notes, writer Jennifer Gersten describes the album as featuring compositions that are “transmissions from in between.” She writes, “Crowell’s intricate notions take flight, then build us a home in midair.”
Crowell looks to the unique musical expressions of Sandbox Percussion, Dan Lippel, Mak Grgić, and cellist/vocalist Iva Casián-Lakoš to not only navigate his highly nuanced writing of vastly different ideas –– all which have evolved gradually over time and/or several iterations of musical form –– but to artfully unveil the real world object or experience with which each work cleverly resonates.
Crowell has known and worked with the quartet Sandbox Percussion for more than a decade, and the complexities and degree of rhythmic grace sewn into Verses for a Liminal Space show the high level of sophistication and deep refinement that this longtime relationship has allowed. Commissioned by a university consortium and finished at Dumbarton Oaks where Crowell was doing a fellowship, the piece occurs in what Gersten describes as, “three ‘verses’: short, spaced circumnavigations, flowing into one another.” The vibraphone is featured prominently first, winding up and down. From there, the sounds of vibraphone and marimbas appear to bring the music to a sudden halt in place. Then the third “verse” reveals what feels at once like a cascading deluge and an orbiting carousel of sound. Recurring, low percussive tones serve as a sonic beacon, tethering together the audible spaces within and outside the music.
The album’s titular work, Point / Cloud, is described by Crowell as a response to Steve Reich’s 1987 work, Electric Counterpoint – a monumental three-movement work for guitar in which the soloist plays with pre-recorded tracks. The title Point / Cloud leans into the contrast cultivated by the instruments over time: individual notes played with pointillistic quality, which lead to an eventual accumulation of densely packed but nebulous sonic “clouds.”
In a fanciful twist of fate, the evolution of Pacific Coast Highway reflects an embrace of the unexpected, not unlike what arises while traveling on the highway. The work was originally conceived for electric guitar and electric bass but would go on to assume various other arrangements or, what Crowell describes as, “multiple personalities.” This album captures a classical guitar duo version, performed by astute guitarists Dan Lippel and Mak Grgic. Crowell, having spent some of his life growing up in California, titled the work Pacific Coast Highway as a nod to a particular route on the work’s namesake road. Lippel and Grgić’s guitars each burst with notes that dance with a graceful connection, traversing the piece with weaves and turns evocative of the California thoroughfare.
Crowell says the finale work, 2 Hours in Zadar — performed by eco|tonal (Iva Casián-Lakoš and David Crowell), with text by Casián-Lakoš’s mother Nela Lakoš — stands at the intersection of his own compositional sensibilities and Casián-Lakoš’s musical strengths, as well as her Croatian ancestry. Subtle utterances of Casián-Lakoš speaking Croatian are blended with organ-like electronics, which are derived from manipulations of Casián-Lakoš’s voice. From there, the work unfolds with Gregorian-style chanting alongside Casián-Lakoš’ cello. Eventually, samples of a sound unique to the city of Zadar makes its presence known: The Sea Organ. A symbiosis of human architecture and the unpredictability of nature, this “organ” is a marble stair in the Croatian coastal city of Zadar that contains an assortment of pipes in its steps, which are “played” by the ebb and flow of waves. Casián-Lakoš reemerges, singing more of her mother’s text. She describes a speaker who contemplates the vastness of the ocean and as Gersten describes it: “surrendering to and yet—with plainspoken sweetness—refusing the water’s power.”
Point / Cloud is a focused and eloquent expression of Crowell’s musical ideas, displaying the fruits of steady craft, lived experiences, and evolving artistic perspectives over the course of many years. The recording conveys a defined concept that is cleverly presented through styles of performance and composition of notably contrasting character. As mixer and producer of the album, Crowell’s first hand attention to detail in this regard allowed him to reflect upon and shape the sound of the music with even more artistic specificity.
About David Crowell: David Crowell is a composer and instrumentalist (saxophones, guitar) based in New York City. His work crosses stylistic boundaries, encompassing contemporary classical composition, improvisation, jazz, and experimental rock and pop. Artistic processes vary piece by piece, from composing purely for acoustic instruments to the use of electronics and manipulations of originally sampled sound. Improvisation plays an important role in generating material, either to exist on its own terms or for later development in a more deliberate compositional manner.
Commissioning ensembles have included JACK Quartet, A Far Cry, Argus Quartet, Alarm Will Sound, New Morse Code, NOW Ensemble, Sandbox Percussion, and icarus Quartet. Recent new works for the Argus Quartet (2021) and Unheard-of//Ensemble (2023) have both been supported by Individual Artist Grants from the New York State Council on the Arts. A new work for string orchestra was commissioned by Dumbarton Oaks for A Far Cry, which premiered the piece in April 2022. Crowell was also the Musician In Residence at Dumbarton Oaks in spring 2021. He performed internationally as a member of the Philip Glass Ensemble from 2007-16, including a three-year international tour of Einstein on the Beach and ten complete performances of Music in Twelve Parts. Crowell has also played with the Bang on a Can All-Stars, New York Philharmonic, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Steve Reich, Signal Ensemble, and Asphalt Orchestra.
Track List:
Point / Cloud
Music by David Crowell
1. Verses for a Liminal Space [14:33]
2. Point / Cloud I [4:01]
3. Point / Cloud II [3:47]
4. Point / Cloud III [4:22]
5. Pacific Coast Highway [4:55]
6. 2 Hours in Zadar [9:48]
Total Time: [41:26]
David Crowell, electronics; Iva Casián-Lakoš, cello, spoken word, vocals; Sandbox Percussion: Jonny Allen, Victor Caccese, Ian Rosenbaum, Terry Sweeney, percussion; Dan Lippel, guitar; Mak Grgić, guitar.
Verses for a Liminal Space
Performed by Sandbox Percussion
Engineered by Mike Tierney at Bunker Studio in Brooklyn, NY
Point / Cloud
Performed by Dan Lippel
Engineered by Ryan Streber at Oktaven and David Crowell in Ditmas Park, NY
Pacific Coast Highway
Performed by Dan Lippel and Mak Grgić
Engineered by John Schneider at Earthstar Creation Center
2 Hours in Zadar
Performed by eco|tonal (Iva Casián-Lakoš and David Crowell)
Croatian Text by Nela Lakoš
Engineered by Aaron Nevezie at Bunker Studio and David Crowell in Long Island City, NY
Produced and Mixed by David Crowell
Mastered by Charles Van Kirk
Artwork by Rebecca Crowell
Cover Design by Kate Gentile
Notes by Jennifer Gersten