Search - Simeon Ten Holt, Oldenburg, Veen, S., Veen, J. Piano Ensemble Russo, Fred Oldenburg :: Simeon ten Holt: Complete Multiple Piano Works [Box Set]

The musical equivalent of a long, rainy day in the flat coun

Discophage | France | 09/19/2008

(4 out of 5 stars)

"From disc to disc, I am going from record to record. Only recently did I listen to 10 hours and 15 minutes of Minimalist piano on a similar Dutch-originated 9-CD collection by Brilliant - pieces of Glass, Nyman, Adams, Cage, Pärt, Satie, even Nietzsche and other less prominent composers, including a few Dutch ones, played by pianist and composer Jeroen van Veen, who also appears here (Minimal Piano Collection [Box Set]). It is in fact that set that directed me to the present one. It contained a superb piece by Simeon Ten Holt, Solodevilsdance No. 4, which immediately prompted me to want to listen to more of this composer. And more is exactly what you get here: 11 CDs, 11hours and 41 minutes.



Simeon ten Holt is a Dutch composer born in 1923. He studied with Jakob van Domselaer and in Paris with Milhaud and Honegger, then went through various compositional phases, first struggling out of van Domselaer's tonal influence, then becoming serially tonal (Berg obviously proves that this in no contradiction in terms), e.g. striving to organize the tonal material according to serial principles. But it is really his embrace of repetitive music, with his seminal Canto Ostinato (1976-1976, here featured on discs 1 & 2) that made his breakthrough to wide public attention in his home country - and, as could be expected, controversy.



I have a problem with the accepted term "minimalism". I prefer to reserve it to music - illustrated by Feldman, Cage sometimes, and in Europe Scelsi, Sciarrino or Lachenmann - that moves at the edge of nothingness, mostly slow-moving and based on very few and sparse musical events, each acquiring great dramatic impact. What is usually designated by the term "minimalism" - the music exemplified by LaMonte Young, Adams, Glass, Reich, Riley, Nyman, Gorecki, Pärt, Tavener - I prefer to coin "repetitive music". It is based on the repetition of basic structures, rhythmic/melodic cells, simple musical phrases, and while the basic elements can be minimal, the processes of subtle evolution out-of-sync tempos of the various voices, tiling and layering to which they are subjected can produce fairly busy results.



As much as I enjoy minimalist music as I've defined it, I must confess also to having some problems with repetitive music. It is not the repetition I mind - like everybody else I enjoy Ravel's Bolero - but the simplistic, predictable and neo-romantically saccharine harmonies that usually come with the music of Glass and Adams. Is there something to repetition that necessarily entails the tonic, dominant, sub-dominant, tonic sequence worthy of the most trite supermarket music?



Fortunately, I find the music of ten Holt better than that.



All the pieces contained in this set date from his repetitive period. Except, who knows why, for Shadow nor Prey (1993-5) which comes on the last disc, they are presented in chronological order, starting with Canto Ostinato, then Lemniscaat (1982-3), Horizon (1983-5), Incantatie IV (1987-90), Meandres (1997). Except again for Shadow nor Prey (played by Fred Oldenburg and Jeroen van Veen), they are all played by the so-called "Piano Ensemble" comprised of the two former plus Sandra van Veen and Irene Russo, but the notes (disappointingly silent on the individual works) aren't entirely clear whether they are played on four pianos or less: it seems to be the case, but the booklet has a photo with a piano keyboard and eight hands; I suppose this is purely a publicity gig. Also, ten Holt's catalog at Donemus publications shows that Incantatie IV is scored for "keyboard (and other) instruments, five in all".



So ten Holt repeats. Obsessively. Eleven hours and forty minutes of repetition. Don't take this comment as disparaging. Except for LaMonte Young's well-tuned piano, these are the longest stretches of repetitive piano music to have come my way. Except for "Shadow nor Prey", each runs over two usually well-filled CDs, the shortest being "Meandres" (1997) with 1:46 (discs 9 & 10) and the longest Canto Ostinato with 2:28.



From piece to piece the compositional process is also repetitive. Ten Holt picks a very simple, catchy, almost ditty-like melody, based on simple intervals, the kind of obsessive tune that will go circles in your mind, played in a delicate staccato touch like some fine mechanism, and off you go. Each piece is made of anything between 100 and over 200 short sections, each being repeated at will until the performers move to the next one, the variation from one to the other being sometimes quasi imperceptible, sometimes more pronounced. The performers' clockwork regularity - an essential feature of this music - is impressive. But really, it is music that should be played by performer-less, computer-processed pianos. Meandre stands out somewhat for containing, in its Part II, two cadenzas which break the pattern of obsessive repetition (tracks 10/2 and 10/8 at 1:00), but it is nothing very dramatic. The music is tonal, but at least the harmonies aren't so sweet and saccharine as to be maudlin (unlike often with Glass or Adams). It could be music written for some neo-classical contemporary ballet ("no plot, just movement") or experimental film. Think of a long, rainy day in the flat country, or again a long, idle train ride in the flat country (possibly on a rainy day) and you'll get an idea.



When Ten Holt factors in some dynamic progression (as in Canto Ostinato), it usually goes from mezzo-piano to forte and back over a long span, but he is also happy to remain for a long time in a given dynamic range, between mezzo-piano and mezzo-forte. He also likes to use the jazzy off-beat chordal syncopation in the upper range.



I wouldn't say that I always listened very intently, but the music does produce a certain entrancing effect - like your favorite song played over and over again. I have gone to sleep on it, and played it over in the morning. I've played it while writing this review, or others, or bidding on the famous auction site. It nicely fills the void of ambient silence. It is a hypnotic journey.

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