«Emanate» is the sophomore album of contemporary and new electronic music composers, Israeli, Belin-based Yair Elazar Glotman (who recently co-composed late Jóhann Jóhannsson’s «Last and First Men», Deutsche Grammophon, 2020) and Swedish, Stockholm-based Mats Erlandsson. Both explore their ideas of a ‘displaced sound’ with this extended duration composition that features an ensemble that employs electronic and acoustic sound sources through both analog and digital means. This process leads to a rich yet ambiguous work; dark, edgy, and bass-heavy soundscapes that sound neither clearly electronic or acoustic, existing in some in-between space, simultaneously static and yet continually shifting.
«Emanate» is also a nuanced sonic statement against our oversaturated digital age where omnipresent media connectivity enables instant gratification and a continuous flood of competing interests. It reacts against our snap judgments as we multitask through the flood of incoming information that leads to an erosion of our creativity and attention. Erlandsson adds that the title of this composition refers to its textural qualities. «How it feels or behaves – its inherent seeping or slowly unfolding tendencies, as if it is a gas or liquid emanating from somewhere. It also relates to the transfer of ideas and intentions happening through the making and publishing of a musical work, where the album acts as a sort of container».
Elazar Glotman and Erlandsson cite their sources of inspiration the influence of Renaissance vocal polyphony; Italian composer Giacinto Scelsi’s «PranamII composition» (1973); Hungarian-Austrian composer György Ligeti’s 1967 piece «Lontano» (already heard on the soundtrack to Stanley Kubrick’s «The Shining» and Martin Scorcese’s «Shutter Island»); as well as American electro-acoustic composer Ingram Marshall, and Iceland’s composer-producer Valgier Sigurðsson. «Emanate» was written and recorded in a gradual process, structured around the strict formal design of a three-part palindrome, following the pattern A1-B1-C-B2-A2. Each of these 5 parts is bridged by interludes (titled I-IV) which follow their own logic, working with the degradation and variable density of a separate, percussion-based material. Its first half is focused on a specific approach to tonal harmony – chordal or intervallic, contrapuntal/canonic, and melodic while throughout the second part these borders become blurred with material and approach from the different parts bleeding into one another. «Emanate» was recorded at Bonello studios in Berlin in February 2019, two days after it was performed at Berlin’s CTM festival. The piece was performed in its entirety twice, with the second take being selected as best, and later Elazar Glotman and Erlandsson layered additional overdubs.
If you need some out-of-time-and-space experience that would re-calibrate your senses anew, then this beautifully realized, the immersive composition is the place for you. «Emanate» may gently hypnotize you with its delicate ripples of the music.
Eyal Hareuveni
Lucy Railton (c), Liam Byrne (viola da gamba), Hilary Jeffery (tb), Simon Goff (vio), Viktor Orri Árnason (viola), Sara Fors (v), Maria W. Horn (org), Yair Elazar Glotman (b), Mats Erlandsson (zither, live tape manipulation), Mephisto Wunderbar (woodblock)
