James Tenney

Postal Pieces

Genre: MODERN CLASSICAL / AMBIENT

Colour LP

Boomkat Product Review:

James Tenney was a student of composition under John Cage, Harry Partch and Edgard Varèse, among others, and ‘Postal Pieces’ (1965 - 1971) is arguably his most well known and influential project, driven by a lifelong interest in incorporating observations of everyday life into his work. To that end, he summoned his friends - including Pauline Oliveros, La Monte Young, Harold Budd, Philip Corner, Max Neuhaus and others - to compose new music based off obscure instructions he sent them by postcard (replicas of which are included as inserts), offering only cryptic, ostensibly humdrum directions.

Tenney helped kickstart the plunderphonic movement when he pillaged an Elvis Presley recording in 1961 on 'Collage No.1 (Blue Suede) (for tape)', but swiftly moved into computer music, working at Bell Labs in New Jersey on some of the earliest examples of algorithmically composed and computer synthesised music. He came up with 'Postal Pieces' when he was living in New York City and working closely with Fluxus, and finished it some years later after taking a position at CalArts. The complete set features 11 pieces (or "Scorecards" as Tenney called them), and on this edition five have been selected from The Barton Workshop and James Fulkerson's acclaimed 2003 recordings.

Composed using percussion (played by Bulgarian artist Tatiana Koleva), 'Maximusic' is a dedication to experimental percussionist and composer Max Neuhaus and followed these basic instructions: “the sound of a motorbike on the freeway, heard from afar on a damp June evening." It's a mind-opening recording; for almost half of its seven-minute duration Tenney emphasises elongated, oddly-pitched metallic tones that sound brilliantly contemporary, lurching into roaring, repetitive rhythmic rolls in the second act.

The cheekily titled 'Having Never Written a Note for Percussion', dedicated to American percussionist John Bergamo, is even more dumbfounding. Tenney only gave sparse instructions to his solo performer: a single note must be rolled from quadruple pianissimo to quadruple fortissimo, and the piece should be very long. You might have caught it before - Rrose interpreted it back in 2015 using a 32-inch gong - but on this version, Tobias Liebezeit turns bleak Köner-like drones into nervously rattling hisses and hums.

Written for Harold Budd, 'For Percussion Perhaps, Or... (Night)' is the album’s most elegiac piece, with Tenney instructing: "very soft... very long... nearly white..." James Fulkerson handles the instrumentation, playing trombone and live electronics to stretch out long notes that harmonise with Budd's signature playing style. The disc is finished off with two more closely related pieces: 'Cellogram', dedicated to Juilliard String Quartet cellist Joel Krosnick, and 'Beast', written for jazz and classical bassist Buell Neidlinger. These compositions fully challenge our pre-conceptions of the instruments: 'Cellogram' using a pair of notes that phase against each other as they slide along the cello, and 'Beast' examining the obtuse rhythms held within the double bass's wavering resonant frequencies.

If you need an introduction to Tenney's canon, ‘Postal Pieces’ is the perfect place to start - offering five pieces that help define the sheer breadth of his musical interests, and the enduring influence of his work in the years since they were made.

Colour LP (5)

Edition of 300 pressed on brat vinyl, including a download and a printed inner housing an anti-static sleeve plus an insert/Obi. Comes with exact replicas of the original graphic scores as postcards and new liner notes from Bradford Bailey.

Play All Colour LP (5)