TEN TRACKS TO TEST YOUR SYSTEM ON PIANO DAY
Why does the world need a Piano Day? For many reasons,” says Berlin-based pianist/ composer and Piano Day founder Nils Frahm. “But mostly it doesn’t hurt to celebrate the piano and everything around it: performers, composers, piano builders, tuners, movers and, most important, the listener.”
We’re happy to join the piano party, so we’ve put together some of our favourite pieces of piano music for testing your system. You can listen to these ten and the rest of our selections on our streamingservice playlists, and read about them on our website.
SON OF PARASOL BY LUBOMYR MELNYK
A label-mate of Frahm’s on Erased Tapes, Lubomyr Melnyk is a pioneer of what he terms continuous piano music, a near-transcendental style where both hands are in constant motion and silence is welcomed only between each piece. Strong organisation is key to picking out overlapping patterns, as is a firm grip on timing and dynamics.
1/1 BY BRIAN ENO
The opening track from one of, if not the, finest ambient record of all time – Brian Eno’s Ambient 1: Music For Airports – 1/1 is dependent on the rich textures of its instruments and subtle dynamics within its sparse arrangement to lift the recurring piano line from the tarmac toward the clouds.
MUSIC FOR GYMNASTICS BY JORDAN DE LA SIERRA
Jordan De La Sierra, a student of both Terry Riley and Pandit Pran Nath, recorded his 1977 work Gymnosphere: Song Of The Rose in a small basement studio before playing the tapes at the walls of San Francisco’s Grace Cathedral and capturing the resulting echoes and reverberation. Mixing the two recordings together, the result is an ethereal sonic mist in which detail, timing and dynamics are put firmly to the test.
NUCLEAR WAR BY SUN RA
One of more than 1000 recordings by the indomitable Sun Ra, Nuclear War is a wry meditation on the effects of its title matter, set to a playful, jazzy relationship between piano and drums. Expect a disjointed performance from poorly timing hi-fi systems.
VESSEL BY JON HOPKINS
From Jon Hopkins’s 2009 album Insides, Vessel juxtaposes its lilting main piano line with fairly industrial manufactured beats and synthesizer buzzes. It’s well textured and digs deep into low frequencies to test mid/bass drivers for restraint and tonality. See also Four Tet’s equally marvellous reimagining.
LET’S FALL IN LOVE TONIGHT BY LEWIS
Few things are so pleasant on the ears as a rich and full-bodied midrange. This, from Lewis’s once lost debut record, revels in such atmospheres. The piano and accompanying pad synths are awash with loving warmth, while Lewis’s croon coats the arrangement like soft caramel.
ELEMENT. BY KENDRICK LAMAR
While DAMN. might not be so sprawling an example of genre experimentation as Kendrick Lamar’s preceding record, 2015’s To Pimp A Butterfly, the Californian rapper is never pedestrian with his instrumentation. The ominous repetition of the sampled piano line in ELEMENT. is only truly revealed by a rhythmically aware hi-fi set-up.
U BY DJ SEINFELD
Despite being heavily treated with digital effects by DJ Seinfeld, the piano in U is proof of the instrument’s recognisable character, despite what a producer may do to it. The tonality and attack are unmistakeable, as is the need for a well-organised and well-balanced system to make the most of this lo-fi house gem.
DISINTEGRATION BY RYUICHI SAKAMOTO
Somewhat the antithesis of Lubomyr Melnyk’s continuous piano, this piece from Ryuichi Sakamoto makes as much use of the spaces between the notes, letting each staccato jab decay before the next, as it does any kind of melody. Detail and sonic insight is key to realising the experimentation of this piece.
GNOSSIENNE: NO. 1 BY ERIK SATIE
One of the most famous works by likely the foremost architect of minimalism, Gnossienne: No. 1’s sombre march relies on strong expression as much as detail, timing or balance to display its near-surrealistic sense of movement. The Gymnopédies, equally, ought to feel decidedly lavish in spite of their bare instrumentation.