Melbourne composer/ performer Anthony Parteras has the annoying propensity to make me feel ignorant on a regular basis. Some of the things he does to music/ sound are almost beyond comprehension. Somehow he manages to simultaneously appear structurally rigorous whilst maintaining the option of allowing anything happening at any time. It seems to be a peculiar schism to his psyche, the classical composer in him is continuously thwarted by this punk rock desire to fuck everything up, and it’s through this prism that I view his music. It’s when composers move beyond composing for conventional instrumentation or start notating unconventional approaches to conventional instrumentation that things start to get interesting. Pateras it seems can’t resist, mixing Robin Fox’s electronics with his own prepared piano (piano with bolts and cardboard stuck in the strings) alongside the Australian Chamber Orchestra’s violins, cello’s and viola, or if you want to take it up a level there’s Automatons his piece for 10 voices, 2 violas and electronics with Natasha Anderson and Errki Veltheim, a bizarre skittery subliminal burst of schizophrenia. His second album for John Zorn’s Tzadik label is less outlandish than it’s predecessor (i.e there are less dominos and balloons), yet it is remarkably diverse. The same trio from the previous track pop up again on When Objects Dream, a piece for contrabass recorder, prepared piano and violin, incorporating some similar frenzied scatter-gun runs, yet also delve into these quiet unsettling thumping moments before launching again, the piano thunderous but abrupt, in what I can only conclude was an improvised jam. Pateras also has a solo piece for electronics, JWT a controlled splurge of electrics that sounds like a synthesizer being peeled like an orange, with the timbre of the electrics so vivid it almost feels tactile. He works with the Ensemble of the Australian National Academy of Music, and a percussion quartet as well as the aforementioned configurations but be assured nothing is as you expect. Whilst his approach varies dramatically across the album there are some similarities across the works. You get the sense, for example, that he delights in releasing waves of density and activity then allowing it all to seep down gently into a near silent false sense of security before building attacking again. Must be that peculiar psyche. Classical music has never been so confrontational.
-Bob Baker Fish
