Teresa Hackel/Eiko Yamada

Alexey Kruglov/Masami Suzuki
Song for My Friend. Seaside Conversation
Contempora 022

Serendipitously drawn to sonically define sea coastlines these dual reeds duos consisting of one European and one Japanese player have created programs that are similarly imposing, but otherwise couldn’t be more different. Fishermen’s Souvenirs is a four-track, 50 minute display of manipulating and molding timbres from a collection of five recorders played by German Teresa Hackel and Japanese Eiko Yamada, improvised in the Fishermen’s Chapel in Leigh-on-Sea, a fishing town near London. More distinctive still, Song for My Friend. Seaside Conversation lasts only slightly more than 11 minutes, but was recorded at the same time 600 kilometres apart by Russian Alexey Kruglov playing recorder and alto saxophone on the island of Sakhalin on the shores of the Okhotsk Sea, while as Masami Suzuki played soprano saxophone and the bamboo flute at Niigata on the Sea of Japan. Recorded by each musician, the disparate results were mixed by Kruglov.

One of the Russian Federation’s outstanding improvisers, Kruglov has played with everyone from Simon Nabatov to Vladamir Tarasov; while Yamada has recorded with Ulrich Phillipp and Fumi Endo. Lesser known Hackle has worked with Caroline Kraabel; and Suzuki with other local improvisers. Oddly enough both Japanese players share their name with two of the country’s most popular entertainers.

Entertainment is not the raison d’être of either of these discs. The UK-recorded Eurasian duo meeting is dedicated to proving the versatility of the recorder often dismissed as a children’s instrument. Throughout the Maritime session, the wheezes and tootles played on the higher-pitched recorders are supplemented by the concentrated and resonate tones of the bass and great bass recorders that suggest the depth of the ocean floor. Often lyrical, the soprano and tenor recorder timbres are thinned for puffing decorations and projected as lyrical expositions. Intertwined and often played in tandem, the thick, jagged and often nearly unbroken lower tones frequently create an underlying continuum. As well, their uneven breaths and loaded gulps can be splayed and squeezed to add to the color wheel of textures. This is done with consistent blowing and buzzing propulsions that cleave onto the ascending squeaks and twitters. Besides antiphony and accompaniment, subtle matching of yelps and whoops are shaped into paced expositions when both musicians use similarly pitched instrument.

As linked to the ocean’s ruggedness as the Hackel/Yamada duets recall the pacific mementos and memorabilia of successful voyages, Song for My Friend. Seaside Conversation begins with the bellicose roar of foaming water and never neglects the sea’s wildness on either side of the shores.. As often as mellow vibrations and peeps are heard so too are thickened and rugged watery growls and foghorn-like echoes. In spite of expressing a variety of pitches and tempos with their instruments, roaring surf is sometimes as prominent as singular tandem bonded expositions. Even after the reed tones sound, wildness water’s ferociousness is heard and acknowledged.

Never at sea, despite their proximity, these celebrations of water, wildness and fishers also highlight the skill of dual intercontinental reed interaction.

–Ken Waxman

Track Listing: Fishermen: 1. Souvenir I 2. Souvenir II 3. Souvenir III 4. Souvenir SIV

Personnel: Fishermen: Teresa Hackel (Helder tenor recorder, Paetzold great bass recorder and  treble recorder) and Eiko Yamada (soprano recorder, treble recorder, tenor recorder and bass recorder)

Track Listing: Song: 1. Song for My Friend. Seaside Conversation

Personnel:Song: Alexey Kruglov (alto saxophone, recorder and voice) and Masami Suzuki (soprano saxophone, Noh-kan and voice)