Night After Night

Performance Review: David Lang, the loser

Originally published by National Sawdust Log on Sept. 30, 2016.

David Lang: the loser

Presented by BAM Next Wave Festival
Howard Gilman Opera House, Brooklyn Academy of Music, Brooklyn, NY
Reviewed on Sept. 9, 2016

By Steve Smith
Photographs: Richard Termine

If you’ve followed the career of David Lang, the Pulitzer Prize-winning composer and co-founder of the revolutionary activist new-music collective Bang on a Can, for any significant amount of time, you might…umm…worry just a little bit. Not about his talent, originality, or capacity for innovation, certainly. But if you’ve been around from near the start, you kind of have to wonder about Lang’s seeming preoccupation with cruelty, extending from early works up to the loser, the 60-minute opera for solo baritone, piano, and small ensemble presented in its world premiere at the Brooklyn Academy of Music’s Howard Gilman Opera House Sept. 7-11.

Okay, I’m kidding—I’m not actually concerned about Lang, a friendly and generous member of the musical community. Still, it’s hard to overlook the darkness that runs through several of his prominent works. Remember the unsettling start of his 1987 piece Are You Experienced? “Hello, I’m David Lang,” the composer recites, deadpan. “I know you were looking forward to hearing this piece, but something terrible has just happened. While we were busy setting up, someone crept up silently behind you and dealt a quick blow to the side of your head.”

What follows is droll, clinical, and morbid by turns, set to some of Lang’s most insouciant, peppy music. Further examples would follow: the ominous mystery of the difficulty of crossing a field, the chilly anguish of little match girl passion, the amorous torment of love fail, the livid guignol of anatomy theater. Lang seems fascinated by dark matter, responding with settings that are not just provocative, but also distinct, individual, and strikingly empathetic.

Playlist.

King Crimson  - Radical Action (To Unseat the Hold of Monkey Mind) (DGM/Panegyric)

Uton and Ø+yn/Bird People and Creation VI - Monster Collab (Cosmic Winnetou)

Strom Noir - The White Colour of the Clouds (Cosmic Winnetou)

Wadada Leo Smith - America's National Parks (Cuneiform; due Oct. 14)

An Elm - Fly Pan Am (Cosmic Winnetou)

Guenter Schlienz - Evocations (Makrame)

Tredici Bacci - Amore Per Tutti (NNA; due Nov. 11)

Reid Anderson - The Vastness of Space (Fresh Sound)

King Crimson - "One More Red Nightmare," "Larks' Tongues in Aspic, Part II," "Pictures of a City," "Epitaph" - 2016 European Tour downloads (DGMLive)

Cecil Taylor Unit - One Too Many Salty Swift and Not Goodbye (hatOLOGY)

Beat Keller - String Trios Nos. 1, 2, 3, 3b, 4, 5, 6; Tom Johnson: 12, 3, 2; 6, 3, 2 (from Networks); Joseph Kudirka - String Trio - Haiku String Trio (Edition Wandelweiser)

Manfred Werder - 2003 (Edition Wandelweiser)
> stück 2003 (1) - Erik Carlson, Stephanie Richards, D. Edward Davis; stück 2013 (2) - Erik Carlson; stück 2013 (3) - Erik Carlson, Stephanie Richards

Sergio Merce - be nothing (Edition Wandelweiser)

Daniel Schmidt and the Berkeley Gamelan - In My Arms, Many Flowers (Recital)

Giovanni Fontana - Epigenetic Poetry 1968-2014 (Recital)

Matthew Sullivan - Skene (Recital)

The Caretaker - Everywhere at the end of time (History Always Favors the Winners)

Playlist.

Steve Flato - Road to Ruins (Abrash)

Warfather - The Grey Eminence (Greyhaze)

King Crimson - "Easy Money," "Suitable Grounds for the Blues," "Sailors Tale," "Starless," "Level Five" - 2016 European Tour downloads (DGMLive)

Pearl Jam - Fenway Park, Boston, MA, Aug. 5, 2016 (Pearl Jam)

Joda Clément - Sea Songs (Caduc)

Taku Sugimoto - Mada - Ryoko Akama, Cristéan Alvear, Cyril Bondi, D'Incise (Caduc)

Santiago Astaburuaga - Grado de Potencia #1 (Caduc)

Eric Wubbels - Duos with Piano: Book I - Wet Ink Ensemble (Carrier)
> Shiverer - Erin Lesser, Eric Wubbels; "the children of fire come looking for fire" - Josh Modney, Eric Wubbels; doxa - Ian Antonio, Eric Wubbels; This is This is This is - Alex Mincek, Eliot Gattegno, Eric Wubbels

Metallica - U.S. Bank Stadium, Minneapolis, MN, Aug. 20, 2016 (YouTube)

Suzanne Ciani - Buchla Concerts 1975 (Finders Keepers)

Suzanne Ciani - Seven Waves (AMS)

Graham Lambkin - Salmon Run (Kye)

Darcy James Argue's Secret Society - Real Enemies (New Amsterdam; due Sept. 30)

Pere Ubu - Elitism for the People 1975-1978 (Fire)

Amirtha Kidambi Elder Ones - Holy Science (Northern-Spy; due Nov. 11)

Anniversary.

Fall and all attendant memories
Crowd the day with unrelated histories
Each year leaves its unresolving fantasies
To hang around each corner
Hang around each street.

Thick with ghosts, the wind whips round in circuitries
Carrying words as strangers exchange pleasantries
Do they intrude upon your private reveries
As they meet you on each corner
Meet you on each street.

Watch for daily braveries
Notice newfound courtesies
Finger sudden legacies
As they clean up every corner
Wash down every street.

Mark the month and all its anniversaries
Put away the draft of all your eulogies
Clear the way for all your private memories
As they meet you on each corner
Meet you on each street.

Make the time for all your possibilities
They live on every street.

Suzanne Vega, "Anniversary," from Beauty & Crime (Blue Note, 2007)

Playlist.

Thalia Zedek Band - Eve (Thrill Jockey)

Come - 11:11 (Matador)

Uzi - Sleep Asylum (Homestead)

Dangerous Birds - "Alpha Romeo"/"Smile on Your Face" (Propeller Product)

Live Skull - Dusted (Homestead)

Live Skull - Snuffer (Caroline)

E - E (Thrill Jockey; due Nov. 11)

Wrekmeister Harmonies - Live in NYC (Capitan)

Black Sabbath - Master of Reality (Warner Bros./Rhino)

DJMagic - "Rest in Peace Borh Da TLC (Tribute)" (GQOM OH!)

Anthony Braxton - Complete Language Solos (Sound American/Tri-Centric Foundation)

Grachan Moncur III - Evolution (Blue Note)

Andrew Hill - Point of Departure (Blue Note)

Anthony Williams - Life Time (Blue Note)

Herbie Hancock - Maiden Voyage (Blue Note)

Larry Young - Unity (Blue Note)

Greg Ward & 10 Tongues - Touch My Beloved's Thought (Greenleaf Music)

Arthur Blythe - "Faceless Woman" (from Basic Blythe) (Columbia)

</Boston>

 

<highway>

Demdike Stare - Tryptych (Modern Love)

Grateful Dead - Dave's Picks, Vol. 19: Honolulu Civic Auditorium, Honolulu, HI, Jan. 23, 1970 (Grateful Dead/Rhino)

King Crimson - Islands (DGM)

</highway>

 

<New York City>

Radiohead - A Moon Shaped Pool (XL Recordings)

Johannes Brahms - Piano Trio No. 2 in C - Christian Tetzlaff, Tanja Tetzlaff, Lars Vogt (Ondine)

Eliane Radigue - Geelriandre / Arthesis (Senufo Editions)

Jürg Frey - guitarist, alone - Cristián Alvear (Another Timbre)
> 50 Sächelchen; relikt; sen 23; guitarist, alone

Robert Rich - Nest (Soundscape)

Sarah Davachi - Dominions (JAZ Records)

Anne Guthrie - Codiaeum Variegatum (Students of Decay)

Alex Cobb - Marigold and Cable (Shelter Press)

Mathieu Ruhlmann + Chris Strickland - This Heap Is Greater Light (Glistening Examples)

Napalm Death - Utopia Banished (Earache)

Gustav Mahler - Symphony No. 3 in D minor - Beatrice Krebs, Westminster Choir, New York Philharmonic/Dimitri Mitropoulos (Music & Arts)

King Crimson - Queen Elizabeth Theatre, Toronto, Ontario, Canada, Nov. 20, 2015 (DGMLive)

Metallica - Kill/Ride Deluxe Edition 14-Track Sampler (Metallica.com)

Gorguts - Pleaides' Dust (Season of Mist)

Guido Gamboa - Saturday's Note (Penultimate Press)

Yoshi Wada - Off the Wall - Yoshi Wada, Wayne Hankin, Marilyn Bogerd, Andreas Schmidt Neri (Saltern)

Circle - Circle 1: Live in Germany Concert (Concord)

Anderson Wakeman Bruford Howe - Anderson Wakeman Bruford Howe (Arista)