Biography
Two of Constellation's acclaimed solo instrumental artists join forces on this tremendous new album of original compositions for horn and violin.
Stetson and Neufeld first began playing in duo formation while on tour together as soloists in 2012, joining each other on stage for one or two of their respective pieces. Stetson had also collaborated in the past with Bell Orchestre and Arcade Fire, and with Neufeld and Shahzad Ismaily in an improv trio dating back to 2010 (including the Blue Caprice soundtrack). Duo compositions for their debut album emerged throughout 2014, and were road-tested that spring with performances at the Festival de Musique Actuelle de Victoriaville (Canada) and Moers Festival (Germany). The album was recorded without overdubbing, looping, sampling, cutting or pasting at their farmhouse attic studio in rural Vermont by Hans Bernhard and mixed in Montreal by Mark Lawson (Arcade Fire).
"Never were the way she was" is guided by the metaphorical narrative of the life of a girl who ages slow as mountains; excited, exalted, and ultimately exiled in her search for a world that resembles her experience. The album's expansive sonic trajectory and multiplicity of structures and voicings belies the fundamental economy of two acoustic instruments combining in real time. The result is a musical chronicle that powerfully establishes its own spatial and temporal horizon, a soundtrack that requires no images but profoundly compels the imaginative. From the filigreed ostinato polyrhythms of “The sun roars into view” and “In the vespers” to the stately long tones of “And they still move”, the dark drone-inflected sea-saw waltz of “With the dark hug of time” to the growling, pulsing thrust of the album’s epic centerpiece “The rest of us”, Stetson and Neufeld offer up an incredible (and impressively diverse) integration of composition, performance, timbre and texture while holding their respective instruments in sparkling juxtaposition. Never were the way she was is a sum quite definitively and thrillingly greater than its parts.
Thanks for listening.
Release date: 28 April 2015
Running time: 42:51
PACKAGING NOTES
CD comes in a custom gatefold jacket printed on thick 24pt. paperboard with a printed CD dust sleeve. LP is pressed on 180 gram virgin vinyl at Optimal (Germany) and comes in a heavyweight jacket with black poly-lined audiophile dust sleeve, credit insert, pull-out art poster and download code for 320 kbps MP3 copy of the album.
TRACKLIST
1. The sun roars into view
2. Won't be a thing to become
3. In the vespers
4. And still they move
5. With the dark hug of time
6. The rest of us
7. Never were the way she was
8. Flight
CREDITS
PERSONNEL
All songs written and performed live (no overdubs/loops) by Colin Stetson (tenor and bass saxophones, contrabass clarinet) and Sarah Neufeld (violin, voice).
Engineered by Hans Bernhard at The End of the World.
Mixed by Mark Lawson at Sonobee.
Mastered by Harris Newman at Greymarket Mastering.
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