Since its first release, Telyn Rawn (Horsehair Harp in English) — a solo Rhodri Davies album on which he played eighteen pieces on horsehair harp, studio-recorded in Newcastle-upon-Tyne, in January 2020, and released in July 2020 — Davies' own label AMGEM has steadily built a reputation; as a label, it is worth checking out whenever it releases an album, about twice a year on average. Of the label's first ten albums, eight were credited to Davies himself, good news as he remains as adventurous and versatile as ever.
Of the albums not credited to Davies, Dyslexic Harp is credited to French saxophonist Jean-Luc Guionnet whose artwork adorns the front of each AMGEN album, giving them a coherent house style. Although Davies played the piece on pedal harp, Guionnet was responsible for composing, recording, editing, mixing and mastering it. The second album not credited to Davies is Relics of the Horsehair Harp (Creiriau Delyn Rawn in Welsh) credited to various artists. As its title suggests it is a companion piece to the label's first album, Telyn Rawn; Davies selected some favourite musicians to respond to the eighteen improvised pieces on that album; each musician was asked to imagine that the music improvised in 2020 was ancient music which had existed in the medieval period...
There is not room to list all the musicians Davies recruited or their instruments; however, the names of a few give a taste of the album's quality and variety — Laura Cannel, recorders, Orphy Robinson, marimba, Ko Ishikawa, sho, Stevie Wishart, hurdy-gurdy, C Spenser Yeh, computer and mouse, Pat Thomas, electronics — suffice to say that the album's soundscapes are radically different to those of Telyn Rawn and that all the musicians were very creative and imaginative in following Davies' instructions. Listening to the two albums back-to-back, it is not difficult to hear the influence of the 2020 one on the 2024 one. In fact, the two complement one another so well that they deserve to be heard together. With that in mind, both are very highly recommended.
Comments and Feedback:
|
