Tonight’s round-up begins with “Strutt,” a piece which an artist and composer in Johannesburg, Givan Lötz, has loaded on his Soundcloud page; and but for its last extra letter, the title would be rather a straight-forward description of the character of the composition: this is music on the go.
His album Easy Now is available from the Jaunted Haunts Press.
Returning to Amsterdam, the second track is a work of the young Istanbul composer Mithatcan Öcal, which was premiered by the Nieuw Ensemble last year at the Muziekgebouw aan ’t IJ, entitled “Üngüjin,” a Turkish word (his explanatory text informs us) designating some sort of desert-dwelling ogre or inimical being whom one would most probably dearly want to avoid encountering; fortunately, however, the same cannot be said of this music itself, whose acquaintance it’s a pleasure to make: and Öcal’s further career should prove interesting to follow.
Significantly, “Üngüjin” is dedicated by Öcal to the memory of Iannis Xenakis.
To finish things off, from the first album, Silver Linings, issued two years ago by The Sandman’s Orchestra, a duo in Lille featuring the singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist Pierre Laplace and the singer Léonie Gabriel (they are uncle and niece), is the number “Hello Stranger,” uploaded on their Soundcloud page.
The release of their second album, Nocturne, is imminent.