Albums I Liked in 2010: Regis Campo Pop-Art

This is the first in a series of columns recapping the albums I enjoyed in 2010. Feel free to submit your personal favorites in the comments section. Audio clips are posted below the text.

Each year brings sounds both new and old to one's attention. Pop-Art, an album featuring three works by French composer Régis Campo (b. 1968), technically belongs to the latter classification, even though it was released in the not-so-olden days of 2005.

Regardless of release date, there is something quite fresh about Campo's sound world.  This stems less from a unique stylistic perspective and more from a palpable buoyancy that permeates his musical discourse. Rhythmic activity is typically fast-paced and syncopated, propelling one idea effortlessly into the next. The disc's opening work, Concerto pour piano et orchestre (1998/1999) exemplifies this quality. During the first 40 seconds, the piano's repeated patterns of delicate cluster chords accelerate and break apart into streams of cascading pitches (listen below). While methodical and deliberate, Campo makes this and many other such transformations come off seamlessly. It is exciting to behold.

The word "seamless" also describes the interaction between soloist and orchestra, with the latter often serving as an intricate extension of the piano rather than a wholly independent entity. Campo gives the pianist a virtuosic part that embodies traditional degrees of technical difficulty (including a cadenza that lasts over six and a half minutes). This piano-centric mentality is somewhat reminiscent of Chopin's piano concerti. Stylistically speaking, however, echoes of Berio (Points On the Curve to Find), Ligeti and Xenakis (the cadenza reminds me a bit of Evryali) abound.

Campo has impressively succeeded in adding a valuable contribution to the crowded field of piano concerti. And as I alluded to earlier, he doesn't do this by reinventing the genre. Rather, he deftly manipulates a compelling array of textural, timbral and formal fluctuations. Sometimes this is all one needs.

The middle work on the disc, Music to Hear (2000) for seven voices and five instruments, provides a nice contrast to the Concerto in terms of instrumentation and formal approach. Each of the seven short movements sets a Shakespeare sonnet and is comprised of a singular texture. As with the Concerto, the timbral interplay is quite intriguing. Voices often convey instrumental qualities. In the third movement, for instance, a soprano sounds very much like a clarinet (listen below). Regular shifting between pitch and noise also yields interesting results, especially in the second and fifth movements. At times Music to Hear verges on campiness, but, in my opinion, never quite succumbs.

The title track, Pop-art (2002) for flute, clarinet, violin, viola, cello and piano, ends things on a playful and even jubilant note. Campo says of this piece:

The playing styles are more developed than usual, so sometimes the player strokes the instrument, at others it is hit, sometimes it becomes a toy and is even furtively kissed (although only the flute and clarinet). Thus the underlying development of the work, as serious and strict as can be, is totally masked by these various theatrical aspects.

Pop-art is indeed highly theatrical and a fun listen. Given these qualities and its Pierrot-esque instrumentation, I'm surprised Pop-art isn't programmed with greater frequency. The same could be said for the other two pieces on this disc.

Campo's music offers a number of technical hurdles which all of the performers (Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France with Jay Gottlieb, Musicatreize and Ensemble des Lauréats du Conservatoire with Kanako Abe) handle admirably. Most importantly, each performance highlights the mercurial and visceral nature of Campo's music, qualities that make me want to listen again and again.