FEDERICO DAL POZZO – Untitled_VNZ (KrysaliSound, 2018) Identificata dalla sigla riportata nel titolo e dalla sua stessa iconografia come una dedica alla città di Venezia, la nuova opera di Federico Dal Pozzo è tuttavia qualcosa di ben diverso da una cartolina turistica. Non soltanto per l’origine veneziana dell’artista, ma soprattutto per il suo peculiare approccio […]
Truly showing love for his surroundings, Federico Dal Pozzo opts for a peculiar form of sound poetry on “Untitled_VNZ”. Forgoing melody, rhythm, or traditional music composition, the whole of the work has a voyeuristic quality to it. By opting for such an intimate nature, the whole of the piece seems to simply drift off into the infinite. Over the course of the piece Federico Dal Pozzo lets the work evolve in a way that feels fully organic. Nearly pastoral in its focus, everything about it has a tactile quality. Keeping things to the essentials means that Federico Dal Pozzo lets the essential elements of the work shine through and shine brightly with a tremendous amount of spirit.
From the smallest of hushed gestures, the whole of the piece progresses quite nicely. Exploring space becomes of the utmost importance for everything stems from this need to focus ever more intensely on tiny moments. The usage of echo feels particularly fine because everything gets heavily magnified from these elements. Layer upon layer of sound comes into the mix lending it a stream of consciousness style. Around the latter half of the work things become more digital in nature, eventually transforming into the stuttering electronics and glitches that end it.
Meditative to its very core and offering a glimpse at the many small universes of sound just outside the usual levels of perception “Untitled_VNZ” shows off Federico Dal Pozzo’s uncanny ability to sculpt an aural environment.
“Stilhedens Strømmen I Fuglenes Blod” (published as a self-release in 2015) is a brave acoustic guitar suite, delicate and magnetic, recorded in a perfect balance between ambient and folk. The result is spiritual and meditative flow where the listener can dive and let himsel be lulled by repeating melodies, evocative small variations and a great hypnotic style.”
øjeRUM is the work of the prolific Danish artist Paw Grabowski whose music has appeared on labels such as Unknown Tone, Midira, Eilean Rec, Fluid Audio and others. He’s equally known for his collages that have appeared on his and other releases.
“Stilhedens Strømmen I Fuglenes Blod” which translates to “The Flow Of Silence In The Blood Of Birds” is a single thirty minute piece with lo-fi sounds that feel like you are listening to an old warped cassette. Field recordings join acoustic guitar and minor drones to give off a folk feel. Layers of guitars and sounds such as chimes give off a feeling of loneliness and solitude. With the repetition of the piece it can become hypnotic and with the space in the recording, the track allowed to breathe and space for other elements to filter in. That said when it got to the final five minutes is when my interest rose as much as I like minimal music, on this piece I was craving bit more interaction from drones, field recordings or other instruments.
Federico Dal Pozzo is a Turin based concrete composer and musician. With a past based in percussion and musical studies “His works, appointed “Untitled_” are based upon concrete objects and the transfiguration and perception of the sound and audio-spatialization. He’s a Sound Designer in various theatre and dance companies in Italy, France, Belguim and Israel. He works in various Italian Foundations for Audio-Installations and Live Performance (Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo, Castello di Rivoli, Promotrice dell Belle Arti…)”
“Untitled_VNZ” is a piece coming in at just under 50 minutes that covets a great amount of musical distance mainly broken down into movements or sections that fuse together. It is a free form piece that lies in the experimental / electroacoustic style with field recordings, drones, glitches, noises constantly evolving throughout the piece. There are build ups, use of space, silences and walls of sound. Occasionally more traditional instrumentation seem to come in, but for the whole this feels more akin to the likes of Francisco Lopez and a sound art piece than a musical one.
For fans of longform experimental sounds, this has a particularly clear mastering by label boss Francis M. Gri.
I’m so proud to announce that my work “Apart” is now available in store, released by the English label Whitelabrec. Thanks to Harry Towell for this opportunity…
Hurry up and buy the last copies of this limited edition!
Each highly limited collectable Whitelabrecs release is built around a set format as follows:
50 x vinyl-effect CDrs with card vinyl-style sleeves, rubber stamped titling, a polaroid print of the cover artwork housed inside a plastic case to keep it looking mint. Ink, font style and sleeve colours will vary for each release, chosen by the artist.
https://whitelabrecs.bandcamp.com/album/apart
Federico Dal Pozzo’s latest Krysalisound recording is full of minute pleasures, an ice race avoiding the pinnacle of an all out avalanche. Instead, the sound waves are condensed drone designs based on sound design in its purest form: hum and counterpoint.
Much of the music relies on driving ground fissures, trips to metropolis, and like being stuck in a bunker, a firm grasp of the natural architecture of buildings. So in all, the music is wide ranging with all the experimentalism of a electromagnet inside a complex tape loop studio. One just has to tap on “play” to drift off to the hums of wonder within…
My favourite thing about “VZ0” is its concentric circles, its eddies and loops. These loops transform your sonic environment and offset any energy required to listen to them, meaning they are positively enveloping. I find nothing negative about this record, it’s very pure, and succinctly put in its stylistic symbolism. It seems to enact a constructed set of poles that keep tessellating among moving waves of dozy sound.
And there are washes of rhythmic passivity too, nothing aggressively done, just true float, real drift and weaving, like a spellcasting, mischievous witch, sunning herself in a weather mirror. These sounds move slowly over the lands like rays of the sun, forever sparkling and coming from a much deeper, encrusted whole.
Perhaps one’s true intent becomes known from drones like these. In the searches for deeper meaning, and in general deep thought about life, the mirror reflects back on itself to a projection of powerful musical dualism to soothe the soul. A just exercise, given that the music is only heard when humans choose to listen. Krysalisound label is this under the radar that you can afford to give a unassuming drone suite some companionship, and possibly an endorsement, because this particular experiment is very fine indeed.
So yes, not an avalanche of white noise, rather some of the quietest yet most ruminative music I’ve heard in the last 12 months. Recommendable lusciousness for Steve Roach and Robert Rich fans alike, it’s sure to put a wry smile on the sleep ambient scene’s brow.
Condensare, sintetizzare l’esperienza della città ma anche il “concetto” di Venezia: questo il senso della sigla VNZ nel nuovo “Untitled_” di Federico Dal Pozzo, che dopo il recente “TeVeT” prosegue la sua collaborazione con la Krysalisound di Francis M. Gri.
Elaborando in tempo reale varie sorgenti concrete e field recordings, l’autore realizza con mano sapiente e delicata – seppur decisamente poco ortodossa – un “concerto” acusmatico dedicato a questo scrigno di storia e tradizione, luogo dell’anima che sembra suonare autonomamente la propria sinfonia, “e non c’è mano grande abbastanza da voltare le pagine dello spartito”.
Non poteva essere altro che l’acqua, dunque, l’elemento primario di questa libera astrazione lagunare: stille d’acqua purissima sfiorano la superficie sonora, la accarezzano finché non passano gradatamente allo stato solido, tintinnando e propagando la loro eco tutt’intorno; le onde gentili delle manipolazioni elettroacustiche imitano fruscii di nastri e vecchi vinili; in secondo piano si ripetono i versi di una recitazione sconnessa, come frammenti sparsi di un già criptico monologo beckettiano; un’insistente nota di pianoforte insegue la propria scia in crescendo risonanti alla Charlemagne Palestine.
Al ventesimo minuto sembra chiudersi brevemente il sipario, ma con il reingresso le epifanie strumentali divengono più costanti, benché ugualmente sfuggenti. Si odono i rintocchi di un campanile in lontananza, laddove in superficie acute scie elettroniche vorticano lentamente, fluttuando su un asse verticale lungo tutta la gamma delle altezze.
Superata abbondantemente la mezz’ora, l’atmosfera in prevalenza tonale fa spazio ad aspri ronzii statici in stereofonia, come di vecchi schermi catodici cui non rimane altro che un muto dialogo tra simili – e non è forse vero che quel flusso continuo di sfrigolanti linee bianco-nere somiglia allo scrosciare indisturbato di un fiume in piena?
In questo stesso solco giunge a compimento l’opera, con un finale che stende una sottile patina di rumore bianco, sgomberando il campo da qualunque stralcio descrittivo evocato in precedenza. L’intero excursus finisce col somigliare a un processo di rimozione, anziché a una nostalgica mappatura sonora della città in cui Dal Pozzo è nato: il suo “Untitled”, semmai, raduna impulsi inconsci entro un paesaggio troppo annebbiato e opaco per lasciarci vedere la cartolina di una Serenissima che, in ogni caso, non si può più definire tale. Di quel paradigma romantico, dell’eleganza e prestigio che avrebbe voluto tramandare in eterno, resta oggi soltanto un’ombra.
[krysalisound] Riflessi di una città catturati per essere ricombinati in un flusso che ne evochi l’essenza. È un omaggio alla sua Venezia quello composto da Federico Dal Pozzo in “Untitled_VNZ”, audioracconto costruito modulando e ricombinando estemporaneamente l’ampia tavolozza di suoni raccolti sul campo per dare forma ad un percorso avvolgente e suggestivo. Plasmando in tempo […]
We’ve some big news to announce and that’s that Harry (the label owner) will be having a baby in October, so things may slow down just a little towards the end of the year as he adjusts to a few changes… There’s a lot of the schedule to work to so the plan is step […]
FEDERICO DAL POZZO “Untitled_VNZ” is now available in store in digital format and handmade packaging.
“Untitled_VNZ” is an acousmatic concert dedicated to Venice and its sound. A sound that vibrates of water, stone, re, metal , all of which in a continuous movement of sensorial and mnemonic evolution. Time becomes water that collects re exes of our hearing and later absorbing to design a story of echo in new notions of forms. An orchestrated composition from the city’s topology, a city that makes one think of music papers in a continuously played music: the scores come together like sea waves, the pentagram bars are canals with its numerous “legato” of bridges, of high churches windows, and let’s not forget the violins on the edge on the gondolas. Its Music is bigger than the orchestra, and there is no hand big enough to ip the score sheet.
Krysalisound
“Untitled_VNZ” is an acousmatic concert dedicated to Venice and its sound. A sound that vibrates of water, stone, re, metal , all of which in a continuous movement of sensorial and mnemonic evolution. Time becomes water that collects re exes of our hearing and later absorbing to design a story of echo in new notions of forms. An orchestrated composition from the city’s topology, a city that makes one think of music papers in a continuously played music: the scores come together like sea waves, the pentagram bars are canals with its numerous “legato” of bridges, of high churches windows, and let’s not forget the violins on the edge on the gondolas. Its Music is bigger than the orchestra, and there is no hand big enough to ip the score sheet.
RELEASE DATE: 24.06.18
