Sound visions for the guitar

Guitarist Elena Càsoli is always good for surprises. She is at the heart of today's music production and teaches guitar and interpretation of contemporary music at the Bern University of Music. On the Italian label stradivarius, she has already worked with StrongStrangeStrings caused a sensation, followed by Changes Chances with music by Cage, Carter and Riley.

Their latest CD is dedicated to the guitar music of the Italian spectral and computer musician Fausto Romitelli (1963-2004), who died at the age of just 41 after a long illness. Romitelli had studied in Milan and then continued his compositional training with Franco Donatoni. Following his interest in "sound research", he went to Paris in 1991 to come into contact with Hugues Dufourt and Gérard Grisey at IRCAM (Institut de Recherche et Coordination Acoustique/Musique). From 1993 to 1995 he was a "compositeur en recherche" there. As a young composer, he established himself as part of the "sound avant-garde" on the leading European stages for new music in the environment of Ligeti, Scelsi and Grisey and explored unheard-of sound dimensions, whether in the field of instrumental and vocal music or with electronics, live electronics and multimedia,

Elena Càsoli is also able to reveal Romitelli's visionary cosmos in his guitar pieces. Highly musical as she is, she creates the meticulously notated and therefore difficult to decipher scores with dramaturgical finesse and a multi-layered color palette.
Solar (1984) for solo guitar gives the CD its name. Càsoli knows how to make the quiet, shimmering beginning so exciting that you follow along with her with interest: it is a quiet piece full of surprises that unfolds a dramaturgically idiosyncratic and tonally differentiated poetry with few means. Càsoli is familiar with each of its finesses, and towards the end she even ponders the individual notes with a quiet hum.

The CD offers five first recordings, Solar is one of them. For the pieces that require two guitars or an electronic guitar, Càsoli has brought Virginia Arancio on board, as well as recorder player Teresa Hackel. This brings in Seascape (1994) and Simmetria d'oggetti (1987/88) for flute and guitar, Romitelli's imaginative approach to breathing is impressive. - Anyone who begins to listen to this CD will be captivated by the delicate, engaging world of sound.