A fascinating new project by German cellist Anja Lechner and Greek pianist Vassilis Tsabropoulos, “Chants, Hymns and Dances”, could be subtitled “Music from the Crossroads of the World”. It is a project that blurs the dividing lines between East and West, between composition and arrangement and improvisation, and between contemporary and traditional music. At the centre of the repertoire are compositions by Tsabropoulos, which take as their inspirational starting point ancient Byzantine hymns, and music by the Armenian-born philosopher-composer Georges Ivanovitch Gurdjieff (c.1877-1949) which draws upon melodies and rhythms, both sacred and secular, of the Caucasus, the Middle East and Central Asia.
Gurdjieff & Tsabropoulos: Chants, Hymns & Dances
Anja Lechner, Vassilis Tsabropoulos
- 1Chant from a Holy Book
05:12 - 2Bayaty
04:18 - 3Prayer
03:50 - 4Duduki
06:14 - 5Interlude I
00:43 - Trois Morceaux après des hymnes byzantins
- 6I05:00
- 7II04:52
- 8III04:09
- 9Dance
08:04 - 10Chant
05:40 - 11Interlude II
00:39 - 12Assyrian Women Mourners
06:07 - 13Armenian Song
02:16 - 14No. 11
06:55 - 15Woman's Prayer
01:58 - 16Chant from a Holy Book, var. 1
06:12
Classic FM, CD of the month
Stereoplay, Klangtipp
The music is gravely beautiful through and through – not saccharine, but pervaded by nostalgia and a longing for something that lies just beyond one’s grasp. … The sincerity and ability of the performers are beyond question.
Raymond Tuttle, Fanfare
A gradual breakdown in the once-formidable divides between Western and Eastern styles has been particularly fruitful over the years. Composers, performers and listeners on each side have found themselves pulled toward the other, usually landing in some fascinating no man’s land in between, a land full of unexpected aural turns.
A case in point is Chants, Hymns and Dances, an irresistible new recording on the ECM label featuring German cellist Anja Lechner and Greek pianist/composer Vassilis Tsabropoulos. … The disc opens up a window into an ancient world of Armenian folk songs and Byzantine liturgical tunes, all gently bathed in the more contemporary light of New Age-like rumination and understated improvisation. Not quite “world music”, but not exactly classical or jazz, either, the result has a welcome, even compelling distinctiveness.
Tim Smith, Baltimore Sun
The piano music of G.I.Gurdjieff was some of the first in the West to suggest the great diversity of music in the rest of the world and especially the orient. … Arranging it for cello and piano, as well as the choice of superb performers (and recording) for the music, has now put it in an entirely different light with this new release. These classical musicians have great talent for improvisation and treat the material more freely than others have done. This approach, along with the glorious melodic tone of the cello lines, bring it into a higher realm. The singing tone of the cello reminds one that this music came at basis out of an oral tradition of music – not instrumental. The original pieces by pianist Tsabropoulos are based in part on Byzantine hymns, and fit perfectly in the midst of the program of Gurdjieff works. This is truly an album of world music, with an easily-recognized spiritual dimension.
John Sunier, Audiophile Audition
Gurdjeff war auf vielen Gebieten ein großer Improvisator, was sich auch an den etwa hundert Kompositionen erkennen lässt, die er während einer relative kurzen Phase seines Schaffens Mitte der zwanziger Jahre dem befreundeten Komponisten Thomas de Hartmann vorsang. ... Heute haben der griechische Pianist Vassilis Tsabropoulos und die Münchner Cellistin Anja Lechner diese kompositorischen Raritäten erstmals für Klavier und Cello arrangiert. Mit Chants, Hymns and Dances legen sie eine der bisher schönsten unter den inzwischen doch vielen Gurdjieff-Einspielungen vor. ... Erstaunlich, was die beiden erstklassigen Solisten an subtiler Schönheit aus ihren Instrumenten herausholen. ... Hier ist eine Musik, die einen auf Anhieb völlig in ihren Bann zieht. Perfekt dazu passend: fünf im Mittelteil des Albums platzierte Eigenkompositionen des Julliard-Absolventen Tsabropoulos, der bereits auf seinem Soloalbum Akroasis erstaunliche Annäherungen an alte byzantinische Hymnen veröffentlicht hat.
Karl Lippegaus, Süddeutsche Zeitung
Keith Jarrett war einer der ersten, die den betörenden Reiz der schlichten, hymnenartigen Lieder entdeckte und einspielte. Von seiner Aufnahme ließen sich Anja Lechner und Vassilis Trabropoulos zu ihren Duo-Stücken animieren. ... Es ist eine eigentümliche Musik, die weniger den Verstand anspricht als vielmehr Gefühle weckt, wie man sie aus der Kirche kennt. Beim Zuhören überkommen einen Ausgeglichenheit, innere Ruhe, seelischer Frieden. ... Bei Gurdjieffs Musik ist ihre geistige Herkunft aus russisch-orthodoxen Mönchsgesängen deutlich zu spüren und so lag denn auch die Entscheidung der beiden Musiker auf der Hand, einige Kompositionen von Tsabropoulos, die sich auf byzantinische Hymnen stützen, mit auf ihre Platte zu nehmen. ... Die Musik von Gurdjieff und auch von Tsaropoulos verbindet auf alle Fälle ihre einfache Melodieführung, ihre berückende Schlichtheit. Sie kommt ohne komplizierte Rhythmen, komplexe Strukturen aus, ist sofort eingängig, verständlich, empfindsam. ... Doch das ändert nichts daran, dass diese Musik ein Hörgenuss der ganz besonderen Art ist.
Johannes Kaiser, MDR Kultur
Hervorragend: Meditationsmusik, byzantinisch akzentuiert.
Hans-Klaus Jungheinrich, Frankfurter Rundschau
In ihren Einrichtungen für Cello und Klavier knüpfen Anja Lechner und der griechische Pianist Vassilis Tsabropoulos feine Fäden zwischen Abendland und Orient und feiern im innigen Zwiegespräch ihrer Instrumente die schöne Illusion von Verständigung über alle Unterschiede hinweg. Die eigenen Meditationen, die Tsabropoulos über ... alte byzantinische Hymnen anstellt, fügen sich in diesen dunkel strahlenden Klangkosmos ganz selbstverständlich ein.
Andreas Obst, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung
“Chants, Hymns and Dances” features music of G.I. Gurdjieff (c. 1877-1948) in new arrangements for cello and piano by Anja Lechner and Vassilis Tsabropoulos, as well as compositions by Tsabropoulos (b. 1966) based, in part, upon Byzantine hymns. The focus of the album is music derived, directly or indirectly, from the oral music tradition.
Gurdjieff’s musical works were amongst the first pieces in the West to take account of the diversity of music resonating in the wider world. Neither wholly “western” nor wholly “eastern” in themselves, they suggest a window thrown open to the orient. German cellist Anja Lechner sensed the music’s potential for her new duo with Greek pianist Vassilis Tsabropoulos. Its context seemed immediately familiar to them. Lechner had been working closely with Armenian composer Tigran Mansurian who had made use, particularly in his adaptations of Komitas, of some of the same roots. Other Gurdjieff pieces had clear affinities with the music of the Greek Orthodox Church, also the wellspring for a group of compositions by Vassilis Tsabropoulos.
Despite their very different backgrounds, Anja Lechner and Vassilis Tsabropoulos have in common the fact that they are classical musicians with an uncommon facility for improvisation. The Gurdjieff material has never previously been treated as freely as it is here. Tsabropoulos insists that “the only way to reach the heart of the material is by feeling free. But you have to respect the context, asking, ‘How can we develop the melodic lines while at the same time protecting them?’”
A similar modus operandi is employed by Tsabropoulos in his approach to the Byzantine hymns. The “Trois morceaux après des hymnes Byzantins” are based upon melodies that have survived since the 4th century to be sung at Easter in the Greek Orthodox Church. From the CD booklet notes: “The half-Greek Gurdjieff would certainly have known the Passion Week hymns well, these irreducible masterpieces of proportion, whose sense of balance, and interweaving of modes and melodic lines, have influenced the history of composition. In reinterpreting this material, the Lechner/Tsabropoulos duo is re-examining some of the building blocks of European music. Tsabropoulos once said, ‘It was the timeless essence of this music as well as its expressive simplicity that drew me to it” and the clarity of the Gurdjieff music strikes him similarly, ‘as if there is a clear path between the two worlds’”.
Gurdjieff’s musical works were amongst the first pieces in the West to take account of the diversity of music resonating in the wider world. Neither wholly “western” nor wholly “eastern” in themselves, they suggest a window thrown open to the orient. German cellist Anja Lechner sensed the music’s potential for her new duo with Greek pianist Vassilis Tsabropoulos. Its context seemed immediately familiar to them. Lechner had been working closely with Armenian composer Tigran Mansurian who had made use, particularly in his adaptations of Komitas, of some of the same roots. Other Gurdjieff pieces had clear affinities with the music of the Greek Orthodox Church, also the wellspring for a group of compositions by Vassilis Tsabropoulos.
Despite their very different backgrounds, Anja Lechner and Vassilis Tsabropoulos have in common the fact that they are classical musicians with an uncommon facility for improvisation. The Gurdjieff material has never previously been treated as freely as it is here. Tsabropoulos insists that “the only way to reach the heart of the material is by feeling free. But you have to respect the context, asking, ‘How can we develop the melodic lines while at the same time protecting them?’”
A similar modus operandi is employed by Tsabropoulos in his approach to the Byzantine hymns. The “Trois morceaux après des hymnes Byzantins” are based upon melodies that have survived since the 4th century to be sung at Easter in the Greek Orthodox Church. From the CD booklet notes: “The half-Greek Gurdjieff would certainly have known the Passion Week hymns well, these irreducible masterpieces of proportion, whose sense of balance, and interweaving of modes and melodic lines, have influenced the history of composition. In reinterpreting this material, the Lechner/Tsabropoulos duo is re-examining some of the building blocks of European music. Tsabropoulos once said, ‘It was the timeless essence of this music as well as its expressive simplicity that drew me to it” and the clarity of the Gurdjieff music strikes him similarly, ‘as if there is a clear path between the two worlds’”.
