Fellow Traveller - Attacca Quartet (2013)
Ideated from: March of years past. Also on the March 2013 list: the soundtrack to Dave Grohl’s Sound City doc, late-era Bowie, and William Tyler.
John Adams (not to be confused with John Luther Adams, another pretty great composer) has been working since the 70s. He gets lumped in with the 20th century minimalists like Philip Glass, but he’s really not that minimal. He’s always had a keen ear for busy, conflicting melodies. His commonly played piece of ochestral repertoire, Short Ride In A Fast Machine, is a pretty good entry point for what he does.
The bulk of this record is a suite of dance tunes that show off this motion and playfulness very well. The Attacca Quartet give us a good performance, clearly recorded so you can hear the interplay between them. I listened on headphones and thought several times that someone was behind me when the recording caught a musician’s sharp breaths.
It’s all fun and raucous. The slightly more staid quartet piece in two movements at the end of the dances is still full of motion and restlessness, but the dances are what recommends this one.
