Embers, by Raymond Deane and Valentin Silvestrov performed by Carducci Quartet, Crash Ensemble

Embers

by Raymond Deane and Valentin Silvestrov performed by Carducci Quartet, Crash Ensemble

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1.	Crash Ensemble - Marthiya 13:14	info	buy track
2.	The Carducci Quartet - String Quartet No.3 21:04	info	buy track
3.	Carducci Quartet - Embers 09:44	info	buy track

about

Embers

As the pandemic goes on making regular concerts impossible, the Louth Contemporary Music Society continues its work in the studio. Last autumn’s CD release Meadow, featuring music by Linda Catlin Smith, won praise from leading critics on both sides of the Atlantic, including the New Yorker’s Alex Ross. Now comes a follow-up, Embers, which again is devoted to music for strings – instruments that, in their intimacy, seem to touch our moment.
In the similarly titled radio play by Samuel Beckett, the main character stands at the sea shore, sifting through fragments of memory and story that are still living embers, hot to the touch. So it is in this recording, in which music by the distinguished Irish composer Raymond Deane robustly supports an important quartet by one of the great masters of our age, Valentin Silvestrov.
The opener, Deane’s Marthiya, is named after a form of lament traditional in the Middle East, and is itself a lament over Iraq, composed as that country was suffering invasion, bombardment and dire economic sanctions. The music’s “atmosphere of mourning”, Deane writes, is “not unrelated to the devastation wreaked on Iraq since 2003, and to the wider carnage inflicted upon the Arab and Islamic world by the west over the last century.”
Deane’s other contribution is the title track, written thirty years earlier but by very much the same individual. Though perhaps more questioning than elegiac, Embers is music again on the edge of tears. Ideas, bits of tune, come and go, and recur, very much as things come and go, and come back once more, in the Beckett play. To quote the composer: “The piece obsessively turns over musical fragments which seem to have some remote but uncertain origin.”
Silvestrov’s music gives voice to the sense we may all feel of being bereft, left behind by what was once a social culture of sympathy and togetherness. Listening to his Third String Quartet, we seem to be watching from the dock as a great liner slowly slides away, taking with it our hopes and our dreams. Something of this feeling of being on the sidelines of history may come from the composer’s inheritance as a Ukrainian. Ireland, he notes, is not so far away: “I believe there is some Irish accent, and some simple melodies, that permeate the whole work and may sound as symbols of this wonderful country, in whose destiny and historical legacy I perceive a close spiritual affinity to Ukraine, my homeland.”
All three works are captured in intense, poignant performances by leading ensembles: Crash (for Marthiya) and the Carducci Quartet.

Louth Contemporary Music Society is funded by the Arts Council and financially supported by Create Louth.

credits

released March 5, 2021

Executive Producer: Eamonn Quinn
Recording Engineer Marthiya: Debbie Smith
Recording Engineer String Quartet No. 3 and Embers: Simon Kiln
All Works Mixed, Mastered and Produced by Simon Kiln

The Carducci Quartet
Matthew Denton - Violin
Michelle Fleming -Violin
Eoin Schmidt-Martin -Viola
Emma Denton - Cello

Crash Ensemble
Maria Ryan - Violin
Nathan Sherman - Viola
Kate Ellis – Cello

Cover Image: "Grotto" by David Quinn used with kind permission of the artist.
www.davidquinnartist.ie

P & © Louth Contemporary Music CGL 2021.

LCMS2021

Reviews:
Superb release from a label we here on our side of the big lake wish to know a lot more soon.
panm360.com/en/records/embers-album-deande-silvestrov-marthiya-quartet-no3-carducci-string-quartet-crash-ensemble-louth-contemporary/

A Society Rallying After the Silence Review:
Crash Ensemble sound excellent here..............
Carducci Quartet sound – dry and dark, and intimate without becoming Romantic – is an excellent fit for both works despite their stylistic differences.
Brendan Finan in the Journal of Music
journalofmusic.com/criticism/society-rallying-after-silence

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Louth Contemporary Music Society Dundalk, Ireland

I would say the Louth CMS is particularly significant because of the dedication, love and devotion that drives Eamonn Quinn to seek out special musicians to bring to his corner of the world. These choices are made on musical worth regardless of their commercial potential. It is these kind of risks that keep music alive. Composer – Terry Riley ... more

louthcms.org

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