Simone Mancuso - La Parola Al Legno (2010)

Tracklist:
SCIARRINO Salvatore
1. Il legno e la parola (2004) per marimbone
CAGE John
2. Child of tree (1975) for amplified plants
3. Silence I
4. Branches I (1976) for amplified plants
5. Silence II
6. Branches II for amplified plants
7. Silence III
SCELSI Giacinto
8. Maknongan (1976) per marimba

“The wood speaks” is the title of this disc, loosely translated, and percussionist Simone Mancuso’s manipulations coax from his primarily wooden instruments a number of different timbres, dialects, and tones of voice. Salvatore Sciarrino’s Il Legno e la Parola is written for marimbone, an oversized marimba, and by using hard mallets Mancuso elicits a crisp attack that suits the bouncing, frolicking notes of the extended melodic line. (There are also a couple of unexpected bursts of metallic sonorities, probably chimes and triangle, that fall outside of the program’s subtitle: “Solo percussion works for wood instruments.”) The percussionist’s choice of marimba for Giacinto Scelsi’s Maknongan is allowable but surprising; composed “for any low instrument or bass voice,” Maknongan (program note annotator Benjamin Levy says that the title is taken from the name of the creator god of the Ifugao people of the Philippines) has been previously recorded using contrabass clarinet, string bass, bass flute, baritone saxophone, bass tuba, bassoon, and bass voice. Intended as a meditation on limited pitch material, it nevertheless calls for a variety of contrasting timbres, which Mancuso obtains through assorted mallets and bows.
As might be expected, the Cage works are the least conventional here, and in fact require the percussionist to “play” instruments that either come directly from nature, such as a cactus (amplified), tree branches with leaves still attached, water gourds, and seed pods, or have been made from similar materials, in this case, a bamboo xylophone and wind chimes. Moreover, the performer is instructed to avoid the kind of techniques that are shaped by habit or experience. Mancuso’s occasional rhythmically patterned attacks may not have completely deprived the music of a “personality” as Cage intended, but the unusual sonorities that emerge—sizzles, rattles, taps, crackles, thuds, drips, scrapes, rustling—many of them on the very precipice of audibility, create an unfamiliar and evocative listening experience. Moreover, Mancuso goes a step further and programs episodes of silence—one minute, four minutes, and six minutes, respectively—separating the three Cage works, in order to heighten our awareness of the non-intentional “musical” details of our own environment, as Cage originally proposed with his 4’33”. It worked, at least for me—my sleeping dog snorted at one point, which broke the silence and redirected my attention to the muffled traffic sounds outside the house. The planned silence, and Mancuso’s delicate handling of the unorthodox instruments, at least temporarily, gave me an appreciation of quiet sounds, a welcome contrast to our incessant world of too much, too loud.