This music from Macedonia has a great deal in
common with the music on the CPO Roots of the Balkan Serbian
folk disc I
reviewed earlier this year, but has added jazz elements and
an even more pared down fashion. Despite the "musical genius"
hyperbole both on the disc material itself and the admittedly
excellent composer's website (www.taleognenovski.com.mk),
this is more than worth a listen, the only irritation coming in
the shape of the very repetitive drum accompaniment. I can accept
that the latter is part of the style of music on offer here but
it still makes listening in small doses a recommendation. The
clarinet playing of Tale Ognenovski is much celebrated in his
part of the world but he also toured in the west many years ago
and even performed at Carnegie Hall. He is undoubtedly an exceptional
artist and the predominant image created in my mind is of Benny
Goodman playing the superb Contrasts he commissioned Bartók
to write for him, but with a folk rather than a classical emphasis.
All the pieces are credited as being written (arranged?) by Ognenovski
and there is a certain thematic consistency which makes it difficult
to listen to them as stand-alones. Also, despite the CD promising
jazz, folk and classical, it really all comes under the umbrella
of his conception of how the elements interlink, with some but
not major differences of emphasis. For example, the three "jazz
compositions", the shorter folk based "oro" pieces and even the
"concerto" all feature more or less the same instrumentation,
played by the composer himself and his son and grandsons.
The "jazz" pieces are rather more abstract and
off the wall, the folk ones more immediately endearing. None of
this ought to detract from the fact that this is an extraordinary
and admirable, if rather quixotic, adventure into the dissemination,
rather late in life, of a life's distillation of musical thoughts
and feelings. There is, unsurprisingly, a great kinship with the
village music of Albania and southern Italy, and an undoubted
sense in some pieces of a throwback to the orientalism of Ottoman
rule. This disc is likely to appeal to world music aficionados
who enjoy the Balkan/Levantine soundworld and perhaps also those
who care to hear the source musics of their classical favourites,
the aforementioned Bartók but also, here, perhaps people
like Skalkottas. I mention the latter at the risk of resurrecting
the "Macedonia debate"! The blaring reed pipes also occasionally
put this listener in mind of the bombardes of his beloved
Breton bagadou although without the percussive rigour that
usually backs them. Interesting, not really for daily listening
but I, for one, feel the wiser for having heard it. Worth a listen!
Neil Horner
Tale Ognenovski,
clarinet, reed pipe, small bagpipe, zourla