Artist: Paul Lansky
Album: Touch & Go (2024/2025)
Label: Bridge Records
Genre: Contemporary Classical / Electro-acoustic / Percussion
Reviewer: Mark Weber
Paul Lansky (b. 1944) looms large for me because somewhere back in memory he took a reel-to-reel to a freeway at night in the early 鈥�70s and recorded the trucks and cars whizzing by. It was southern Ohio 鈥� Rt. 71 about 20 miles north of Cincinnati after the long drive south from Cleveland 鈥� it's d茅j脿 vu. He takes the tapes back into the studio, alters the sound, expands and contracts, double-shifts phases 鈥� Doppler immersive 鈥� and drives this four-lane highway deep into your memory. It鈥檚 40,000 BC and you鈥檝e crawled up the Danube River from the Black Sea into deep Europe.
All of which is my fiction 鈥� part of me swears it鈥檚 true. The fact is, Lansky recorded what became his monumental 鈥淣ight Music鈥� in 1987 on Route 5 in California. I drove Rt. 71 many times in the mid-80s and it sure sounds like that stretch to me. D茅j脿 vu. Paul studied with Milton Babbitt 鈥� that鈥檚 huge. Babbitt鈥檚 body of work is monumental in the field of electro-acoustic music and chamber. So maybe that鈥檚 Lansky鈥檚 forte: d茅j脿 vu. You remember it from somewhere, neanderthalic, basic, just above subconscious memory. So, anything Paul Lansky does, I鈥檓 all ears.
This new release of recent percussion pieces is a prize. Bridge Records is a giant in this field. If you see a record on Bridge, then you know it鈥檚 going to be something. And Paul could record a flushing toilet and I鈥檇 listen.
