Christina Vantzou: No. 4 (LP, Kranky, April 2018)

Christina Vantzou keeps us on our toes here. Glissando for Bodies and Machines in Space is all sighing voices and synthesized hums. Percussion in Nonspace is sparkling little number of delicate chimes. At Dawn is a generously-processed string drone number (the cello is by Clarice Jensen whose For This From That Will Be Filled I was admiring recently). Doorway (the first track over three minutes in length) adds a spooky piano line to the strings. Some Limited and Waning Memory is a beautiful ambient synth number (the synths on this track are by Steve Hauschildt… I’m not going to namecheck all the collaborators here, but it’s an impressive list) coupled with a gentle piano melody (and some more sighing vocals harking back to the first track). And so on. Even though the second half of the album is mostly drawing from the same set of elements, I’m struck by how each track seems to create a distinct sense of place, from the desolate moor my mind conjures up for Staircases (plangeant strings and an almost Satie-esque piano line) to the abandoned warehouse of Sound House — or perhaps that should be derelict cathedral, since it ends with about twenty seconds of the wonkiest requiem mass you’ve ever heard, a moment which is jarring but somehow works brilliantly. Basically, Vantzou shows huge invention (with everything except her album titles: this is her fourth release on Kranky, and there are no prizes for guessing what the first three were called), a fantastic control when marshalling the talents of her musicians, a wonderful sense of texture, and a great knack for dropping in the perfect dose of melody at the perfect moment, and the whole thing is just delightful.

I bought this from Boomkat. They call it Modern Classical / Ambient.