Guerssen Rec.
William Nowik : Pan Symphony in E Minor (US,1974,re.'09)****
This is really a strange album, very different from even related musical projects with improvisations or with the concept of creating something of a symphony, this is much stranger. It is called “Pan symphony in E Minor” and it is in fact far from a usual symphony. Based upon what seems to be open folk improvisations with acoustic and electric guitar and drums or violin or sax and a few other occasional instruments like harmonium or thumbpiano with glockenspiel, this sounds like fragments of improvisations, hanging together a bit in the open rhythm of the improvisation and in the E minor idea (?). The CD splits it into three parts (they could distinguish the opener well, but then, like me, were lost in the larger symphony). This symphony is in fact consisting of 14 parts with some returning musical combinations.
Yes, the ode to Pan is very clear in the short opener where we hear a couple of flute combinations of which one of the flutes is like a human call, a very pan-pagan religious opener. Then a tension is set with an arm crash on the piano, and harp like chords in the inside of the piano, small parts of guitars, violin and sax seems to prepare some sort of musical tale with some sound-based tension from within, never the less with a few recognisable tune improvisations on the guitars or violin. This varied story-like first large part is good for the full first side.
The second side has a couple of bluesier improvisations on guitar with some strange moments in between with the theme of a ticking clock, and a weird part dominated by a church organ like playing on a sort of harmonium* while some body parts meet a wooden floor or closets like a loose percussion sounding like stamping feet or someone coming up the wooden stairs very nearby, before returning to the more bluesy tunes again.
It is a bit strange and a very open atmosphere one knows hardly where he is or where the music is going except that it is expressing some momentous hanging together...symphony. Strange !
The liner notes reveal better how constant short improvisations were commissioned more often from him, while this project more expressed his wandering mind during this time, being something like very subconscious, somewhere.
* This instrument seemed to have been an old 18th century pump organ, while some of the strangest flutes used on the intro has been a ceramic blowfish, which produced strange (“cosmic”) tones while it originally was not even meant as a real instrument. The sax parts were played by Warren Cooper. The recording engineer had gained some fame by working with Eric Clapton. He also helped with some of the musical settings.
