Jocy de Oliveira + announcements

[Edit: Fuck! I never posted the link!

Jocy de Oliveira - Estórias Para Voz Instrumentos (Creel Pone, 1981/2006; 67.7 mb, 200 kbps VBR)]

Some of you may be thinking: no posts in over two weeks? Did Meshes kick the bucket? In some ways, yes and no. With all the writing I was doing this summer, I think the blog may have jumped the shark prematurely. Now that I'm pretty settled in back at school, it's quickly becoming apparent that to produce the kind of labored prose here alongside my course work is difficult enough. But I also recently began writing for two of my favorite music zines, Dusted and Signal to Noise, which are collectively sapping my journalistic energies. The King takes all my time; the rest I give to Saint-Cyr, to which I would like to give all... Plus, I'll be making my return to radio in the next few days, so I need to save some of this pedantry for the air.

But, I would very much like to continue the blog in abbreviated form. What I mean is, turning Meshes back into a more standard format of: music files, short descriptions, and descriptive excerpts from other websites. I'll still take time to do features (Then and Now has been a favorite), but for the most part you'll have to start looking elsewhere for the print. I've also had occasion to rethink my blogging ethics after receiving messages from FMP, Ata Tak and De Stijl Records to remove material from the site; which explains part of my absence, as I haven't been sure what is/isn't appropriate to post. I'm going to get things going again with a Creel Pone, mostly without guilt, since that entire operation is founded on pretty shakey legal ground anyhow!

Pre-Maja Ratjke, pre-Jaap Blonk, here's someone who was pushing the limits of the voice within avant-garde music forms back when Fluxus was still in vogue. Originally released in 1981, Jocy de Oliveira's eccentric and amazing collection Estórias Para Voz Instrumentos has been excavated from the detritus of electronic music LPs by the folks over at reissue label Creel Pone. The Sao Paulo-born pianist and composer stretches out for four lengthy and distinct compositions. Grunts, whispers, manic chanting and the like are set alongside concrete sounds and all sorts of oscillator mayhem on "Estória II Para Voz Percussào" (1967): a potent blend that you can still hear in the collaborations of, say, Ikue Mori and Catherine Jauniaux. "Estória IV Para Vozes Violino," recorded a bit later (1978), utilizes Oliveira's voice to create a steady drone off which the side-long piece can build, creating dense soundscapes with vocal multi-tracking and low, extended horn lines. The whole thing would have the quality of a litany or a Gregorian chant if not for Oliveira's introduction of synth tones and other bizarre, vibrant noisemakers before degenerating into sparse tribal rattling. There are two more excellent pieces sandwiched in the middle, "Wave Song Para Piano E Fita" (1977) and "Dimensoes Para Quatro Teclados" (1976), the first an extended drone with shades of Eastern music, the other scored for organ, piano, harpsichord, and various chiming instruments that spiral together dramatically. I'll avoid any culturally reductive statements about how this album injects some Brazilian liveliness into the cold, academic forms of the Western avant-garde, and instead simply say: Brilliant!