Tobias Eduard Schick composes subtle, complex, idiosyncratic and energetic music, seeking out tonal friction, contrasts and rare nuances of colour. His soundscapes seem to be permeated by experiences of reality, like water flowing through different layers of the soil before it rises to the surface again in a spring. They are based on mental or physical states, questions of time consciousness and other aspects of the human condition and transform these into tonal and formal concepts.
A special relationship of delicate, gradually changing soundscapes and unexpected upheavals runs through all five works on this CD like a common thread. Fast, nervously flitting movements testify to a suppressed tension, to a high, subliminal energy that results not least from the awareness that they can turn into their absolute opposite at any time. Eruptive piano sounds and short attacks protrude like jagged rocks from a sea of imagined sounds and barely hint at what lies beneath their surface. Returning to places visited in the past, the music appears saturated with the experience of its own history. Phases of calm and unintentional lingering change and develop a pronounced persistence that creates a vacuum, an urge to change that breaks through in sudden upheavals. And even if dark-toned, slowly changing streams of sound and remote, peaceful soundscapes are repeatedly invaded by violent masses of sound with all their might, this shows that the realms of beauty are not secure, enclosed spaces, but must constantly defend their fragile existence anew - and that this is perhaps the decisive source of their fascinating power.
Performers on this recording:
Claudia Chan, Olivia Steimel, Ensemble Contemporary Insights, Zachary Seely, Trio SAEITENWIND, NEW - Neues Ensemble Wendland
