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Skating on the fragile edge of sound

The Magnetic Resonator Piano (MRP) is the brainchild of Andrew McPherson, who has been working on this instrument since 2009. Electromagnets are installed above the strings of a regular concert grand without physical contact with the action, allowing for control of minute details of shimmering resonance, fragile pitch bends, sliding crescendi from silence and sustained “bowed” sounds that the performer can shape directly from the keyboard. For a pianist used to the inviolable earth-bound principles of attack and decay, this magical package provides the fuel to grow wings and discover flight. All of the sounds heard on this recording are produced acoustically. Only whole takes were used and there are just two edits, both to slightly restrict duration. 

GLOWING RADIOACTIVE ELEMENTS started life as a semi-improvised piece with four movements. Radium is an element which glows pale blue, Plutonium glows deep red, Tritium is green and the gas Radon is yellow at its freezing point, and orange-red below. I added the fifth, obsessively-repetitive loop Actinium before a concert in Düsseldorf. This element is silvery-white, glowing blue.

ATOMIC LEGACIES builds on musical as well as extra-musical influences: I quote and deconstruct the first movement of Haydn’s “Sun” string quartet Op. 20 No. 1 (Hob. III:31) as an afterthought, as well as my own Actinium for solo Magnetic Resonator Piano. Some of the titles reference the work of visual artist Helmut Schweizer and environmental eco-artist Eve Andree Laramee. This work was created especially with the Ligeti Quartet in mind and I am grateful for their input and guidance.

Navigating nuclear nostalgia

Dispositioned traces of glowing matter slip into our cells, into the spaces between our bodies, into our selves... – Eve Andree Laramee, “Tracking Our Atomic Legacy: Now We Are All Sons of Bitches.”  Women Eco Artists Dialog, Issue 5, 2012

Dream 1: We live in a region famous for its university, rich natural resources and the country’s second nuclear reactor, built to manufacture weapons-grade plutonium. This facility is in a secret, “closed” city: it does not appear on maps and we are not supposed to know that it exists. There are multiple unreported leaks of plutonium during the countless major accidents at the plant, which release enormous quantities of radioactive material into the air and the surrounding area. Nuclear waste is routinely pumped directly into the ground and stored indefinitely in uncovered pools. Grannies pick mushrooms, berries and wild sorrel in the surrounding woods and sell them at the city market.

Dream 2: Two decades earlier and several hundred miles to the east, Grandfather oversees the construction of multiple underground silos and the installation of ballistic missiles armed with nuclear warheads. His wife and young daughter don’t know what exactly his job entails. He wears an impressive army-issue watch with a radium-coated dial and hands, which glow in the dark.

Dream 3: Late one night, something wakes me. I look out from the window of our sixth floor apartment on the side of the city close to the nuclear plant and the chemical factories. I can see a gigantic truck with unnaturally massive wheels moving slowly on the wide, empty road. It is towing a very large cylindrical object with a conical snout. The next day nobody believes in my special secret missile truck and I have to convince myself that it was a dream. London, July 2019

Track Listing:

1. Radium 06:28
2. Plutonium 07:08
3. Tritium 05:39
4. Radon 02:03
5. Actinium 03:42
6. Atomic Legacies 16:36 *

Featuring the Ligeti Quartet: Mandhira de Saram (violin), Patrick Dawkins (violin), Richard Jones (viola), Val Welbanks (cello)

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