morton feldman's triadic memories

Morton Feldman - Triadic Memories

CD and DVD formats

96kHz/24-bit high-definition digital audio

Mode 136 (Feldman Edition 8)

Click here for a streaming video of Marilyn Nonken discussing Triadic Memories.

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This is, without a doubt, the most beautiful recording of Triadic Memories I've heard. 

- Brian Marley, The Wire [ complete review ]

Any pianist wanting to play Feldman needs the most exquisite touch, and also great stamina, and Marilyn Nonken clearly has both in abundance. * * * * * (five stars)

- Ivan Hewett, The London Times [ complete review ]

Nonken's interpretation particularly recommends itself to those searching for their first 'Triadic Memories' (or even their first experience of Feldman for that matter).  Very simply, I think it easier to hear and experience this essential aspect of Feldman on this recording than on any other recording of the solo piano music I've yet heard and if you are looking to introduce a friend or family-member to Feldman then this disc should be a serious contender.

- Alan Nicholson, Why Patterns [ complete review ]

There's such a temptation with Triadic Memories…to smooth out the prickly rhythms, and let the music float and turn ambient. Nonken resists. Her rhythms twist and turn with Feldman’s peculiar notation, and her tone color, though soft, is melodically urgent, not self-effacing. It's a dynamite performance captured on a spectacularly pristine recording. 

- Kyle Gann, ArtsJournal.com 

Not just in length but also in beauteous accessibility, Triadic Memories is a less daunting piece than the big quartet. That doesn't mean it's less important; beauty can be its own reward. Ms. Nonken played it with a relaxed, almost rubber-wristed calm, caressing the keys without losing rhythmic  definition. A lovely performance of a lovely piece. 

- John Rockwell, The New York Times (review of live performance)

Even if you're not up for discerning the grand construction in Feldman's meditative, pared-down music, its medicinal value is so strong that, while I was recovering from surgery, it worked as well as Motrin -- or the Mozart piano concertos I have used after a wisdom-teeth extraction. Think of what Feldman could do for hangovers. 

- Daniel Patrick Stearns, The Philadelphia Inquirer, December 18, 2005 (Christmas Gift Pick)
 

'Triadic Memories' (1981) has enjoyed a relatively long recording history on compact disc and in contrast to last year's Late Works with Clarinet (Mode 119), Mode's new Feldman disc has a host of other recordings to contend with.  Indeed, the chances are that subscribers to Why Patterns already own at least one recording of this seminal piano work, which makes it somewhat pertinent to ask if owning yet another is absolutely necessary.  To cut to the quick, however, this is the finest Feldman release I've heard so far this year.  I was able to compare the recording (in both formats) with interpretations by John Tilbury (Londonhall), Roger Woodward (Etcetera) and Louis Goldstein (Offseason Productions), and frankly only the Goldstein offers serious competition.  Subscribers will be familiar with the extravagances of the Woodward, and the deficiencies of Tilbury's piano have never appeared more pronounced than when compared to Marilyn Nonken's interpretation.  As she makes clear in her linear notes, attention was paid to both the choice of instrument and the recording venue, and the decision to opt for a Hamburg Steinway at the Krannert Center, University of Illinois was certainly an excellent one.  The instrument's tone is satisfyingly rich and importantly for the piece the naturalness of the decay is astonishingly beautiful.

Indeed, clumsy as the word is, 'naturalness' is perhaps a pertinent adjective to describe this recording.  Being a work without a marked tempo, interpretations of 'Triadic Memories' vary greatly in length.  They range from about seventy minutes to around one hundred and ten.  For her part, Nonken's decision to opt for a regular eighth-note pulse that 'approximates the heart-rate at rest' gives this 'Triadic Memories' a satisfyingly anthropomorphic texture that not only feels right but also helps heighten the listener’s awareness of the piece’s rhythmic complexity.  It is certainly a clever way to support the tactile immediacy of the sound whilst orientating the thoughtful listener towards that old Abstract Expressionist chestnut of the relation between abstraction and physicality.  Admittedly, I can imagine that experienced listener’s may find it a little too comfortable, lacking something of the edge that Louis Goldstein manages to draw from the piece for example, but it simply depends on how you like your Feldman.  Given that the piece's great beauty resides with the clustering and overlapping of its decaying notes, however, Nonken's interpretation particularly recommends itself to those searching for their first 'Triadic Memories' (or even their first experience of Feldman for that matter).  Very simply, I think it easier to hear and experience this essential aspect of Feldman on this recording than on any other recording of the solo piano music I've yet heard and if you are looking to introduce a friend or family-member to Feldman then this disc should be a serious contender.

Like the Flux Quartet's recording of 'String Quartet II' on Mode 112, Mode 136 is available in two formats: a 2 CD edition and a single DVD.  Both index the work into nine sections with the CD edition opting to have a short second disc rather than breaking the work evenly.  The DVD includes a twenty-minute discussion of the piece by the performer and although managing to be interesting and informative without becoming overtly technical, this worthwhile extra does suffer from a somewhat hyperactive camera and an absence of German or French subtitles.  Nevertheless, I hope Mode continue to expand in this area.  (I'm sure that I'm not the only one who would welcome the chance to hear Aki Takahashi discuss 'For Bunita Marcus' on the forthcoming Feldman Edition 10, although I fear the piece’s length will see Mode opt for a CD only release).  Similarly, and as we've come to expect from the label, both formats sound fantastic.  The DVD has the slight edge in terms of definition: never have I heard the softness of Feldman's attack sounding so crisp and clean, and adding this to the fact that the DVD offers a chance to hear the ninety-minute performance uninterrupted, it is certainly the one to go for if you have the audio equipment to support the format. 

- Alan Nicholson, Why Patterns, 1 August 2004
 

Some modernist composers such as Stockhausen want to embrace everything in their music. Others work by exclusion, ruthlessly paring their music down until only the essential core remains. The American composer Morton Feldman, who died in 1987 aged 61, was perhaps the most ruthless of all these great renouncers. He didn’t want lyricism or complication or any of the storm and stress and conflict that go with “expression”. What he wanted was to “tint the air ” with gentle sounds, revealed in slowly changing patterns. 

The pattern that launches this piece is a particularly fascinating one: we hear two repeating figures, one high, one low, which gradually move together and then cross to opposite ends of the piano. And so it goes on for 93 minutes, in a state of suspended animation that will entrance some listeners and infuriate many others. Any pianist wanting to play Feldman needs the most exquisite touch, and also great stamina, and Marilyn Nonken clearly has both in abundance. * * * * * (five stars)

- Ivan Hewett, The London Times, 14 August 2004
 

Pacing the material is one of the major problems a pianist has to face when tackling Morton Feldman's late compositions. A further complication arises with Triadic Memories (1981), in that a specific tempo isn’t indicated. If the pianist moves too swiftly through the material, the decay of the note (its "exquisite decomposition", as Marilyn Nonken refers to it in her sleevenote) may not receive sufficient emphasis. Too slow a pace can easily result in lugubriousness. The music should feel airy and convey the sense of receding from and moving towards the listener. If the tempo is judged well, time seems simply to dissolve. 

Having performed the piece at slightly different tempos for a number of years and carefully considered the results, for this recording Nonken has opted for a "steady eighth-note pulse that approximates the heartrate at rest". The degree of expressiveness she brings to Triadic Memories is, thankfully, kept to a minimum. In this regard she’s nearer to Aki Takahashi than to Roger Woodward. Of course, the playing has to be tailored to some degree to the piano on which the music will be played, and the room in which it will be heard. The Steinway here was chosen by Nonken because of its depth of sound and its "rich, soulful timbre", and she describes how the wood-panelled Foellinger Great Hall at the University of Illinios casts the sounds "in a golden light". This is, without a doubt, the most beautiful recording of Triadic Memories I've heard. 

Nonken's 93-minute performance is broken onto two CDs. It's also available on a single DVD, which allows the music to be experienced seamlessly. While the piece is playing, the DVD's only visual component is a patterned rug on which the menu is presented. But the DVD also contains a 20 minute interview with Nonken in which she sits at the piano, discusses Feldman, and illustrates her comments with brief snatches of his music. What she says is illuminating, especially about the phantom triads in Triadic Memories and how, in an extraordinary manner, they emerge from the music as it decays. 

- Brian Marley, The Wire, September 2004