Fragments (album)

This was my second solo release and was voted Classical Album of the Year at the 2004 Vodafone New Zealand Music Awards. It was an incredible line-up of performers and I realise in retrospect we had so much time to record each piece; something that shows in the results.

Pianist Stephen Gosling returned to Wellington from New York (he had been here a few years earlier recording the Rhythm Spike album, and woudl be here agian a few years later to premiere my piano concerto Three Psalms). His collaboration with percussionist Jeremy Fitzsimons was wonderful, as was the ensemble work with the New Zealand String Quartet,.
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The album starts and ends with two versions of Fragment. The piano and vibes version opens the album and the it finishes with the piano duet version (both parts played by Stephen - with some spooky perfect ensemble telepathy between the overdubs).

Happy Tachyons - a piece that is hardly performed, thanks to it being so close to (if not over) the limit of what is humanly possible - was recorded forensically. Capturing small, perfectly clear and articulated passages. I knew this was probably going to be the only time this piece was every recorded, so I wanted as accurate a representation of of what it should sound and feel like, as possible. It was a kind of torture on Jeremy and Stephen, who wanted to (and could) play much longer passages. But now that I listen to Happy Tachyons I'm glad it exists in this way, in at least one location.

Then there is Piano Quintet (2000), a work that's been described as "reflecting the influences of Pärt, Schnittke, Body, Bach and the music of the Greek Islands". Well, OK. This is a work I love immensely, but it is seldom performed, thanks to the challenges in the string writing - especially in the first movement, where I had thought to reverse the roles and make the strings the rhythmic drivers of the music and have the piano play a more fluid and flowing role. I love this recording, and am grateful to have such a great capture. The NZSQ, long-time supporters of my work, were fantastic. The third movement I wrote when my daughter Zoe was born, and whenever I hear it I can recall looking at her in the cot, as she slept, giggled, cried. There has been no greater magic in my life than those moments with my children.

Then there is the capture of Stephen's incredibly physical and muscular performance of Jettatura. Stephen has an incredible combination of power in his tone, a rhythmic grounding that is beyond classical, and an affinity with music like mine. His recording is one of the great exemplars of this very difficult solo piano work.

The album also features what I consider to be the definitive recording of Matre's Dance (a piece that has had an incredible life in the world thanks to Evelyn Glennie - who wrote "Psathas writes music that is very much of now; it's beautiful, fashionable, successful"). I also put Stephen and Jeremy through the agonising paces of micro-recording with this piece. Awful for them, but I discovered something fascinating; capturing a piece like Matre's Dance in recording where every take is short but is a maximised short energy burst, results in a higher level of performance energy overall when edited together. It's unlikely a live performance, however wild (and they have been really wild) will have this kind of consistent, focused, and highly concentrated energy-level from bar to bar, start to finish.

Steve Garden from Rattle Records engineered and mixed the sessions. It was essentially the 'next Rattle album for Trust Records'. It was weird putting an album out on Trust when I had such a strong relationship with Rattle (with Rattle I went on to create albums including View from Olympus, Ukiyo, White Lies, Helix). The one exception was this album, Fragments. Why be disloyal to Rattle who were immensely supportive of my work? Funding. Rattle weren't able to fund it at the time, and Trust Records could. At that time, in that early part of my journey, I needed the music to be 'out there' and felt I had to go with what was possible sooner rather than later.

Track List

1 Fragment (Percussion Variation) 2:58

2 Happy Tachyons 7:39

3 Piano Quintet I

4 Piano Quintet II

5 Piano Quintet III

6 Jettatura 4:33

7 Matres Dance 9:37

8 Fragment (Piano Duet Version) 3:45

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Credits

• Composed By – John Psathas
• Percussion – Jeremy Fitzsimons (tracks: 1,2)
• Piano – Stephen Gosling (tracks: All)
• Strings – The New Zealand String Quartet (tracks: 3-5)

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