The Dawn of the Bicameral Clarinetist
Gary Dranch clarinet
Frank McCarty composer
Elliott Schwartz composer
Shulamit Ran composer
Larry Nelson composer
Paul Martin Zonn composer
Will Gay Bottje composer
James Drew composer
Jacob Druckman composer
Gerald Plain composer
Imagine the clarinet like you’ve never heard it before–elevated by cutting-edge technology and taking flight to new, uncharted frontiers. With THE DAWN OF THE BICAMERAL CLARINETIST, clarinet virtuoso Dr. Gary Dranch offers an extraordinary exploration of the pivotal era between 1968 and 1979, when portable synthesizers first made their way onto the concert stage.
This Navona Records release sheds light on the clarinet’s development in a time shaped by the Space Age, when composers, inspired by technological advances, crafted a unique collaboration between electronic devices and live musicians. The album title reflects this groundbreaking synergy, where the clarinetist merges with the digital realm, leading audiences into strange and beautiful new dimensions.
Featuring rare live recordings and a thrilling fusion of jazz, rock, and classical influences, THE DAWN OF THE BICAMERAL CLARINETIST captures the essence of this transformative period with striking clarity and depth. If your interests lie in the intersection of technology and art, this album is sure to make a positive and enduring impression.
Track Listing & Credits
# | Title | Composer | Performer | |
---|---|---|---|---|
01 | Soundpieces from Scratch (for solo clarinet, 12 pre-recorded clarinets, synthesizer) (1975) | Frank McCarty | Gary Dranch, clarinet; Frank McCarty, pre-recorded clarinet; Gary Mitro, live sound engineer | 16:53 |
02 | Extended Clarinet for Bb clarinet and tape, lights, grand piano (1974) | Elliott Schwartz | Gary Dranch, clarinet | 10:38 |
03 | For an Actor-Monologue for Clarinet (in A) (1978) | Shulamit Ran | Gary Dranch, clarinet | 7:21 |
04 | Music II for Clarinet and Tape (1977) | Larry Nelson | Gary Dranch, clarinet | 10:00 |
05 | Stray Puffs for Clarinet Solo (1968) | Paul Martin Zonn | Gary Dranch, clarinet | 6:01 |
06 | Modalities 2 for Clarinet and Tape (1971) | Will Gay Bottje | Gary Dranch, clarinet | 6:56 |
07 | St. Dennis Variations for Bb Clarinet (1979) | James Drew | Gary Dranch, clarinet | 11:55 |
08 | Animus III (1969) (An Explication) for Bb clarinet and tape | Jacob Druckman | Gary Dranch, clarinet; Gary Mitro, live sound engineer | 15:01 |
09 | Showers of Blessings (1972) | Gerald Plain | Gary Dranch, clarinet; Gary Mitro, live sound engineer | 11:24 |
Special thanks to David Merrill for analog to digital conversion
Track 1
Recorded live June 12, 1980 at the Krannert Center for the Performing Arts, Great Hall, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in Urbana IL
Recording Session Producer Scott Wyatt
Consulting Audio Engineers Scott Wyatt, Michael Manion
Recording Technician and Concert Coordinator Gary Mitro
Tracks 2, 4-7
Recorded live February 18, 1982 at the New York University Education Building in New York NY
Recording Session Producer & Engineers: Special thanks to the recording engineers at N.Y.U.
Track 3, 8-9
Recorded live May 3, 1980 in the Music Building Auditorium, The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in Urbana IL
Recording Session Producer Scott Wyatt
Consulting Audio Engineers Scott Wyatt, Michael Manion
Track 8 & 9
Recording Technician and Concert Coordinator Gary Mitro
Mastering Melanie Montgomery
Executive Producer Bob Lord
VP of A&R Brandon MacNeil
A&R Jeff LeRoy
VP of Production Jan Košulič
Audio Director Lucas Paquette
VP, Design & Marketing Brett Picknell
Art Director Ryan Harrison
Design Edward A. Fleming
Publicity Kacie Brown
Digital Marketing Manager Brett Iannucci
Artist Information
Gary Dranch
Clarinetist Gary Dranch, a specialist in new and contemporary music, obtained his Doctor of Musical Arts degree in Performance from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1981. Dranch has devoted his career to promoting new compositions for clarinet and enlarging its repertoire. As a native New Yorker, Dranch returned home to embark on a freelance career, performing and championing new music compositions with NYU’s Contemporary Players, The New Repertory Ensemble of New York, The American New Music Consortium, The Forum For New Music at NYU, and with North/South Consonance, performing at The Loeb Center, Carnegie Hall, Symphony Space, and LaMama, among other contemporary new music venues.
Notes
With all the hoopla over the Artificial Intelligence revolution and its explosive impact on all aspects of human life, including the performing arts, it felt like a good time to pay homage to the prescience of a number of American composers from the 1970s who eagerly exploited a technological revolution that had been a long time in the making. Although experimentalism in music had been foreshadowed by the pioneer works of notables such as Edgar Varese and Iannis Xenakis, the 1970s brought to the concert stage for the first time, portable synthesizers. Composers consciously placed tape-recording machines and playback speakers onstage to literally act as adjunct performers astride their human counterparts. Hence the derivation of the title of this album, by which the clarinetist is seemingly catapulted into a bicameral “mindmeld” state of mind. Augmented with “bionic” technologically-enhanced properties, the clarinetist figuratively transcends earthly boundaries and soars into stratospheric other-worldly realms.
This album stands as a retrospective time-capsule, shining a retrospective light on the explosive and overtly self-consciously controversial experimentalism of the solo clarinet music of this period. The selected works here are representative of the “bicameral” clarinetist, forging new demands on the instrumentalist’s extended skills, such as altissimo register, multiphonic and microtonal fingerings, improvisational and theatrical techniques, collaborations with electro-acoustical sound engineers, and multimedia planners, to name but a few.
— Gary Dranch