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Brink: Utility Music
Sono Luminus

Brink: Utility Music

$8.49
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Details

Composer
Julian Brink
Artist
Matt Demerritt, Tyler Neidermayer, Meredith Moore, Joe Auckland, Juliane Gralle, Hanna Rabe, Max Gae
Format
CD
Label
Sono Luminus
Released
Oct 28, 2022
Catalog #
SLE-70027
UPC
053479702722

About

Julian Brink is a South African composer. Born in Johannesburg in 1989, he first picked up his mother’s guitar at the age of ten and grew up playing in rock bands. He discovered a love of contemporary classical music through the films of Paolo Sorrentino and Paul Thomas Anderson. Hearing Jonny Greenwood's score for There Will be Blood, in particular, was what led him to pursue composition. Although he didn’t learn to read music until he was 19, while studying guitar at undergraduate level, he went on to complete a master's degree in film scoring through Berklee College of Music and relocated to California in 2015. Brink works in film music and lives in Los Angeles with his wife, actress Maddie Hasson.

In collaboration with eminent classical label Sono Luminus, Utility Music is Brink's first standalone release. Originally composed in 2019 as a score for an abandoned film project, the music was arranged for piano, harp and string trio. It was later repurposed, reorchestrated and combined with a few older pieces into what is its current form. The album features performances by several distinguished musicians, with the heart of the music being the string trio of Moldovan violin virtuoso Dan-Iulian Drutac; Nick Revel, violist of the Grammy Nominated PUBLIQuartet; and Joe Zeitlin who was the lead cellist on Mica Levi’s Oscar-nominated score for Pablo Lorraín’s Jackie.

TRACKS:

  • Colombo / Green Fingers
  • Miniatures
  • Simple Trio No. 1
  • Eventually Lapse
  • Albatross
  • At Night
  • Eastwood No. 4
  • Simple Trio No. 2
  • Aura for M
  • Baptism in the Field
  • Pattern Shells

REVIEW:

For his first standalone release, Julian Brink has repurposed and re-orchestrated an incomplete score for an unfinished film. The 11 short, delectable tracks ‘toss boundaries’, as the trombonist provocateur Juliane Gralle observes. Taken together, it feels like there might still be a movie in there, somewhere.

‘Miniatures’ has the feel of a haunted, southern Viennese waltz surrounded in fog, its central beauty emerging serenely through the mist accompanied by drops of ringing pizzicatos. ‘At Night’ features cellist Joe Zeitlin creating other-worldly shadings of tone and colour then lifting them gently from the musical score. The two ‘Simple Trio’ tracks, which offer a vade mecum of ‘uncomplicated transitions between notes to make the samples sound more realistic’, feature the trio of Zeitlin, violinist Dan-Iulian Druțac and viola player Nick Revel of PUBLIQuartet, which Brink describes as ‘the heart of the album. I try to forget that they haven’t all met each other and aren’t playing together in the same room.’

‘Albatross’ channels John Cage and Morton Feldman with mesmerisingly deceptive, irregular beats, wonderfully quiet. The last track, ‘Pattern Shells’, influenced by Villa-Lobos, is a spontaneous splurge of brass and tropical birds.

-- Gramophone

Tracklist 11 tracks

  1. 1 Colombo / Green Fingers 03:40
    Track
    1
    Title
    Colombo / Green Fingers
    Duration
    03:40
    Composer
    Julian Brink
    Performer
    Joe Auckland, Meredith Moore, Dan-lulian Drutac, Nick Revel, Joe Zeitlin, Gabe Noel
  2. 2 Miniatures 04:08
    Track
    2
    Title
    Miniatures
    Duration
    04:08
    Composer
    Julian Brink
    Performer
    Dan-lulian Drutac, Nick Revel, Joe Zeitlin
  3. 3 Simple Trio No. 1 02:48
    Track
    3
    Title
    Simple Trio No. 1
    Duration
    02:48
    Composer
    Julian Brink
    Performer
    Dan-lulian Drutac, Nick Revel, Joe Zeitlin
  4. 4 Eventually Lapse 04:21
    Track
    4
    Title
    Eventually Lapse
    Duration
    04:21
    Composer
    Julian Brink
    Performer
    Joe Auckland, Dan-lulian Drutac, Nick Revel, Joe Zeitlin, Gabe Noel, Hanna Rabe
  5. 5 Albatross 03:00
    Track
    5
    Title
    Albatross
    Duration
    03:00
    Composer
    Julian Brink
    Performer
    Matt Demerritt, Nick Revel
  6. 6 At Night 02:31
    Track
    6
    Title
    At Night
    Duration
    02:31
    Composer
    Julian Brink
    Performer
    Joe Zeitlin, Hanna Rabe, Max Gaertner
  7. 7 Eastwood No. 4 05:08
    Track
    7
    Title
    Eastwood No. 4
    Duration
    05:08
    Composer
    Julian Brink
    Performer
    Matt Demerritt, Dan-lulian Drutac, Nick Revel, Joe Zeitlin, Hanna Rabe, Max Gaertner
  8. 8 Simple Trio No. 2 01:55
    Track
    8
    Title
    Simple Trio No. 2
    Duration
    01:55
    Composer
    Julian Brink
    Performer
    Dan-lulian Drutac, Nick Revel, Joe Zeitlin
  9. 9 Aura for M 02:23
    Track
    9
    Title
    Aura for M
    Duration
    02:23
    Composer
    Julian Brink
    Performer
    Dan-lulian Drutac
  10. 10 Baptism in the Field 03:22
    Track
    10
    Title
    Baptism in the Field
    Duration
    03:22
    Composer
    Julian Brink
    Performer
    Tyler Neidermayer, Joe Auckland, Juliane Gralle, Nick Revel
  11. 11 Pattern Shells 03:02
    Track
    11
    Title
    Pattern Shells
    Duration
    03:02
    Composer
    Julian Brink
    Performer
    Matt Demerritt, Juliane Gralle, Dan-lulian Drutac, Nick Revel, Joe Zeitlin