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Album Details

• Artist: David Behrman
• Album: My Dear Siegfried
• Label: XI Recordings
• Year of Release: 2005
• Original Release: 1972
• ME Rating:
• Reviewed by: patchen on 2006-08-30

Disc one of this two disc set is based on a series of letter between David Behrman's father and the WWI poet Siegfried Sassoon, a friendship that came to mean a lot to both men. Behrman has been a noted electroacoustic composer since the 1960's, and the second disc offers a sampling of work from that period to the present; the recording on the first disc is from a 1972 German performance. Behrman, on keyboard and electronic effects, is helped out especially by vocalists. Thomas Buckner, Eric Barsness, and Meria Ludovici, Tom Hamilton with engineering and special effects, and Ralph Samuelson, on shakuhachi. This is one of Behrman's most accessible and emotional works, as the music gently plays off the words of the two writers. Especially effecting are "Statement Against the War", and "My Father's Grocery Store," as well as letters the two exchanged in 1939, as the Second World War was beginning. Disc Two features five pieces that are more minimal and random, and driven by programming. "QSRL" is perhaps a bit too programmatic, and seems lost in repetition rather than enhanced by it. Much better is 1969's "A New Team Takes Over" which affords more emotional connections for the listener.

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