LAURENCE PIKE - The Undreamt-of Centre - LP - Forest Green Vinyl [SEP 6]

LP - Limited Edition of 700 copies Worldwide on Forest Green Vinyl, housed in a gatefold sleeve which features neoclassical painting 'Orphée et Eurydice' by
Michel Martin Drolling (1820).

The Undreamt-of Centre is the fourth solo album by prolific Australian drummer/composer/producer Laurence Pike, an evocative, contemporary reimagining of the requiem mass.

The album draws on the sounds of modern classical music, Japanese environmental ambient music, fourth world electronics, free jazz and the choral traditions of Estonia, with particular influence from Tallinn-based composer Tonu Korvits. Produced in collaboration with the Vox Sydney Philharmonia Choir, conducted by Pike’s childhood friend, composer Sam Lipman and recorded in a 19th century Gothic church.

Laurence Pike on The Undreamt-of Centre:
I first had the thought of working with voices a number of years ago. I had the strange notion of making a requiem mass for drums, electronics and choir. It sat with me since then, until it felt the time was right to realise the idea. Why a requiem? Initially I simply liked the idea of a structural format that had existed and been reimagined again and again over hundreds of years.

Ultimately, it’s a ritual set to music. The processes and ecstatic outcomes of rituals, were something I had explored in making the Holy Spring album in 2019. I became interested in subverting the religious musical construct of a requiem into something far more contemporary, using language and sounds not readily associated with it. It also seemed a ready-made vehicle to explore the sound of a choir with my electro-acoustic drum kit performances. I had begun searching for a narrative structure or text that I might set a choir to, while not adhering to the text of a Latin mass. I began reading the poems of Rainer Maria Rilke, in particular his ‘Sonnets to Orpheus’, inspired by the classical Greek myth of Orpheus.

Tracklist: 

A1. Introit
A2. Orpheus In The Underworld
A3. Mountains Of The Heart
A4. Universal Forces

B1. The Undreamt-of Centre
B2. Eurydice
B3. Requiem Aeternam
B4. All Is Distance