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When the Streets Were Quiet

by Max Johnson

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1.
Minerva 10:29
2.
3.
String Trio 16:49
4.

about

On "When the Streets Were Quiet", composer, bassist, and bandleader Max Johnson turns the focus to his finely wrought chamber music. Active in many contexts, Johnson is voraciously eclectic and impressively versatile. The works on this collection betray little overt reference to his wide range of stylistic activities, instead zeroing in on his craft centered approach to composition. With an emphasis on counterpoint, imitative textures, structural markers defined by instrumental relationships, and broad arcs of direction and activity, Johnson creates lush, intricate works that balance an elegiac lyricism with well considered rigor. The featured performers are violinist Lauren Cauley, violist Carrie Frey, cellist Maria Hadge, clarinetist Lucy Hatem, and pianist Fifi Zhang.

"Minerva" for clarinet, violin, viola, and cello opens the program with swooping lines that snake between the instruments of the quartet. Punctuated arrival notes articulate the direction of the composite line; splashes of harmonic color emerge from the living canvas of activity. When the texture thins out, a pointillistic klangfarben reveals itself more clearly, spinning out one thread of melody as its tone color constantly morphs. The ensemble sections of "Minerva" are set off by expressive solo and duo passages, contrasting the hybrid expression of the tutti sections with moments of intimate drama. A dense climactic section releases the work’s accumulated energy with a torrent of layered lines (perhaps reflecting the influence of Johnson’s mentor and dedicatee of the work, composer Jason Eckardt) before the piece finishes with a poignant cello solo.

The clarinet takes a central role in "Nine O’Clock When the Streets Were Quiet," joined by violin, viola, and cello. The strings provide an ominous pad of closely spaced intervals over which the clarinet plays a searching figure in an initially compressed register that patiently expands over four minutes, intensified by accents and sudden tremolos in the strings. In the second section, the clarinet drops out, as the strings weave around each other in a similarly small register, like reptiles slithering in the mud. This time the cello and viola widen the register, driving towards an arrival, while the clarinet and violin provide long, connective tones. The sustained textures become the primary idea in the subsequent section, and indeed the remainder of the piece, as the texture slowly settles into the intense closely spaced intervals from the opening to close, this time in a higher tessitura. Johnson’s sound painting of a nighttime streetscape is one of tense apprehension and foreboding.

Johnson’s "String Trio" is organized into multiple sections delineated by solos, pitch areas, and texture, and is primarily written in a harmonic language that evokes the early 20th century transition from extended tonality into free atonality. It takes a surprising turn at the five minute point to a setting of a Barber-esque melody, briefly referencing a familiar kind of mid-century, wide-eyed Americana. An accented four note chromatic figure interrupts the reverie and anchors the following contrasting section, returning the piece to the thornier pitch landscape, now accompanied by vigorous rhythmic interplay. Percolating pizzicati animate the texture before the work closes with a return to the hopeful material from its midway point, acknowledging and integrating some of the harmonic ambiguity from the other sections of the work in a final progression that ends unresolved on a minor ninth between cello and violin.

"Echoes of a Memory" opens with the clarinet and viola trading off sustained lines, supported by ethereal chords in the piano. The middle register emphasis of the instrumentation is subverted by high sustained notes in the clarinet and clarion harmonics in the viola. Flowing lines in alternating unison between piano and one of the other instruments propel the texture forward towards a torrent of interwoven independent lines. Johnson returns to the watery chords in the piano and sustained tones in clarinet and viola for the close of the piece.

- Dan Lippel

credits

released January 6, 2023

Lauren Cauley - Violin
Carrie Frey - Viola
Maria Hadge - 'Cello
Lucy Hatem - Clarinet
Fifi Zhang - Piano
Max Johnson - Conductor (track 1)

All music composed by Max Johnson (Max Johnson Music ASCAP)

Recorded by Aaron Nevezie at The Bunker Produced by Max Johnson
Edited by Max Johnson
Mixed and Mastered by Zach Herchen
Poetry & Liner Notes by Todd Colby
Artwork by Leah Asher
Design by Marc Wolf, marcjwolf.com
Photos of Ensemble by Max Johnson
Photo of Max Johnson by Aidan Grant

Made possible by a grant from the Café Royal Cultural Foundation
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Liner Notes:

Minerva

Something you should know about: Shadows
are faster than light. I know the future and it
is full of awkward feelings. Rub an inflated balloon
with a rabbit’s foot for luck. Dream up something
that looks like a ticket to something bolder
and brighter. A solitary walk with my hands
behind my back. “People look good exhausted,”
I think, “It takes away self-consciousness.”
Exhaustion takes a lot out of you.
The hum of electricity rolls over the valley.
I am a tree. I am the melancholy owl,
all hard edged and panting.
I am moving at the speed of earth.
I enter the room in a super way.

When the Streets Were Quiet

I had to learn how to leave everything alone.
Creaky sounds of an old building, like a ship
moaning at sea. He taped hammers to each
of his hands in order to feel more maximal.
Think how effortlessly a dog barks.
It’s ok, our galaxy is totally normal.
The perception of effortlessness is a previous
arrangement with anxiety. My marks are all touch
and go. No, seriously, who am I trying
to appeal to anyway? Sometimes a feeling
of wanting to be slugged by the wind.
These days are hounding me with eternity.
Call me Mr. Obvious, but there really is
only so much of everything.

String Trio

I forgot how to do everything.
The days of the sparse hang glider are numbered.
We were shown the moon and asked to remark on it.
We knew the nature of spam risks.
All the images of birds are round.
Think of the sweet water, the woeful time travelers,
and the air around us like lotion.
An idea for a sleep helmet never
got off the ground. Gently I fade
into sound. Some would say “fall,”
but I prefer “autumn.” I can imagine
myself using humor in a difficult situation.
And then there’s the whole thing about zero gravity
that has finally come a-knocking at my door.

Echoes of a Memory

Sometimes I look at the day
and think, “Something is really off here.”
I’m grateful that I’ve actually been called
a fool for love. In the hard knocks academy
there are days just like these. Let us sing
in dense, hypnotic, harmonies. In the movie of your life,
someone playing you will be slightly tipsy
as they tip-toe into a room
and read this poem to you.
Sometimes I pretend to be on the phone
chit-chatting when I’m alone. The pain from
a pinprick to the finger travels 275mph
to the brain. Oh just look at yourself.
I will teach your common yard robin
one swear word.

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Max Johnson Brooklyn, New York

“Max Johnson is one of the most prolific and versatile musician/composers in music today” (All About Jazz). Max Johnson is a bassist, composer and bandleader based in New York City, known for his big sound, eclectic style and prolific output. With 9 albums, and over 2000 concerts under his belt, Johnson has proven to be an unparalleled force on the bass, and an individual voice as a composer. ... more

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