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Cecilia Brauer : The Angelic Sounds of Christmas (US,1996)**°'
Sure, this is an idiosyncratic, somewhat humoristic cover. Cecelia Brauer looks like an inventor from a child's Christmas story. But also, this is the first Christmas CD I can really listen too.
The sound of the armonica (yes, it is spelt correctly) was invented by (the English) Benjamin Franklin in 1761 after a successful concert on wine glasses. The armonica turned out to be an instrument with a beautiful ethereal sound. Such life-vividness of sound embodied instruments, unlike some people think, of course, simply cannot be copied as "complete and vivid sound" with ordinary keyboards.
-I even think the same about the mellotron which has its own reactive principle-, because such instruments have moving tones along with the colours. This instrument has a wide in range of expression and with a certain mobility in sound. Beside it has often been used for experimental music this century, there also have been various classical compositions written for it. Even Goethe and Mozart wrote pieces for it.
About this CD I can already conclude that I cannot imagine an instrument more suitable for Christmas songs than the icy otherworldly sound of this armonica. It gives the melody's a spiritual edge, fitting with wintery idealist thoughts-overs and during Christmas times.
One capacity of the armonica above the wine glasses is a more in-depth quality of its sound. 'Glass' is in fact one of those materials between crystal/stone and water and is actually a kind of slowly moving fluid, instead of a vast material. When it vibrates it carries along its vibrations, slightly freebound as through water. When the humidity of the surface is perfect, and the glass is thin enough to vibrate more easily, the sound can move deeper. Then it overcomes longer distances and areas of sounds. Then it is as if the sound assimilates various worlds. It is carried by something of the vast material element, lets say with an earthly vibration, with a more free moving watery twinkling, now warping it even further into light and airy vocalisations. It is a true spiritual instrument that transcendents different worlds of perceptions. When our earthly wishes sometimes lack in true spiritual embodiment, this sound already gives the best of both worlds. When hypocrisy and good will misses a strong foundation for a creative occasion of openness, I think the music on this CD can help.
Now what about the performance of Cecilia Brauer ? Like with Christmas time I feel the different kinds of tendencies when facing Christmas. On the first two tracks, "Oh Little town of Bethlehem" and "I wonder as I wander" Cecilia's playing moves slowly and vibrates humanly, creating a fine interpretation of melodies with an amount of openness for the echoing sounds, truly understanding how to play the instrument with best effect. It's especially the armonica which makes the themes more abstract, and more universal. Here the transcendent mode is most clear. Then we also have, a bit further on, "Oh Come, little Children" which sounds like a 'glass church organ'. For alternation, a couple of tracks are accompanied by soprano (Judith Blegen Gniewek). We also have a family like chamber version of "Ave Maria", with violin (Raymond Gniewek), and harmonium (Cecilia). Some of the interpretations thereafter really recall the Christmas tree, the lights, a warm hearth-fire, and a grandmother spinning in a corner, and a certain innocence in this picture. But the singing on "Christmas Tree" makes the mood annoyingly obvious to me, because the voice interpretation itself, is mostly more melodically contributing, sustaining the more conservative side of Christmas, the less spontaneous, just like the "we must be together" thing, no matter what each persons drives himself really. Where Christmas should bring peace in our hearts, in reality it also confronts us with our struggling nature, and with the contradictory characters of family members. If the occasion itself is spontaneous enough to be open to a truer spirit, it can become really fine. But when the "we-must-sing" and "be part of the belonging together-thing", just because it's expected, the same way like the voice sings over it, with the characteristics of a motionless technical perfection. At least the violin / armonica piece "Siciliano" brings back some comfort. Still various of the later tracks are melodically taken, more basically, and contributes less in interpretation through sound. Then these tracks become more tiresome, with less inspiration through how the instrument sounds. When the harmonium concludes, and emphases on a small home and family feeling asserting itself again, I'm left with the ambivalence of some small values taking over, with the transcendent principle only touched on the surface it is still too unconscious to contemplate. At the end, a conservative nature and a creative transcendent nature are both there, none of them overrule the other. Small hopes and wills are being left here, in some way in a contradictory peace.
Cecilia :
"To really appreciate its most unique sound, it must be heard live
because to me it is "alive". Unfortunately, one can really not appreciate its enveloping sound on a CD. Best way to hear a CD recording of it is with speakers surrounding you. When one is in a room or small hall, the sound surroundsyou as it picks up the vibrations in the air. In fact, I have been told that the further one is from the instrument, the bigger the sound. It is all-encompassing and very unearthly. As
I play it, all the vibrations radiate up my arms. It is so relaxing and peaceful. It is a very difficult and temperamental instrument to play. Everything affects it... humidity, dryness, type of water (one certainly cannot use water that is too "soft"), chemistry of the body, etc., etc. But I "love (to play) it"."
