Dalbergia Retusa [2LP]

Hans Reichel - Dalbergia Retusa [2LP]

Gatefold! Comes with booklet. Black Truffle presents Dalbergia Retusa, an extensive double LP selection of the solo guitar music of Hans Reichel, compiled by Oren Ambarchi. Last heard on Black Truffle as one quarter of the joyously anarchic Bergisch-Brandenburgisches Quartett, Hans Reichel (1949-2011) is one of the great figures of experimental guitar music. Though perhaps lesser known than peers like Derek Bailey, Fred Frith, and Keith Rowe, Reichel's rethinking of the instrument was in some ways the most radical of all. Early on, he dispensed with existing guitars to build a series of his own that explored the use of additional strings and fretboards, moveable pickups, extra bridges, special capos, and other innovations documented in the extensive booklet accompanying this release. Reichel was a long-term resident of Wuppertal, the small Western Germany city that became an unlikely center of European free jazz in the late 1960s, also home to Peter Brötzmann and Peter Kowald. His solo debut Wichlinghauser Blues was an early entry into the FMP discography and began a relationship with the label that stretched into the 1990s; all the solo performances heard here were first released on FMP. Reichel was an important source for the development of Oren Ambarchi's own extended approach to the electric guitar. Appropriately enough, his selection opens with the very first piece by Reichel he ever heard, on a flexidisc included with a 1989 issue of Guitar Player magazine. Though Reichel collaborated with others extensively in many settings and also performed on violin and his other major contribution to instrument invention, the daxophone, his music for solo guitar remains at the core of his oeuvre. Focusing exclusively on solo pieces recorded between 1973 and 1988, the 23 pieces on Dalbergia Retusa showcase the range and consistency of Reichel's work, allowing the listener to see how his performances developed hand-in-hand with his instrumental inventions. Many of the pieces from the 1980s make use of varieties of the "pick behind the bridge guitar," instruments of uncanny harmonic richness primarily designed to be played on the 'wrong' side of the bridge. At times the unexpected behavior of attacks, resonance, and decay can almost seem electronic, conjuring up the technology-assisted work of Henry Kaiser or even Fennesz, but realized solely through Reichel's unorthodox techniques on his invented instruments. Extensively illustrated with photos and Reichel's own plans and drawings of his instruments, Dalbergia Retusa is an essential introduction to the unique world of Hans Reichel. A1. Return Of The Knödler Show (2:52) A2. The Frogs Of Miwa - Cho (1) (4:52) A3. Waiting (I) (5:38) A4. An Old Friend Passes By (3:46) A5. Coco Bolo Strip (1) (5:25) B1. Peace And Pipe Utopia (3:14) B2. Unidentified Dancing Object (1:44) B3. The Call (I) (2:41) B4. Wenn Das Rohr Dommelt (4:03) B5. Mariahilf (Live Version) (3:36) B6. Watching The Shades (I) (2:59) B7. Playing The Table Music (Ii) (2:43) C1. Could Be Nice Too (5:29) C2. Ox Of Inner Depth (4:51) C3. Ymir Shows Up (3:58) C4. Could Be Nice (5:24) C5. Playing The Table Music (I) (4:23) D1. Coco Bolo Strip (Ii) (4:52) D2. Locusts Looking Like Men (5:55) D3. Waiting (Ii) (3:36) D4. No Stove (2:29) D5. An Old Friend Passes By Again (3:00) D6. Heimkehr Der Holzböcke (3:16)