CATALOG

Riccardo Dillon Wanke: Caves

sedcd051 | Released in 2008 | 500 copies | $10 Caves

Riccardo Dillon Wanke’s Caves was composed and recorded in 2006 in Alfama (historical district of Lisbon, Portugal) using acoustic and electric guitars, saxophones and natural sound elements starting from pure radical improvisation evolving into the investigation of drones and static and looped music related to minimalism. At the center of these works are the binaural beats in musical composition, the results lying between classical composition, minimalistic improvisation and a "folk" sensitivity. The five tracks of Caves explore this in various ways. Its music plays with the relation between different geometries: expanded drones and concrete sounds, acoustic melodies and looped music. The project is music with a sort of irrational tension within a composed piece, built as a musical space made with few elements. On the surface, its aura seems immediately knowable and known yet Wanke has delivered a much more complex, nearly radical gesture. Wanke was born in Genova, Italy in 1977, was established in Milan from 1982 until 2005 and now lives and works in Lisbon. He began to study piano 1986, playing saxophone (tenor and alto) in 1994, and then guitar in 2001. He has been working in the experimental music field since 2000 (long-term collaborations with Giuseppe Ielasi, Francesco Dillon, Stefano Pilia, David Maranha, Renato Rinaldi, Christian Alati, Andrea Belfi, Margarida Garcia). He is member of Medves group.

http://www.myspace.com/rdwmusic

some press clips:

“Caves hovers between discord and beauty, between drone and improvised to build a collection of pieces that swings between hypnotic, poignant, emotional pulling….He also often adds in cut-up improvised instrumental elements, or textural sound settles fuzzed over the top of the drones which really heightens the music’s strange, tragic and often beautiful charm. Caves is an exceptional work of honesty, pain and beauty which will have you seeing wonder and magic in every crack, chip and dis-colorment that surrounds your existence-simply spellbinding stuff”-Roger Batty, Musique Machine, 06/2008)

” In this calm and dilated sea the sound grow and extend as an hypnosis, evoking sometimes minimalistic backgrounds speckled of bluesy notes (and) or raga-folk mutation (the beautiful Jest), exploring ways where the (ec)static formula of minimalism pervades in the improvisation and in the folk memories, leaving the droning of a sax kept on the puff-sound boundary dissolve itself in a modulation of bewildered beauty (Old Man). Wanke is, in fact, the nicest monthly surprise in the electro-acoustic field; moving close to David Maranha, Manuel Mota, Giuseppe Ielasi….resulting in a bright and peculiar personality, a clear and conscious sound, a never banal composing ability. 8 out of 10” -Stefano Bianchi-Blow UP magazine, 07/2008)
 
 “Wanke layers sound upon sound, starting with a few simple disparate sounds and then goes on and on to layers them until a somewhat (not to) dense mass of sound arrives….Very nice record, this one, with solid improvised drone music"-FdW, Vital Weekly, 05/2008)