The name of the Christine Ott and Mathieu Gabry project Snowdrops might seem to indicate the prevailing atmosphere, but here limpid piano runs with keys which almost seem to melt into one another are offset by the eerie waves of the ondes Martenot plus breezier forays from the electric hurdy gurdy with additional percussive accompaniment – sometimes indecipherable from the close-miked action of the pianos and keyboards – courtesy of xylophone and vibes.
That is to say that the weather here is damp and blowsy rather than frigid, as Ott and Gabry now on their fourth studio album move in the direction of more temperate climes. Singing Stones (Volume 1) is billed as the first in ‘a series of compositions celebrating slow time and long time’, segueing imperceptibly between ambient jazz and post-classical soundscapes, post-rock textures and deep listening practises with a rustling and windswept, riverrun or volcanic quality that resolutely defies locale.
The catch is that for all of their environmental colour these pieces do move with the glaciality as well as the slight blur of a snow globe, as though they were trapped and suspended inside of a transparent sphere. On the standout ‘Ligne de Mica’ where the duo are joined for the first of three tracks by Bartosz Szwarc on accordion, there is a subtle change of scenery as the piece retreats from a stark arctic reverie and begins to feel warmer and more urbane, still rapt as the accordion suffuses the piece with a growing sense of wanderlust.
And on ‘The Weather Project’ which references the famous installation by the Icelandic-Danish artist Olafur Eliasson – a revelation in the Turbine Hall of the Tate Modern back in 2003, as monofrequency lamps, foil and haze machines imbued the space with a fine mist overseen by the reflective gaze of an orange sun – such celestial projections are turned inwards, as the duo team up with the violist Annè-Irene Kempf whose rugged then elevated bows over plunking keys conjure volcanic rumbles and spurts of hot lava, with the trio skirting the eruption and taking flight to gently survey the fractured crust.
‘Arctic Passage’ is more varied, described as a nocturnal crossing of the ice as the itinerant travellers incorporate the revving drones of the hurdy gurdy, traces of mallet percussion and a more spectral ondes Martenot to span great chasms and white expanses under the shifting blanket of night, while back with Szwarc on ‘The River’ a patient unfolding on the piano backed by the phantom winds of the accordion gives way to more plangent and graceful runs and a verse-chorus structure, with gentle bends in the banks of the water until the steady flow glides smoothly to a halt.
‘Phase One’ on the other hand is an exalted breath on mallet percussion, while the closer ‘Dreamers’ is more propulsive as padded handclaps and an ascending motif on hollowed-out keys drive the piece while a static drone loiters in the backdrop. From the second minute Szwarc’s bass accordion begins to make its presence felt through a few short squibs while teasing piano phrases take a fuller and flirtier tone, only for the percussive keyboard motif to drop off halfway through the track and drift out into the damp aether, as the accordion wrests control of the piece through a folksy bal-musette theme accompanied by the same buzzing drone, a few deft piano runs and the gasping swell of the ondes Martenot as Singing Stones (Volume 1) which is often elegant and stark embraces a rain-on-cobblestone kind of wistfulness.
Several of the compositions on Singing Stones (Volume 1) refer to other artworks, with ‘Ligne de Mica’ first presented as part of an exhibition of the same name by the visual artist Léa Barbazanges, who cleaved blocks of mica crystals into twelves sequences which she backlit for a long horizontal display of azure and cobalt blue, ambery and fuchsia angularity and shimmering iridescence. ‘The Weather Project’ responds to that monumental installation by Olafur Eliasson, and follows up on their earlier collaborations with the violist Annè-Irene Kempf on both Volutes and Missing Island.
Meanwhile the opening piece ‘Corridors’ is dedicated to the Thai film director Phuttiphong Aroonpheng, with Snowdrops having composed the soundtracks to his first two feature films, Manta Ray from 2018 and Morrison from last year. ‘Crossing’ in turn draws its inspiration from Morrison, with Snowdrops describing the piece as a ‘small symphony of breaths, in search of presence and meaning’.
The first of two long pieces on Singing Stones (Volume 1), preceding the crunchier timbres and howling drones of ‘Arctic Passage’, on the near twenty-minute ‘Crossing’ the duo traverse everything from ambient jazz to baroque electronics through rolled chords and percussive treatments, delicate porch chimes and the spurting reed-like sounds of the hurdy gurdy plus that eerie theremin-like ondes Martenot, which elicits alien transmissions or the yawning dread of a Munchian scream beneath blood-red skies, just one of the colours in sight as they rev the engine of their snowmobile and set out flanked by snot or emerald green in search of the wonders of an aurora borealis.
