AUDIO
REVIEWS
GUARDIAN/OBSERVER BEST CLASSICAL ALBUMS OF 2012
5:4 BEST ALBUMS OF 2012 (Top 40)
‘…the music of one of the most distinctive and thought-provoking younger composers’ Gramophone
‘Exceptionally striking pieces, combining mastery of texture and form with a marvellous sense of compositional pacing and gesture. Secret Forest is especially sublime’ BBC Music Magazine ★★★★★
'Dai Fujikura ... has already swept up many prizes, and worked with Boulez and Dudamel. Europe, he says, thinks of him as a Japanese composer. The sensuous, watery influences of Takemitsu, writ large, are certainly audible. He considers himself British and says writing slow, meditative gong music is against his nature. This lively east-west tension is evident in the five works here. Secret Forest (2008) is a riot of imaginative bird and insect noise – a private utopia well worth exploring' The Observer
‘Fujikura’s engagement with lyricism that’s most interesting, side-stepping well-worn approaches from both East & West to create works of striking originality ... deeply hypnotic and at times gorgeous’ 5:4 blog
FUNDERS
With thanks to the Guildhall School of Music and Drama and to the Great Britain Sasakawa Foundation for their generous support of this disc.
RECORDING CREDITS
Okeanos, Eternal Escape and Rubi(co)n were recorded at Coombehurst Studio, University of Kingston, London on 15-16 January 2011.
DAI FUJIKURA Recording Producer
ANDREW POST Recording Engineer
Secret Forest was recorded live at Kioi Hall, Tokyo, Japan on 5 November 2008.
Phantom Pulse was recorded live at its premiere on 11 September 2006 by the Lucerne Percussion Group, conducted by Michel Cerutti, at KKL Lucerne, Lucerne Hall, Switzerland as part of LUCERNE FESTIVAL in Summer.
DAI FUJIKURA Digital Editing
DAVID LEFEBER Mastering
(P) 2012 NMC Recordings Ltd © 2012 NMC Recordings Ltd
Catalogue number: NMC D172
Release Date: 9 July 2012