Ballett 4

Recorded in 2000, the music on this includes cello, Thomas Kagermann on flute, wordless singing, and some soft narration, and mixed beat. There is a 14-minute introduction, "Mellowtrone," which I thought delightful. Then a buildup to a beat oriented part which is ambient. A good example of his work.

Klaus Schulze's "Ballett (Ballet)" suite originally appeared as part of the huge Rainhorse Records 10-CD "Contemporary Works 1" collection of 2000. The work's title is explained by the fact that this suite of compositions was originally composed in memory of the composer's mother, a ballet dancer in her youth, shortly after her death in 1998. There was never any intention at all on Schulze's part for this music to be choreographed, and there is nothing particularly balletic about any of it. The entire suite has now been re-released in a series of four discs, each available separately and with some of them having bonus track added as "make-weights" to fill out the CD medium.

This final disc in the set opens with 'Mellowtrone', a soaring string-synth elegy in Schulze's best Romantic style, full of lush chords and searing solo lines. Excitement returns to the music with the second track, 'Soft and Groovy', where a lively fiddle tune leads the dance over a syncopated rhythm track until a synth voice takes over the pace, toning things down into a more moody affair into which Thomas Kagermann's violin gradually insinuates itself by degrees. Drawing in a wordless vocal line, the fiddle playing becomes more frenetic as the beat shifts up a gear and is joined by a pizzicato string line and, eventually, the voice once again, with both finally singing the track to its conclusion and into the next track, "To B Flat". Here voice and 'cello mutter conspiratorially together for a while, before the 'cello begins to conduct a mournful discourse of its own with flute and violin, leaving the voice grumbling to itself. A strong percussion beat imposes some discipline on things for a while, although the main voices continue to try to take over, the struggle finally being brought to an abrupt end with a cataclysmic eruption which drowns everything and sinks the work back into a moody contemplative state, with delicate 'cello, violin and flute lines circling one another in an unsteady but stately dance. Things continue to subside, until a restless synth figure and flighty flute line draw the muttering voice once more from the depths, to sing the work to an uneasy close.

The bonus track on this CD is the 10-minute 'Eleven 2 Eleven' only previously available on a special promo CD for the "Contemporary Works 1" collection. It is a lengthy synthesiser ballad that brings the disc -- and indeed the complete "Ballett" series -- to a satisfying close. In addition to this disc, you will, of course, want the other three: "Ballett 1", "Ballett 2", "Ballett 3".

› Go to Amazon.com to see both reviews  4.5 out of 5 stars