Kasper T. TOEPLITZ
“Amas”

AMAS is one lengthy composition, played live on a computer consisting of long electronic parts; as described by Toeplitz, it is “a growing organism: my idea when working on it was to take some ideas from Don Buchla’s “philosophy” as a starting point – ideas from the “West-Coast” school of music: in building the “engines” which produce sounds, the shaping of the sounds is rather made by modulations and adding harmonics (by distortion or rather waveshaping) than the more “classical” (East-Coast) method of using filtering. But the Buchla/West-Coast influence is also on the structure of the music itself, the work considered as a living organism rather than a strict composition; or perhaps rather like a fixed time and a walk with a given direction, but all the steps are not fixed.”

Kasper T. Toeplitz is a French composer and musician of Polish origin, born in 1960. He lives in Paris. He has worked with academic research organisations, such as GMEM, GRM, IRCAM, and Radio-France, as well as with experimental musicians, such as Éliane Radigue, Zbigniew Karkowski, Dror Feiler, Tetsuo Furudate, Phill Niblock and Art Zoyd. Citing Giacinto Scelsi, Gyorgy Ligeti and Iannis Xenakis as influences, his early work was mostly written for traditional instruments. He received several prizes and distinctions for these works: 1st prize in composition for orchestra at the festival of Besançon, 1st prize in the Opéra Autrement/Acanthes competition, Villa Médicis Hors-les-Murs in New York, prize Léonard de Vinci in San Francisco, Villa Kujoyama in Kyoto, and DAAD in Berlin. He has also written for his electric guitar orchestra, Sleaze Art. He then integrated computers into his work, via the programming language MAX.

Please note: This release packaging comes folded into quarters, ending up as a 5 ” x 5 ” brochure style booklet (liner notes inside), with the CD in a paper sleeve, all inserted into re-sealable plastic sleeves. There is no jewel case, tray card etc.