Ryan Teague — Six Preludes

This is one little Gem from 2005 that would have made it onto my best of the year list if I had got hold of it sooner. I came across it being played across the brilliant Gibert and Joseph record store in Paris, the strange mesmerizing tones drifting over the shelves of records and straight into my unconscious. I enquired as to the source of this sound and I was directed to this EP by Cambridge resident Ryan Teague.

Six Preludes is a album of electro-acoustic music that speaks with a remarkably spiritual lyricism. From the first few seconds of Prelude 1 the depth of emotion within the music is apparent. Violin, clarinet, and guitar are melded into shimmering masses of treated sound, and above it all an operatic female voice enchants us further. The electronics don’t go as far as to obscure the natural timbre of the instruments and every note is allowed to breath amid the washes of programmed glitches and drones.  Melody, that often forgotten aspect of electro-acoustic music is very much evident here as cinematic crescendos drive the piece into even more epic territory.

Prelude II is less immediate and contains a greater use of sound effects and digital processing. Vinyl like scratches and concrete overtones weave a mysterious pattern around more abstract instrumental passages.  At times the lines between the instrumental and electronic are completely blurred and you are left to experience the sound without inhibition or preconceptions.
This is evident again on Prelude IV where sinewy violin and cello lines are drawn out into long protracted drones and what sounds like clockwork tinkers in the foreground. The shift between soundscape and straight instrumental music is seamless. Even harder semi-industrial elements that are introduced at around four minutes weave effortlessly through a forest of sine waves and metallic guitar tones.

The final track Prelude VI is the tour de force of mood and emotion distilled through filters and laid bare. Short melancholic piano riffs punctuate a myriad of electronic ticks and flicks while a slightly more direct electronica drum rhythm accelerates the piece. The strings soon join the mix and add to the evolving texture like a painter slowly adding layers of detail to a landscape. So much of this music brings to mind ideas of painting, sculpture, and poetry, a rare gift in a genre that is perhaps more accustom to overtly academic chin stroking.

Comparisons are difficult to make as I feel that Ryan Teague has succeeded in developing a genuinely unique sound and approach to electro-acoustic music. The level of processing would perhaps suggest Evan Parkers Electro-Acoustic Ensemble but the lyricism and melodic content of Teagues compositions suggest otherwise. The filmic quality and atmosphere of the recordings to my ear suggest a lineage closer to composers like Michael Nyman or even John Barry. Certainly some of the melodies bring to mind some of Barry’s classic scores like Eternal Echoes.  Minimalists like Gavin Bryars and Steve Reich are also suggested in the counterpoint and use of space. Whatever view you take, Six Preludes offers up the same conclusion, that Teague has put together an EP of great promise and invention which leaves me eagerly awaiting his soon to be released full length album.