From Italy, we have Musica Automata (HELICAL HLC001) by the Italian composer Leonardo Barbadoro.
Under his Koolmorf Widesen alias, this fellow has dipped his digits in the glitch and IDM genres from about 2007 onwards, but none of that here; instead, his compositions are being played by musical robots. To realise this project, he went to the Logos Association in Ghent, home to a unique collection of devices for which we have to thank the pioneer Godfried-Willem Raes, the Belgian instrument-maker who’s been active in this area since the 1970s; members of Company have performed and recorded with him, including Derek Bailey and Max Eastley; and besides the larger Logos Ensemble, there was the Logos duo with Moniek Darge who made a bonkers improv record for Igloo in Belgium in 1983.
Leonardo Barbadoro for his part might not be that much of an improviser; there’s a photo in the digipak of him seated stately behind his laptop and mixing desk set-up, while the mechanical instruments surround him as though they were playing courtiers to the king. If I understand it, the challenge that appeals to him is getting these rather clunky, potentially limited instruments to do his bidding, working on the assumption that his digital compositions – which appear to be the starting point for everything – are a source of “boundless expressive possibilities”. In short, “the computer can do anything” would seem to be his motto, and he’s now testing whether he can apply this agency to the boring old Newtonian world of physical objects, and watch whatever dances may ensue.
Well, he’s had some limited success; I can hear for instance how he’s striving very hard to get some interesting rhythmical counterpoints going on certain tracks, even if the end result seems like a marching band of clockwork toys. He’s determined to push at the limitations of this situation, but it might have been more interesting if he hadn’t; Pierre Bastien, the true king of musical automata, accepted that there was only so much he could do with his levers and meccano arms, and the music he made was unique and brilliant – lo-fi quirk-jazz made with flair, economy, humour, and imagination, and played in real time with not a laptop in sight. Conversely, control-freak Barbadoro studiously manages to avoid any spontaneity or happy accidents on this album, nor is he really doing enough to exploit the possibilities of these musical automata in Ghent. (24/10/2023)