The Skani label has set itself the task of offering a stage primarily to Latvian composers. This album presents world premiere recordings of five works by Agris Engelmanis, who was born in Liepāja in 1936 and died there in 2011. The booklet text reads: ‘He was one of the most modernist-oriented Latvian composers but is still completely underestimated.’ His three diaphonies were composed in 1972, 1979 and 1996, and the name of the genre requires some explanation. In ancient Greece, diaphony meant dissonance, as opposed to symphony or consonance. In fact, the three works are characterised by a process in which powerful, often almost rumbling masses of sound are juxtaposed with quieter, but always free-tonal passages, with the piano taking on a mediating role. The ‘Music for symphony orchestra’ is also furrowed by harsh dissonances, as it were, but is very (neo-)classically conceived in terms of its structure. Only ‘Music Alba’ (1988) - the title means ‘white music’ - strikes a somewhat softer note.
Burkhard Schäfer
FonoForum, 09/2024
