Hauschka
Ferndorf [album]
“Taking
his inspiration from the natural
surroundings of his childhood,
Hauschka has produced the wonderful
Ferndorf (which translates as ‘distant
village’)
— a magical musical exploration
of nature’s
forests and mountains that
surround the German village he left
behind...”
HAUSCHKA BEGINS TO PLAY and all around the office you can hear a pin drop
— what must it be like to hear him live? There is nothing heavy
here. Ferndorf is a very beautiful, light and evocative collection of
magical music pieces inspired by the lovely open forests and far mountains of
an idyllic childhood — natural surroundings that had to be left
to be appreciated.
This tribute to nature has a very attractive art deco-style album cover with
a figure looking back to the village with an enormous sun over it.
Hauschka's second album for FatCat's 130701 imprint offers a brilliant advance
on 2007's Room To Expand. Where the previous album comprised mostly solo
recordings of Hauschka's prepared piano (with a few electronic and instrumental
overdubs), Ferndorf is a far more expansive and fully-realised album,
with many of the tracks also featuring a string duo enabling an increased solidity.
More dynamic — its staccato stabbing rhythms are rendered increasingly
rousing and emotive with these additional strings.
Close your eyes and you are surrounded by the tall trees; you can hear the splash
from the swimming pool in an enchanted clearing and soar to the peaks with the
music in your ears. This is just what you need to listen to as you wind down
after a busy day.
Whilst the recordings still retain the shivers and tics (as by-products of)
of the modified internal workings of the piano — alongside some sweet electronic
touches — these are less central and instead what's foregrounded is the
melodic/rhythmic push and pull, and a development towards more orchestrated
music and notated compositions.
Every track seems to lift your heart and stir your soul; relaxing your body
as your mind blots out the rat race and absorbs each pure musical note of Hauschka's
enchanting Ferndorf.
• Hauschka's Ferndorf is out now (released
8 September, 2008) on CD/LP/Digital on FatCat/130701.
Tracklisting
1 Blue Bicycle | 2 Morgenrot | 3 Rode Null | 4 Freibad
| 5 Barfuss durch Gras | 6 Heimat | 7 Nadelwald | 8
Schönes Mädchen | 9 Eltern | 10 Alma | 11 Neuschnee
| 12 Weeks of Rain
"Every track seems to lift your heart and stir your soul; relaxing your body
as your mind blots out the rat race and absorbs each pure musical note of Hauschka's
enchanting Ferndorf" — MotorBar
Check out myspace.com/fatcat,
myspace.com/hauschka and
fat-cat.co.uk.
About Hauschka
Having studied classical piano for ten years, Düsseldorf-based pianist/composer
Volker Bertelmann's work as Hauschka is based upon a playful exploration of
the possibilities of the prepared piano — an adventurous intervention into
the preconceived idea of the piano as a pure-toned, perfected instrument simply
waiting for a gifted virtuoso to play on it. His resulting tracks are vivid,
unconventional pieces made in a spirit of playful research-enthusiasm.
Prior to his involvement with FatCat, Hauschka released two albums on the Karaoke
Kalk label — Substantial (2004) and The Prepared Piano (2005).
Volker is also a member of Music A.M., a collaboration with Stefan Schneider
(To Rococco Rot) and Luke Sutherland (Long Fin Killie); and of the electronic/club
tracks duo Tonetraeger, with Torsten Mauss.
Since Room To Expand (2007), Hauschka's cultural stock has increased
considerably, based particularly around the revelation of his live performances,
including rapturously received support tours in the USA with Múm, in Japan with
Colleen, and a debut, sold-out London show with Max Richter.
Where the previous album appeared almost in isolation, Ferndorf arrives
with a coherent extended campaign including increased live activity, a digital
single and a video triptych by Japanese animators Overture (responsible for
Múm's 'Rhubarbidoo' video).
The album title Ferndorf translates as distant village and relates to
the small, central German village set in a landscape of valleys and pine forests
in which Volker grew up. Living by the forest, with the freedom to fully experience
nature alongside his six brothers and sisters, Volker spent nearly the whole
day — apart from school — outdoors.
Growing older, the village lost its charm and became for him a boring place,
provoking a move to Cologne. Yet in the last couple of years he rediscovered
that — alongside his experiences of travelling — everything he is
playing today is based on his childhood experience in nature; that the source
of his creativity derives from being at the right place in a certain time.
Ferndorf is thus his hymn to that place. All of these tracks are named
after very spontaneous impressions from that time, deliberately tinged with
a sense of Utopia. So Morgenrot refers to the window of his room which
faced onto the rising red sky in summer mornings; Rode Null is a mountain
behind his parents' house; Freibad is an outdoor swimming pool in the
forest where you can go swimming in the moonlight; Nadelwald is the dark
needle-wood which he sled-rode through in wintertime; whilst Weeks of Rain
refers to Ferndorf's famously rainy climate.
Recorded between October 2007 and March 2008, all of the tracks and string arrangements
were composed and recorded by Hauschka. Purely improvised tracks like Blue
Bicycle, Morgenrot, Neuschnee, Alma and Nadelwald
were recorded with two cellists, Insa Schirmer and Donja Djember. The rest were
recorded with overdubs from Schirmer on Cello and Sabine Baron on Violin, with
additional assistance from Bernhard Voelz on trombone.
