Open Space 3, 4, & 5.(Review)

Elaine Barkin, Benjamin Boretz, et al. Steven Mackey, J.K. Randall: Open Space 3, 4, & 5

Compact discs, 1992/1993; available from Open Space Publications, Sycamore Drive, Red Hook, New York 12571, USA; telephone (914) 758-5785; fax (914) 758-6740; electronic mail postmaster@the-open-space.org; World Wide Web www.the-open-space.org/

Open Space is a new music collective that fosters aural imagineering, encourages collaborative creativity, and provides an "open space" for sounds, words, and other media which may not find accommodation elsewhere. Founded by Benjamin Boretz and others, the collective produces a periodical called The Open Space Magazine, maintains a web-based publication/forum called The Open Space Web Magazine (www.the-open-space.org/osonline/ osonline.html), and issues compact discs, videos, books, and scores through Open Space Publications (www.the-open-space.org/ oscat.html).

Some of the thirteen titles in the Open Space CD catalog are of historical as well as purely musical interest. These recordings present compositions, represent philosophies, or exhibit techniques originally discussed by their authors in Perspectives of New Music and other forums during the 1960s through the 1980s, and thus provide valuable aural documentation of that vital era. Such is the case with the three discs under review here, which include works dating from 1965-1968 through 1989. Each release features a diverse group of compositions, which nevertheless bear some fascinating touchpoints.

Open Space 3 features a compilation of pieces by Elaine Barkin, plus a collaborative effort by Benjamin Boretz, Jill Borner, and Charles Stein. All these works draw heavily on the spoken word for their essential content. Ms. Barkin's liner notes for her Five Collages offer a cogent characterization:

 
   textmusicvoicesoundsoliloquymeditations on eruptive internal & external 
   shifts of focus & purpose; and assemblaged resonances of collaboration work 
   done in intimate environments, work whose conception & realization scrap 
   the requirements of public display, idiosyncratic soundworlds arising out 
   of in&at-the-time interpersonal experience. 

The set begins with "on the way to becoming ..." (a soliloquy), whose spoken text is vivified by a range of interactive, independent, and at times irruptive sounds. Next is Out Back, an electronic essay designed for dance and assembled with the assistance of Cynthia Woll, Warren Burt, Paul Humphreys, and Mr. Boretz. To Whom It May Concern #2 begins with an intimate monologue whose repeated text ("In music, as in everything, the firmest reality is the disappearance of experience") is joined, gradually enveloped, and eventually overwhelmed by an external sound-world. Contributors to this engrossing theatre piece include Mr. Boretz, Ms. Woll, Mr. Humphreys, Chuck Benesh, and Dan Kalantarian. Anonymous Was A Woman achieves a remarkable kind of temporal and physical remove using layered timbres, bell sounds, and repeated text, all shaped with panning, reverb, and echo effects. Finally, "past is part of ..." (a meditation) mixes spoken and whispered text with children's voices, unpredictable piano punctuations, and a heavy dose of almost inescapable echo, to offer us the sage advice about living fully: "the trick is to move on ..."