Michel Banabila - Uprooted FLAC

1	Breathe	6:36
2	Solar Waves	7:08
3	Collector	10:16
4	Dragonfly	07:32
5	Breaking Point	8:05

Category	Artist	Title (Format)	Label	Category	Country	Year
026TR	Michel Banabila	Uprooted ‎(CD, Album, Ltd)	Tapu Records	026TR	Netherlands	2019

• Bass Clarinet – Gareth Davis
• Cello – Peter Hollo
• Composed By – Michel Banabila
• Design – Yasar Saka
• Double Bass – Gulli Gudmundsson (tracks: 1,2)
• E-Bow – Gulli Gudmundsson (tracks: 3)
• Electric Bass – Gulli Gudmundsson (tracks: 5)
• Electric Guitar – Stijn Hüwels (tracks: 3,4,5)
• Electronics – Alex Haas (tracks: 3)
• Liner Notes – Marc Weidenbaum
• Mastered By – Marlon Wolterink
• MIDI Controller – Michel Banabila
• Photography By – Gerco de Ruijter
• Producer – Michel Banabila
• Sampler – Michel Banabila
• Stroh Violin – Oene Van Geel (tracks: 1,3,5)
• Synth – Alex Haas (tracks: 3)
• Viola – Oene Van Geel (tracks: 1,3,5)

'The Uprooted Orchestra'

“Orchestral.” The word’s an adjective, certainly, an unambiguous one. It depicts amassed instruments working in synchrony according to a fixed document prepared in advance.

But what if “orchestral” were uprooted? What if “orchestral” referred to what we heard, not how it was recorded? What if “orchestral” welcomed electronic instruments not just into the pit, but into the compositional process?

For that is the sound of Michel Banabila’s Uprooted, this album of beautiful, striated, patient music — patient on the surface, deep with turmoil underfoot. When bass clarinet and harmonium rise above a misty string section halfway through “Breathe,” that’s orchestral. When woodwinds trill and pulse against piano on “Dragonfly,” that’s orchestral.

Over the years, Banabila has made his share of experimental ambient, wherein future roots cultures are foreseen through a low-tech looking glass. On Uprooted, the tech is transparent. The album has touches of Fourth World, most notably on “Collector” and "Breathe," but Uprooted is orchestral, full stop.

It’s also an album entirely forged of material sampled by Banabila from improvisations by invited musicians. Those samples were then constructed into a whole by Banabila, layered sinuously rather than triggered on a rhythmic grid. The fixed orchestral document here is the recording, and it marks the close of the composer’s efforts, not the start of the performers’.

Marc Weidenbaum.
San Francisco, March 2019.

• Barcode (EAN): 8714835130642