Track–listing:

1 — Gran–read
2 — Cross–filter–Esk–frozen
3 — Good students
4 — One–way street
5 — The plumber
6 — Requiem

Black Cats and Blues was commissioned by Audrey Riley in 2013 as a hypermedia concerto for cello and digital technologies, and was first performed at Leicester De Montfort University in 2014. Vear and Riley then performed together several times using this innovative technology, excited by the potential of the chance encounters. In the work both cellist and composer (kyma operator) make a trio with the third performer in the room, the technology.

The tracks presented in this recording have been collected from early sessions held to prepare the groundwork for the eventual ‘concerto’ Black Cats and Blues. Emerging from those initial meetings between musician and machine, these sketches record moments of surprise and a conversation which could not be pre–meditated.

These sketches explore the relationship between postmodern discourse and technology. With influences as diverse as jazz and the literature of Boris Vian, new combinations are generated from both mundane and transcendent textures. In a poetic sense, Vear and Riley are fascinated by the theoretical limits of meaning. What starts out as contemplation soon becomes debased into a cacophony of temptation, leaving only a sense of nihilism and the possibility of a new understanding.

As temporal replicas become frozen through boundaried and repetitive practice, the viewer is left with an epitaph for the darkness of our culture. These sketches give us a glimpse of freedom.

Craig Vear, 2021

Recorded by Craig Vear
Produced and performed by Craig Vear and Audrey Riley 2014
Mastered by Craig Vear
Artwork by Toby Cornish