The “Quiet & Patient” Music of Teodora Stepančić

“virtual” album cover by Assaf Gidron (courtesy of Other Minds)

Today Other Minds released its latest recording, a digital-only album devoted entirely to a single composition by Brooklyn-based Serbian composer Teodora Stepančić entitled emoji. The work consists of two movements, the first, entitled “j” lasting almost 50 minutes in duration and followed by “i,” which is a little more than seven minutes long. The album is available for download from Amazon.com; but, since the Web page offers nothing other than the two tracks, those interested in a more informed listening experience will probably prefer the Bandcamp Web page, the latest addition to its Other Minds discography, which provides two useful paragraphs of liner notes by Ryan Dohoney.

Stepančić’s music has been described as “quiet & patient, tones start, stop, harmonized according to a near-inscrutable internal logic, sometimes dictated by modular compositional forms.” For those for which this new release is a “first contact” experience, making sense of that quoted description will probably be best facilitated by listening to the shorter “i” track first. This is a solo piano performance (presumably by the composer), consisting of chords punctuated by long intervals of silence. Once the sympathetic listener has adjusted to those extended intervals (s)he will be better prepared for the much lengthier silence that begins “j,” a silence that is broken by field recordings and probably other sources.

In that context Stepančić’s “near-inscrutable internal logic” demands highly focused and patient attention on the part of the listener. Having invested much of my time at performances by John Cage and a generous number of other composers sailing under his flag at some time or other, I have considerable appreciation for such “highly focused and patient attention.” To be fair, however, while I believe that I can still muster that attention in a concert setting (even if it has been several years since I last did so), I am not particularly sympathetic when the experience is mediated by a recording that I am playing for myself at home.

I thus feel it is important to advise readers that listening to this new album is very much a matter of personal taste. There is definitely much to be mined from the experiences of listening to both “i” and “j;” but, just as definitely, these are not “sit back and listen” compositions. One needs to invoke as much grey matter as one can muster to focus on the auditory stimuli, and those willing to make that investment will probably come away feeling rewarded by the listening experience.