“Kutunga” (1994) is the first piece on this solo percussion CD by Matthias Kaul. The “solo percussion” isn’t as obvious, though, as you would have concluded from the title, and neither is this a regular straight percussion CD, as you’ve probably heard them before. In fact, I listen quite a while to “Kutunga” before I even think of percussion… This isn’t because there aren’t any percussive instruments in vibration; no, it’s just because of Kaul’s personal treatment of the instruments, and the additional sounds he has introduced into the web of sounds.

The initial sounds could as well have some electroacoustic origin, the way the tone, deep and bulging, gets right in between your ears. Soon, however, it is followed by a circling, sweeping touch of frame drums, thus giving off not a beat and a rhythm, but a dreamy, hypnotic, soft moving sound. In the foreground, with these circular touches continuing – sometimes joined or relieved by the initial deeper vibration between the ears, a voice speaks soft words in a foreign language.

The language here is in fact Swahili, in two poems; one traditional, the other a contemporary poem by Ahmad Nassir Juma (“Shairi la moto”; “Poem of Fire”).
Matthias Kaul has studied the percussive culture of the tribes of the Xhosa, Samburu and Maasai people of Africa, and the Swahili poems therefore came natural to him as a part of “Kutunga”. The sweeping feel of the frame drum is remarkable, shaping a perfect backdrop for the soft, hushed, deep voice of the Swahili poem. It is easy to get hypnotized by this atmosphere, by these fragrances out of the Dark Continent. The more barren percussive quality starts later in the piece, where the second poem starts, much faster and with an edgier nerve than the first, traditional poem, sounding more like a sound poetic piece from avant-garde Europe

Next piece is “Timpani Ride” (1997). It also involves a text, but this time from Henri Michaux’s “From the Land of Sorcery”. It commences with a xöömej (khoomei: overtone-singing) type of vocal sounds, swaying back and forth like a blowing curtain in your bedroom window, or like a persistent thought you can’t get rid of as you’re trying to fall asleep… Suddenly you discover different layers in this long, lasting vocal chord, which really behaves like a multifaceted drone, slowly descending to a position just a decimeter above the floor, circling your feet, which are resting on the wooden floor inside their sandals as you stare blankly into your world.
All of a sudden a clear sound poetic event begins, giving me associations to late Estonian/Swedish poet, sound poet etcetera Ilmar Laaban (Fylkingen FYCD 1011; “Ankarkättingens slut är sångens början” [“The End of the Anchor Chain is the Beginning of Song”]). In this piece Matthias Kaul utilizes his famous bicycle-timpani contraption, to my utter joy – and it sounds good too! It is quite astonishing that Kaul can produce these hilarious, inspiring and intriguing sounds by way of bicycle and timpani, whereas it sounds like he would have retorted to heavy electronic machinery! Holy smoke! The introverted whistling incidents sound as if coming from a pre-occupied Snufkin in Tove Jansson’s Moomin Valley, or from a rose-cheeked Ellen Corver performing Karlheinz Stockhausen’s “Piano Piece XIII” in Kürten in August of 2001, whereas the grinding tone makes me think of John Cage’s “Freeman Etudes” as performed by Irvine Arditti (Mode Records 32 & 37). Kaul’s application of sounds is as careful as a Japanese painter’s calligraphic touches of the brush on rice paper; delicate, dedicated! The atmosphere here and there inside Kaul’s “Timpani Ride” has some loose analogies with “Presque Rien 1 & 2” by Luc Ferrari (INA GRM C 2008). It has to do with this pre-occupied, puzzled feeling of inward thoughts in a bewildering, obtrusive outer world of rude concretisms! It’s an homage to the dreamer! Some of the scratchiest parts of Kaul’s “Timpani Ride” force me in the direction of Romanian/French spectral music guru Iancu Dumitrescu too, who releases his fantastic provocations on his own label Edition Modern, but evidently Matthias Kaul also harbors the gentle and precise touch of Swedish sound artist Hanna Hartman! You name it – We like it!

“Mazza” (1997) has the subtitle “About the edible character of sounds for percussion and voice”… With an initial big bang of a tam tam (or something like one) a whispering voice speaks of the healing powers of spices (so reads the booklet – I do not understand the words…). The khoomei vocals that were apparent in “Kutunga” continue here, for a while, until sprays of thin metallics shower your tympanic membranes. A Rabelais (or Goofy…) type of table manner has food and saliva running out the corners of mouths, and medieval-sounding mono-chords lure you into an environment of dark cold winter castles of Central Europe or Brittany, only lit by torches as the gargantuan feast oozes down to a fart and a burp and long-last sleep. A percussive fury, brownish, softish, like something out of the oeuvre of early Jean Schwarz (on his own Celia label) follows the fallen asleep castle crowd.
The screaming and shouting that takes hold together with the wooden sticks and the big drums offers a Japanese feeling, and in Japan you have this unheard of mixture of raked rock gardens and violently hit drums – the whole darn register of human spirituality – apparently also present in Matthias Kaul’s music and mind!
The sounds that start midway cannot be acoustical though; something has got to be electroacoustic here, right? Those small overtone events in the high pitches? Or is that an organ with an effects pedal, like Stockhausen used in “Sternklang”?

“Roma” (1995) is an homage to the drifting gypsies of the world. The words are in Romani, written and spoken by Stefan Romeyan. The instruments are cimbalom and gopichand, the latter being a monochord (one-stringed) instrument.
This initially sounds like Kaul is getting inside a grand piano, plucking the strings directly, but then again – inside it all – I get the notion of Shivkumar Sharma’s North Indian santoor, which isn’t strange at all, since the santoor probably is modeled on the cimbalom – and both probably constitute the origin of the piano!
The plucking stringed sounds get really wild here, possibly heavily amplified by close mikings, and it’s all to my liking, again giving me associations – this time to Morton Subotnick’s “Touch” or parts of “Silver Apple’s of the Moon” (Mode Records 97 & Wergo Schallplatten 2035-2).
Kaul actually bows the sounds, screws them like a golfer his ball. The delicate sounds whine and sway in the air above our heads, back and forth like the pylon of a trapeze artist. Then Kaul makes the cimbalom sound like showers of rain – I’m serious – heading into a storm of hail…

The last piece is “Hendrix” (1997) for electrified timpani. Of course the title talks about Jimi Hendrix, the 1960’s and 70’s guitar wizard, who changed the meaning of “Star Spangled Banner” forever in Woodstock in 1969, reclaiming it for the poor, the down-trodden, the destitute, the fighting; for those hungry for justice and righteousness!
This wonderful piece plainly shows that Matthias Kaul is as magically talented with the electroacoustics as with the percussion. I have seldom – very rarely – come across such an immensely interesting and enjoyable sound world as in “Hendrix”, where Kaul mixes – in perfect conjunction and unity – the flying, bowing, wheezing, vexing sounds of electrified timpani with elusive, hushed, whispered American words from the oeuvre of Jimi Hendrix himself! Finally Kaul paints the entire horizon in flashing sonic percussive colors that no one can miss!

Evidently, Matthias Kaul has redefined the word “percussion” through this CD!