Home » Jazz Articles » Album Review » Adam Berenson and Bill Marconi: A Codex of Silent Voices

Adam Berenson and Bill Marconi: A Codex of Silent Voices

By Dan McClenaghan
February 4, 2013
View read count

Adam Berenson and Bill Marconi: A Codex of Silent Voices

Pianist/composer Adam Berenson is a mystery; his Facebook page features nothing about his music-making and, in its photo section, a couple of Jackson Pollock-like abstract paintings along with a Van Gogh-inspired seascape. The song titles on his numerous releases perpetuate the mystery—"Sepulchral Vicissitudes" and "Emotional Idiot," from Contextual (1999),and the title track to The Mystery of the Vanishing Chandelier (2001)—including the title at hand, A Codex of Silent Voices, suggesting Berenson is an artist going deep.

Maybe? Maybe not. Berenson cites influences as divergent as composer György Ligeti and Wolfgang Rihm, alongside pianist Keith Jarrett and Coldplay. So what does his music sound like? Nocturnal, sepulchral, spare, spacious, surreal and cathedral-resonant.

Berenson teams with Bill Marconi for this series of nineteen soundscapes, constructed of mostly electronically-processed percussion woven in with delicate piano threads. It is by turns hypnotic ("Interstices"), eerie and haunting ("Transpersonal"), fragile and pensively pretty ("through this stillness"), or something akin to a soundtrack to the approach of a potential cataclysm ("Truth Lives").

The listening experience of this "codex" (defined as a manuscript book, especially of Scripture, classics or ancient annals) is an introspective one; outside of time, it seems as if it might be full of diaphanous truths that are never quite revealed.

Track Listing

Transpersonal; through this stillness; comfort of oblivion; ...a study in...; Don't Destroy Love; Invisible Threads; Anamorphosis; Be My Mirror; The Everlasting; The Thing; It Is Possible; The Other; Scherzo; I Don't Know Where I'm Going; Grief Fills the Room Up; Interstices; written on air; Yasujiro Ozu; Truth Lives.

Personnel

Adam Berenson

synthesizer

Adam Berenson: piano, percussion, electronically processed percussion; Bill Marconi; electronically processed percussion.

Album information

Title: A Codex of Silent Voices | Year Released: 2013 | Record Label: Mighty Quinn Productions

PREVIOUS / NEXT

U R My Everything
< Previous

Mercy, Pity, Peace & Love
Next >

Support All About Jazz

All About Jazz has been a pillar of jazz since 1995, championing it as an art form and, more importantly, supporting the musicians who make it. Our enduring commitment has made "AAJ" one of the most culturally important websites of its kind, read by hundreds of thousands of fans, musicians and industry figures every month.

Go Ad Free!

To maintain our platform while developing new means to foster jazz discovery and connectivity, we need your help. You can become a sustaining member for as little as $20 and in return, we'll immediately hide those pesky ads plus provide access to future articles for a full year. This winning combination vastly improves your AAJ experience and allow us to vigorously build on the pioneering work we first started in 1995. So enjoy an ad-free AAJ experience and help us remain a positive beacon for jazz by making a donation today.