Three from Elsewhere

As the Elsewhere label approaches its eighth birthday—with its thirty-fifth, thirty-sixth and thirty-seventh album releases coming out together—it seems a good time to address some frequent questions and misconceptions about the label:

Q: Aren't most Elsewhere releases double or triple?
A: Out of thirty-seven releases, five are doubles, three are triples.

Q: Don't a majority of Elsewhere releases feature piano.
A: Yes, a large proportion of Elsewhere releases do feature piano.

Q: Is Elsewhere's sleeve art the best?
A: Yes, definitely, second to none, and unmistakable.

Here are reviews of those three new Elsewhere recordings.

Laura Cetilia
Gorgeous Nothings
Elsewhere
2025

Laura Cetilia is a cellist, electronic musician, performer, composer, educator and presenter. In the ensemble Ordinary Affects, she has worked closely with and premiered works by composers Andre Cormier, Jurg Frey and Christian Woolf, among others. As fate would have it, in November 2017 she played cello on Frey's "60 Pieces of Sound," a version which would be released on Elsewhere, her last contact with the label until this album.

Gorgeous Nothings is an album of three pieces composed by Cetilia, who, in addition to her cello playing, is a US-based composer who won the ARTZenter's Emerging Composer Completion Grant in September 2024. The album contains Cetilia's solo piece for cello and voice, which she performed herself; her trio piece for violin, cello, and vibraphone, performed by Ordinary Affects; and a piece for cello duo, performed by n/ether, a duo she formed with cellist Hannah Soren.

Cetilia's cello works evoke the sense of crossing the threshold between traditional classical music and experimental soundscapes. Within an acoustic resonance that respects the natural reverberations of a space, rippling waves of subtle disturbances conjure a mixed sensation of classical roots and a refreshing encounter with the unknown. The album offers a glimpse into a vast and profound world that is uniquely Cetilia's own.

Samuel Reinhard
For 10 Musicians
Elsewhere
2025

Born in Switzerland in 1980, Samuel Reinhard is the only leader in this batch of releases who had previously recorded for Elsewhere. His previous release for the label, For Piano and Shō (2024), was only his fourth album release, while For 10 Musicians is his sixth. Pianist Paul Jacob Fussum, who recorded with shō player Haruna Higashida on the 2024 album, returns here as one of the ten musicians of the album title, alongside fellow pianist Ginte Preisaite. The two pianists work well together and avoid getting into each other's way.


Where, for his previous Elsewhere release, Reinhard composed a couple of twenty-two minute pieces for the shō (a Japanese free reed mouth organ) and piano, for the ten musicians he composed four pieces, each of about twelve-and-a-half minutes.

In common with like-minded, post-Cage and Wandelweiser composers, Reinhard instructs musicians to play as quietly as they can while still producing a sound. Recorded at The Royal Danish Academy of Music in Copenhagen, Denmark, these recordings were made possible with the support of the Swiss Arts Council and other funders. The album was mixed by Reinhard and Taku Unami, who both deserve praise for the excellent quality and clarity of the music.

Based on the evidence of the two albums he has released on Elsewhere so far, Reinhard is as qualified to appear on the label as other composers who are regulars. Watch this space...

Shoko Numao
The Siwnin Sails
Elsewhere
2025

The third album of this batch, The Siwnin Sails, is a solo album comprising eight songs written and composed by Shoko Numao, an emerging Japanese singer-songwriter. This is not her first album as, back in 2023, she released Live At Ftarri—Lena (Ftarri, 2023), on which her voice was accompanied by Fumi Endo on piano as well as by her guitar; two songs from that album, "Reminiscence" and "Drizzle" reappear on this one.

Numao studied vocal and composition, focusing on jazz, at Dublin City University in Dublin, Ireland, where she trained to use her voice as an instrument, exploring the expressive possibilities of the voice and laying the foundation for her current approach.

Since returning to Japan in 2021, she has been based in Tokyo, performing her own songs, both in collaborations with various musicians and as a solo artist. Unsurprisingly given the purity and beauty of her voice, she has captivated live audiences with her poetic and introspective songs as well as her translucent voice, which occasionally reveals a flickering, ethereal quality. The Siwnin Sails features eight songs written and composed between 2016 and 2024, all beautifully performed by Numao herself on acoustic guitar and vocals. 

Tracks and Personnel

Gorgeous Nothings

Tracks: Gorgeous Nothing ; Six Melancholies ; Soil + Stone..

Personnel: Laura Cetilia: cello, voice (1); Ordinary Affects:-Morgan Evans-Weiler: violin; Laura Cetilia: cello; J. P. A. Falzone: vibraphone. (2); N/ether:-Laura Cetilia: cello, voice; Hannah Soren: cello. (3).

For 10 Musicians

Tracks: For 10 Musicians I ;.For 10 Musicians II ; For 10 Musicians III ; For 10 Musicians IV (2025).

Personnel: Paul Jacob Fossum: piano; Ginte Preisaite: piano; Anders Banke: bass clarinet; Francesco Bigoni: clarinet; Henriette Groth: clarinet; Carolyn Goodwin: bass clarinet; Nicole Hogstrand: cello; Pauline Hogstrand: viola; Mika Persdotter: viola; Vincent Yuen Ruiz: double bass.

The Siwnin Sails.

Tracks: Drizzle ; Ocean Voyage ; Pyrethrum ; Monuke ; A Rumour of Foxes ; Notsuki ; Reminiscence ; Gloty Bush (Nobotan),

Personnel: Shoko Numao: vocal, guitar .

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