A Quiet Madness

I am grateful to the many artists who worked on this release. So much goes into the making of an album from musicians, recording and mastering engineers to liner notes, photography, and album design. To say, “I could not have done it alone,” is an understatement. This project was a joyous collaboration and I cannot express my appreciation enough for the honor to work alongside these many great talents.

Released January 20, 2021.

PRESS RELEASE by Tyran Grillo

“When you think you have a clear idea of a composer’s purpose, suddenly you realize that something is hiding behind it, and behind it, again and again. I will keep playing William Susman’s music for a long time.”

–Francesco Di Fiore, 2012

Violinist Karen Bentley Pollick, pianist Francesco Di Fiore, bayan accordionist Stas Venglevski, and flutist Patricia Zuber have been knitting restorative sonic garments from the compositional yarn of William Susman for over a decade. Their rapport is deeper and more apparent than ever on A Quiet Madness, an appropriately titled new masterwork for our current zeitgeist. 

A Quiet Madness immerses the listener in a photorealistic sound world of understated beauty. At once calming and thought-provoking, it allows the ear and mind to make their own connections without feeling overwhelmed by thematic constraints. Susman’s precise harmonic and rhythmic languages invite us into a subdued, enchanting expression of madness that roams all over the map, akin to the mind wandering during a rainy day—or, perhaps clairvoyantly, akin to the strange passage of time spent in self-isolation during the collective trauma of COVID-19.

A Quiet Madness unfolds across six pieces that were composed between 2006 and 2013. Susman has curated these selections into a unified trajectory. Setting the stage is Aria. Excerpted from Susman’s opera-in-progress, Fordlandia, it features the composer at the piano and Pollick on violin. Its interlacing melodies give way to three Quiet Rhythms for solo piano, into which are shuffled a study in contrast: Susman’s 2011 Seven Scenes for Four Flutes, recorded and multi-tracked by Zuber, and 2006’s Zydeco Madness, played here by Venglevski, who also performed the piece’s premiere.

Although Susman describes the solo piano sections on this album as “quasi-interludes,” each of the Quiet Rhythms is in itself an intricate and autonomous examination in sound. These pieces are performed by Di Fiore, who is himself a composer working in a post-modern, post-minimalist language akin to Susman’s. Meanwhile, Seven Scenes for Four Flutes evokes a sequence of abstract yet vividly colorful scenes that interject a shining liveliness between the darker, more subdued energy of the Quiet Rhythms. Even greater contrast can be heard in Zydeco Madness, which Susman composed in 2006 as a response to the tragic events surrounding Hurricane Katrina. Hence, the relative peace of the concluding Quiet Rhythms No. 7. Despite being recorded before the pandemic, A Quiet Madness opens itself like a gift for a broken world, a place where insanity and solace indeed coexist in strange harmony, and where music is the only imaginable escape.

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William Susman has created a distinctively expressive voice in contemporary classical music, with a catalog that spans orchestral, chamber, and vocal music, as well as numerous film scores. AllMusic calls him an exemplar of “the next developments in the sphere [of] minimalism,” and Gramophone has praised his music as “texturally shimmering and harmonically ravishing.” Susman’s training as a pianist in both jazz and classical traditions was influential in his evolution as a composer, and his music is notable for its integration of global influences.

Karen Bentley Pollick is one of America’s leading contemporary musicians, performing a wide range of solo repertoire and styles on violin, viola, piano, and Norwegian Hardanger fiddle. She currently serves as concertmaster of Valse Café Orchestra in Seattle, and Principal Second Violin and Festival Artist with the Colorado MahlerFest Orchestra in Boulder.

Francesco Di Fiore, pianist and composer, was born in Palermo. He launched his professional career in 1986, performing hundreds of concerts worldwide. In 1993 he won the “XV Internationales Kammermusik Festival Austria Waldviertel” in Horn, Austria. His album Pianosequenza features piano music in film, including Susman’s score to When Medicine Got It Wrong.

Patricia Zuber has performed with many major orchestras in the New York area including the American Symphony Orchestra, New York City Opera, New York City Ballet, American Composers Orchestra, New Jersey Symphony, and the Westchester Philharmonic. She appears regularly with the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra at Lincoln Center. She performs in Duo Zuber with her husband, percussionist Greg Zuber.

Stas Venglevski is a native of the Republic of Moldova, part of the former Soviet Union. A two-time first prize winner of the Bayan Competition in the Republic of Moldova, Stas is a graduate of the Russian Academy of Music in Moscow, where he received his Master’s in Music under the tutelage of famed Russian bayanist Friedrich Lips.

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From Poetry to Music

In the early 90s, pianist Joan Nagano had recently formed a group here in the San Francisco Bay Area called The Belmont Ensemble.  The instrumentation was voice, clarinet, french horn and piano. They were all supeerb musicians drawn from the SF opera orchestra. They asked me to write them a piece. I asked my sister Sue to send me some of her recent poems. I selected three for this song cycle that I felt spoke to each other and could tell a story. The result was Moving in to an Empty Space (1992).

When I set her poetry to music, I was also drawn to her shorter poems. They paint a picture using  words that are bubbling with motion and sound. In many ways, setting her poems to music was cathartic. Her words almost composed the music for me.

In the first poem called Hot Time, the line, “At night people scurry and run together in packs,” and, “as the music blasts into flashing strobe-lights, the walls begin to swell and breathe,” are filled with sonic gestures. The way I treat the vocal line with these words is a centuries old technique called word or tone painting. The melody and dynamics here reflect the literal meaning of the words.

The title of the second poem in the song cycle, Begging the night for change, is filled with movement and also is a stunning metaphor.

And, in the third poem, Moving in to an Empty Space, the closing existential lines, “There is no message, no sound just the silent reflection of my own face shining in the night to remind me that I have always been here,” are pregnant with music.

When I formed OCTET ensemble around 2010, I wanted to create an instrumentation that drew on my background playing in jazz ensembles. This band takes its sound from the big band music I played as a teenager: trumpet, sax, trombone, rhythm section plus vocals. When looking for repertoire, it was natural to arrange Moving in to an Empty Space for OCTET. In 2018, my sister’s poems were published in a collection called The Forest Within.

The second of three songs, Begging the Night for Change, in its original instrumentation of voice, clarinet, horn and piano.

Begging the Night for Change arranged for OCTET Ensemble.

Brilliant Italian Composer/Pianist Francesco Di Fiore

Francesco Di Fiore with Prologue 1 from Quiet Rhythms

I met William Susman in 2011, in the Netherlands, for the first time. I was in Middelburg to attend a performance of my music by ensemble Piccola Accademia Degli Specchi. On tthe same occasion, the ensemble performed the beautiful suite Camille by William.

I was already familiar with William’s music thanks to composer Matteo Sommacal, my dear friend, who invited me to listen to his works. That was a fantastic discovery; William’s music world is absolutely fascinating, very original, personal, with a precise identity and so different from any other music or composer.

From left to right composers Francesco Di Fiore, Douwe Eisenga, William Susman, and Matteo Sommacal in the lobby of Zeeuwse Concertzall, October, 2011

Recently I had the honor to perform a selection from Quiet Rhythms for solo piano, in the Netherlands, at the same venue (Zeeuwse Concertzall) where William’s music and mine was performed in 2011. On that special evening in Middelburg, four composers were present attending a stunning performance in a unique gathering. In some spiritual way, I wanted to recreate that special event performing William’s, Matteo Sommacal’s, Douwe Eisenga’s and my music as well. Four different composers, four different experiences, four different sound worlds but one same language spoken.

Italian Composer/Pianist Francesco Di Fiore

Approaching William’s music has been a very singular experience. When you think you have a clear idea of a composer’s purpose suddenly you realize that something is hiding behind it, and behind it, again and again, and so on. I will keep playing William’s music for a long time, as it piques my curiosity and I have so much to learn from him! – Franceso Di Fiore

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Listen to Francesco Di Fiore perform Quiet Rhythms and watch Valeria Di Matteo’s video by clicking here.

Innovative Italian Video Artist Valeria Di Matteo

Italian Video Artist Valeria Di Matteo

When Francesco Di Fiore decided to perform William Susman’s piece Quiet Rhythms in his Piano Solo project, I was so thrilled to make a new video for it as I already knew William’s music and I loved it so much.

From Valeria Di Matteo’s Video for Quiet Rhythms – Prologue 1

Creating this video was quite natural to me. William’s notes often painted some kind of non-defined geometrical images in my mind and I already had the idea of a video entirely shot inside a piano, also inspired by a beautiful set of close-up images shot by Francesco himself inside his piano.

From Valeria Di Matteo’s Video for Quiet Rhythms – Prologue 1

The result is a first part, Prologue, in black and white, quite linear, abstract and geometric; Action, the second part, is more narrative showing a journey inside the piano. This instrument is so beautiful as a still object but there’s also so much life inside it to show while a piece is being performed and usually no one can admire it during a concert.

From Valeria Di Matteo’s Video for Quiet Rhythms – Action 1

Geometry, order of the shapes, harmony and colors of materials were to me the perfect subjects for this remarkable piece of music.  – Valeria Di Matteo

From Valeria Di Matteo’s Video for Quiet Rhythms – Action 1

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Watch Valeria Di Matteo’s video and listen to Francesco Di Fiore perform Quiet Rhythms by clicking here.