Saturday 16 March 2019

Emotional soundscapes: the music of young Australian composer Brendon John Warner on his debut album 'La fonte'

Brendon John Warner - la fonte
The young Sydney-based composer Brendon John Warner was a name entirely new to me until I was sent his recent album La fonte

Warner was a guitarist with the Australian band We Lost The Sea for eight years, before leaving the band to pursue his own compositional career, where synthesisers and lo-fi electronics are a big feature.

La fonte is just five tracks long, but this is hardly short change as one track lasts 13 minutes and another 22 minutes.

Brendon John Warner
Brendon John Warner
Whilst the overall sound-world is perhaps contemplative ambient, Warner brings a lot of other influences into play and you feel that his music is like that of a number of other artists who blend elements of classical, contemporary and more.

Tracks like sentinelles feel very much like emotional soundscapes, and the way Warner mixes synthesised sounds with sounds from the natural world is highly evocative; the movement feels like music which owes something to RVW's Sinfonia Antartica. All the music on the album is slow moving, it takes time to establish itself and for the sheer soundscape to make itself felt. And Warner's palate is quite eclectic too, we can hear evocative ambient, but also dramatic rock and other tracks would work well in live orchestral guise. The album uses a mixture of acoustic and electronic instruments, along with a whole range of non-musical sounds which Warner blends into his whole eclectic mix.

There are also non-musical concerns too, references to 'the tenuous relationships between humanity and plant Earth, ecology and economy, man-made climate change and our polar icecaps' make you realise that these emotional soundscapes have a deeper meaning for the composer, one that gives a personal quality to the music.

Brendon John Warner - la fonte
  • la fonte [10:23]
  • la jeunesse relative [6:17]
  • sentinelles [22:05]
  • edifier [9:32]
  • etats [13:47]
 The album is available from Amazon, Bandcamp, Spotify, iTunes and more

Elsewhere on this blog:
  • Highly engaging: revival of Mozart's The Magic Flute from Simon McBurney, ENO & Complicité (★★★★½) - opera review
  • Magnificent original: Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake restored in a superb performance from Vladimir Jurowski on Pentatone (★★★★★) - CD review
  • Intimate conversations: the young Jubilee Quartet in three quartets spanning 20 years of Haydn's maturity (★★★★½) - CD review
  • Riveting drama: Peter Konwitschny's production of Halevy's La Juive at Opera Vlaanderen (★★★★★) - opera review
  • Claustrophobic & atmospheric: Verdi's Macbeth from English Touring Opera (★★★½) - opera review
  • Letting the music speak for itself: Mozart's Idomeneo from English Touring Opera (★★★★½) - opera review
  • Cadogan Hall debut: the Gesualdo Six in a programme of Renaissance and Contemporary (★★★★) - concert review
  • The Children's Hour: intimate and delightfully casual, Gareth Brynmor John and William Vann at Pizza Express Live - concert review
  • Haydn's The Seasons from Vladimir Jurowski and the London Philharmonic Orchestra  (★★★★★) - concert review
  • Virtuosity and intimacy: Flauguissimo duo's A Salon Opera  (★★★½) - CD review
  • Political piano and terrific technique: Adam Swayne's (speak to me): new music, new politics (★★★★★) - CD review
  • Neapolitan revival: Rossini's Elizabeth in a rare staging from English Touring Opera  - opera review
  • Home

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