Review | By Guillermo Escudero / Loop
Resonant Dowland | Matthias Engelke
This is a new release in the Sound Art Series on the German label Gruenrekorder. This is a work of German composer and sound artist, Matthias Engelke, who performs the songs of Renaissance composer John Dowland. Engelke composes music for theater with analog electronic devices where music, sound, dance and movement interact. Tenor singer hold the romantic Renaissance charm and brooding character of Dowland’s songs. As the electronic arrangements flow and weave a perfect symbiosis between two different worlds and different times. And here we can see how complementary they can be. For example, the rhythmic beats in “White as lilies was her face” perfectly match his playful nature. On „The lowest trees have tops“ the string arrangements give a ceremonial aura to a nostalgic song. „Lady if you so spite me“ at times approaches the IDM genre with its emerging beats, while the singer coexists in a different space, as if he were in a parallel dimension. […]