"The Plains at Gordium", Notes by Petr Kotik
"In the summer of 2004, many issues I was facing seemed mysterious and unsolvable."
The Plains at Gordium is a work by Petr Kotik, whose pioneering work as founder and leader of the S.E.M. Ensemble has been a stalwart champion of the Avant-Garde from its inception, at the Center of the Creative and Performing Arts, SUNY/Buffalo, in 1970 to present day.
Well-loved recordings by the S.E.M. Ensemble (Julius Eastman: Femenine, The Entire Musical Work of Marcel Duchamp, Morton Feldman: For Philip Guston) are easy to find. That has not been the case for Kotik's own music. This beautiful recording of a relatively recent work by Kotik provides a beguiling, labyrinthian entry into Kotik's own musical vision.
Press
WIRE Magazine, Review: "Over 54 minutes the rhythmic emphasis tilts, shuffles and slants in a manner that is strangely compelling, despite the duration and skeletal form of this piece. Had Sun Ra and his Arkestra descended into the middle of The Plains At Gordium they would undoubtedly have settled in and kept step, finding themselves on congenial terrain."
Track List
DIGITAL TRACK LIST
- The Plains at Gordium (54:02)
Credits
About Petr Kotik
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Petr Kotik is a composer, conductor, and flutist. According to Kotik, he composes through a process determined by chance and intuitive steps. Since the early 1980s, his editing process includes a computer-generated chain of events based on Andrey Markov's probability sequences.
Kotik studied flute at the Conservatory and Music Academy in Prague. He studied composition privately in Prague with Valdimír Šrámek and Jan Rychlík, and at the Music Academy in Vienna, Austria with Karl Schiske, Hans Jelinek, and Friedrich Cerha. From 1969 to 1972, Kotik served as a Creative Associate at the Center of the Creative and Performing Arts at SUNY Buffalo. Kotik founded the new music ensemble Musica viva pragensis and the QUaX Ensemble, both based in Prague. In 1970, he formed the S.E.M. Ensemble. In 1999, Kotik founded the Ostrava Center for New Music, which in 2001 began to produce the biennial Ostrava Days Institute and Festival. In 2005, Kotik founded the international chamber orchestra Ostravská banda as the resident chamber orchestra at Ostrava Days.
