Heart of the Matter

(Cover art and design: Rudolph Crivici 2011)

Scored for: saxophone, Eb and bass clarinet, string quartet,  didjeridu, keyboard, bass and  percussion x 4.

Over ten years in the making, the story of the creation of The Heart of the Matter has taken on almost mythic, archetypal proportions: Romano Crivici originally composed 9 short movements that subtly ‘described’, or rather expressed the energy or feelings associated with, various iconic objects in the Powerhouse Museum’s collection. Recording was begun with the Inner Voices (an expanded version of Crivici’s earlier group, the Elektra String Quartet) -however, due to blind Jazz pianist Jan Rutherford’s tragic death from cancer, (with whom Crivici was collaborating on the text) the project as such was never completed.

After a lapse of a number of years, Crivici took up the project again, and has spent the last five years rewriting and further developing the initial ideas to their now almost symphonic proportions.Now complete, he returns to public performance after this period of self-imposed artistic exile, during which time he engaged in critical self reflection of his compositional technique , as well as the study of anthropology.  His return from the creative wilderness is marked by a vision far brighter, deeper and more developed than it ever could have been had it occurred within the limits of the usual artistic ‘industry’ production time-line…. but that’s another story.

This album contains three of the movements from the Heart of the Matter cycle, as well as two improvisations recorded by Mark Atkins (didjeridu) and Crivici (piano).

The Musicians