Records: Mandocello by Elliott Sharp
Published by zOaR Music - BMI
With origins in the stick lutes and lyres dating back to 3000 years BCE, the mandolin emerged from the almond-shaped barbut, oud and pandura brought to Iberia by the Moors in the 7th Century CE. The modern mandolin, a steel-stringed instrument tuned in fifths, evolved in Italy in the 18th century predominantly through the work of the Vinaccia family, makers of violins, cellos, guitars, and mandolas. The roots of the mandocello begin with the mandolone, a 4-stringed instrument used in mandolin ensembles popular in the 18th century. Though their popularity waned in the early 19th century, it grew again with the innovations of the Vinnacia luthiers who developed a louder and more robust instrument, the mandocello, to take the bass role in mandolin ensembles. In contemporary music, this instrument has been used widely in Celtic and other folk musics though rarely in the context of avant-garde and improvised music.
For the acoustic portion of this album, the main instrument used was a mandocello of uncertain origin but appearing to be converted in the 1930s from an archtop guitar. The exception is Partched where a doubleneck mandocello/guitar built by Steve Wishnevsky was played. For the electric portion of this album, a Mutantum solid-body electric mandocello was used, constructed in 2019 from a 12-string guitar neck matched with a 1960s Intermark Cipher guitar body.
The compositions include D Rex dedicated to the pioneering guitar improviser Derek Bailey, Tsuruta for the visionary Japanese biwa player Kinshi Tsuruta featured in "November Steps" by Toru Takemitsu, and Partched for the iconoclastic composer and instrument builder Harry Partch.
released September 6, 2024
COMPOSED AND PERFORMED BY ELLIOTT SHARP
Recorded, mixed, and mastered at Studio zOaR - NYC, July 11-15, 2024.
Published by zOaR Music - BMI
Back cover photo by Kai Sharp.
Elliott Sharp: composer, multi-instrumentalist, producer, author, leads Orchestra Carbon, Tectonics and Terraplane with compositional strategies including fractal geometry, chaos theory, and genetic metaphors as well as new techniques for graphic notation to yield work that catalyzes a synesthetic approach to musicmaking as well as functioning as retinal art.