Alex Weiser: water hollows stone
Bright Shiny Things

EPs are regarded in different ways, depending on the perspective adopted. For a label, it might be viewed as a way to maintain an artist's profile rather than see it get lost in the daily shuffle of new releases. The artist might treat it as a bridge between full-length releases that are generally held to be of greater consequence. Alex Weiser's water hollows stone would seem to match that template in containing a pair of piano works that check in at a easy-to-digest twenty-six minutes; furthermore, it follows a debut album, and all the days were purple, that made a strong impression upon its 2019 release and, testifying to that, was named a 2020 Pulitzer Prize finalist; it also arrives when its New York-based creator is hard at work on not one but two operas with librettist Ben Kaplan.

But even a single listen to the EP reveals that it would be wrong to sell it short. Its two works—the multi-part water hollows stone in particular—are substantial pieces and ultimately won't be forgotten when the book on Weiser's career is someday written. Recorded at Los Angeles's Colburn Thayer Hall in May 2021, the release features a world-premiere four-hand rendering of water hollows stone by HOCKET duo Sarah Gibson and Thomas Kotcheff and fade by Gibson alone. Weiser was inspired to write the title work after seeing a 2000-year-old quote from the Roman poet Ovid in the Bryant Park subway station, specifically “Gutta cavat lapidem,” translated as “dripping water hollows out a stone.” Drawing a parallel between the power of water and music, he reflected that a single drop of water, much like a musical note, is powerless on its own but in a greater volume can effect profound change.

Each part of water hollows stone comes at the concept in different ways: with lilting patterns rippling, entwining, and cresting, “waves” evokes the graceful flow of water as an elemental force; the animated “cascade” interlocks rising and falling arpeggios to evoke water's poetic movements; and the serene “mist” borrows a technique from Helmut Lachenmann whereby separate notes of a chord are released one at a time so that the decay of the sound becomes as important as the note's initial sounding. Connected to the three-part work is fade, which Weiser conceived as a postlude and can be seen as a further exploration of “mist” and its general notions of decay and resonance. The effect is slightly less soothing in its presentation, however, when the piece unfolds in a series of heavy chords.

December 2022