Moons are defined by their orbit around celestial objects other than stars. In this sense, they are essentially relational, in the orbit of gravitational fields of larger spheres. However, moons are not without their own energies, causing, for example, oceanic tides on these regulating planets. Multiplied, one could imagine how several moons might come to simultaneously pull at the edges of but also contain large bodies of water as some sort of mercurial mediator. These sorts of ambiguities between transition and stasis are of apparent concern to composer and cellist Eden Lonsdale in his debut album, Clear and Hazy Moons, comprising four pieces for chamber ensemble, three of which are performed by Apartment House and the title track by the Rothko Collective.
The opening sound on Lonsdale's disc neatly encapsulates this metaphorical lunar liminality. A lone, heavily reverberated piano harmonic, a muted fundamental alongside a high, hazy partial: indeed, I cannot tell whether this sound is real or synthesised. Its core conflict between haze and clarity sets the atmosphere for and is continuously alluring throughout Oasis. The orbiting, microtonally fluctuating B♭ harmonic partials act as reference points – guiding but hazy moons – controlling the ebbing and flowing tides of beatings conjured by the other instruments. This opening to this disc is slow-moving: at the surface level, not much happens. However, this apparent stasis creates an almost purpose-built crater for the considered playing of Apartment House to fill, breathing iridescence into Lonsdale's blueprint. A subtle shift of pacing occurs around 8’30”, wherein the players alter their roles, and this continues for the remaining six minutes. Indeed, one of Lonsdale's achievements across this album is how different sections of the same piece are both transitioned between and subsequently speak to each other. Some sort of partial eclipse in this new-found meandering occurs from c. 12’45”. Here, for about a minute and a half – and perhaps due to the fleeting quasi-major tonality – there is captivating lucidity, like the piece has arrived, before it jettisons this clarity and abruptly ends.
Billowing begins by sounding like a sort of lopsided Arvo Pärt-like hymn before introducing quickly descending lines. It then exhales as if this solemnity is collapsing in on itself. These plunging lines draw attention to themselves – distorted moons hastening their orbits – at the expense of the simple Holy Minimalist melodies. The first seven minutes present discrete episodes of approximately a minute long, each with slight variations: expulsions of unearthly energy through a lunar filter. The music withers and returns minutes later for the fifth episode: here, Lonsdale's attention to structural nuance momentarily baffles and subsequently allures me, which demonstrates the way he holds the listener's attention. From just before the seven-minute mark, the piece cowers in itself, presenting elongated wraiths of the previous material, inviting re-inspection and reinterpretation of its timbral world. The higher woodwinds that follow recall the first section with increased clarity. The piece sits with this isolation of the previous moment for a few minutes before returning to the full descending figure and gradually to the billows of the start. This is an elegant show of pacing.
Lonsdale's third offering, the title track of the album, performed by the Rothko Collective, is sculptural in feel. Celestial-sized forms orbit in and out of focus, as if one is standing in an effervescent Alexander Calder mobile; these are, largely, reiterations of ideas found in the first half of the album, which are readily welcomed back (the delicately placed swell at c. 11’40” is particularly beautiful and suggestive this time around). Indeed, spatial breadth is highlighted (if not produced) through the recording method: a single Zoom microphone in one of central London's churches; as a result, there is an immediacy to this track. The distance between listener and players – something not convincingly replicable through DAWs – places one in St Giles’ Cripplegate, and one has the sense of what it might be like to hear Lonsdale's music live in a fitting acoustic. The natural reverb captured through this single microphone does well to organically blend the timbres, particularly when the piece waxes at 9’30”. However, the trade-off for this method of ‘haze production’ is a loss of the detail that feels important to the ambiguities Lonsdale is working with and which Apartment House and recording engineer Simon Reynell captured so beautifully. That said, this commitment to uncertainty, even within the title track of an album, is commendable. The recording style leads me to imagine how Clear and Hazy Moons might be extremely effective as a spatialised, performed installation (indeed, this might be said for any of the pieces on the album), capitalising on the possible ethers created by Lonsdale's music, made particularly apparent here by the slow fade-out, which allows the ensemble to artfully sink into the ambience of the recording space.
The disc closes with the fullest and longest piece on the album, Anatomy of Joy. At first glance, this musical stature and seemingly uplifting title might seem assertive, but there is a loss of Lonsdale's compositional voice. The feeling of ‘joy’ being alluded to here detracts from the nuance and novelty of expression in the previous three pieces. The loosely would-be-poignant atmosphere feels empty, like it might accompany a generic montage sequence in a romantic drama. Where Lonsdale excels in the previous pieces is in writing music that balances doing something alongside composing stasis through repetition. Anatomy of Joy only does the latter, which, make no mistake, is both graceful and pleasant, particularly in his use of the double bass low pizzicato at 19’00”. But having heard what the composer can do elsewhere – that is, write really rather stunning music – I can't help but feel a little let down: musical moons irregularly wax and wane, but not in a way that beguiles me.
When using this sort of sound palette and these structures, as is not uncommon for emerging composers, it is very easy to write nice music, but considerably harder to write distinctive music. Long, slow and fragile sounds can conceal questions of craft because, well, they sound nice. However, what Lonsdale does over the course of Clear and Hazy Moons is arrange this idiom in a way that is continuously compelling and his own: there is nuance to each of the four eclipsing realms, which is deftly paced to encompass and cradle listeners. Certainly, then, Lonsdale is a composer to watch.
