Chris Swithinbank

Last year I put to­gether a lengthy look at good stuff I’d seen, heard and read. To close this year, here are some much briefer notes on some of the best things I en­coun­tered in the last 12 months.

Richard Craig, In­ward — With­out a doubt the best disc of new music I’ve heard this year, as the Ram­bler fore­told. Ei­ther Spo­tify it or buy it now.

Dmitri Kourliand­ski, Neg­a­tive Mod­u­la­tions — One of the first con­certs I heard after mov­ing to Paris in Sep­tem­ber was by the young en­sem­ble Le Bal­con. They in­tro­duced me to this won­der­ful en­sem­ble, elec­tron­ics and video piece. Here’s an mp3.

Evan Parker, Peter Evans & Okkyung Lee — Parker’s rep­u­ta­tion barely needs any bur­nish­ing and per­form­ing in this trio in No­vem­ber he was liq­uid bril­liance as was to be ex­pected, but it was young Amer­i­can trum­peter Peter Evans who re­ally shone. Im­pro­vis­ing at its best.

Hel­mut Lachen­mann / EIC, Con­cer­tini — En­sem­ble In­ter­con­tem­po­rain’s per­for­mance of Lachen­mann’s spa­tialised en­sem­ble work Con­cer­tini at the end of No­vem­ber re­minded me that he is with­out equal.

Drew Baker, mi­cro­script — This 10-minute work, played here by Chicago’s En­sem­ble Dal Niente, was one of my favourite record­ings found on­line this year.

2011 was re­ally no­table for being a year when I fi­nally found time to read some of my stack of wait­ing books. If you pick any­thing to read in 2012, make it David Fos­ter Wal­lace’s In­fi­nite Jest. There is no ques­tion in my mind that it is one of the most won­der­ful books of the 20th Cen­tury and at just one thou­sand pages long, at least a thou­sand too short.

See you in 2012!