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Lola Perrin Interviewed at AAJ June 2007 |
Born in New York (with Ukrainian and Hungarian roots), and educated in Switzerland, pianist Lola Perrin is now based in London. Following an early career producing soundtracks for television she went into a period of musical isolation until she launched her solo career in 2003. Ever since, she has attracted increasing attention across Europe as a performer and composer In the autumn of 2006, on a double bill with her brother Roland, she played at Spitz on the closing night of the London Jazz Festival, to rave reviews. Her music has affinities with jazz, classical and minimalism, and is mainly inspired by visual artists. Perrin collaborates frequently with film makers, and the results are a feature of her live performances. British AAJ correspondent John Eyles spoke with Perrin about playing to images, scoring for film and television, and her two releases, Fragile Light (World Quarter Music, 2006) and Perpetual Motion (Blue Planet, 2004). Check out Lola Perrin: Rave Music for Butterflies at AAJ today! |
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| From Minimalism to Latin grooves - The Perrin Siblings Written by Julian Maynard-Smith www.classicalsource.com |
There's not a trace of sibling rivalry as Lola and Roland Perrin talk about how their very different approaches to composing and performing make for the perfect complement... Lola and Roland Perrin share the same parents - and the same choice of instrument, the piano. They are also both composers as well as performers. But their musical approaches are markedly different, as their varied double bill at the Purcell Room on 15 March attests.Lola's delicate, meditative compositions, often built from deceptively simple motifs, have been compared with the works of composers and performers as diverse as Steve Reich and Keith Jarrett - 'minimalism with emotion', to paraphrase one of Lola's own descriptions of her music. Her performances are often accompanied by contemplative and abstract video projections. Roland's sound world is more extrovert, his Blue Planet Orchestra performing world grooves and witty arrangements that bring to life 'what if?' ideas such as 'What if Scott Joplin had been Cuban?' or 'What if Beethoven had been Spanish?' The evening will begin with Lola debuting a new solo piano work, The Silver Suite. She will then be joined by her brother for the world premiere of G-Mass, a work for two pianos that will feature a video projection by The Gray Circle, a London-based visual design company. "It will be the first time we've ever played a two-piano work together," says Lola with a smile in her voice. "He's my big brother and I'm in charge because I wrote the music!" For the second half of the concert the roles are reversed, with Lola playing her brother's music on one song. "I'll be playing in his band and Roland will be playing the accordion. He's normally at the piano one hundred percent of the time. It really is a double bill. My own work is very rooted in visual arts, some connection with something I've picked or something that's picked me." Lola's use of visual inspiration for her musical compositions began with Edward Hopper's "Early Sunday Morning", "... only because I was living on a similar-looking street and trying to put into music the relationship issues and feelings I was having. This painting has a row of shops at dawn, and you don't see any people but you sense them. So I moved from house to house, writing different pieces about each house. Then I went and visited the photos of Ansel Adams and wrote a suite of nine pieces based on them." Silver Suite was also inspired by the work of an artist: Carsten Hoeller's "Test Site", the tubular, spiral slides currently on exhibition at Tate Modern. Perhaps surprisingly for a composer whose music is reflective and peaceful, the primary emotion that the exhibit inspired in Lola was anger. "I felt the frustration of the attendants controlling the crowds - annoyed that they were being put through this scrum." Lola began wondering, "What are these slides about? And does he intend us to be angry and uncomfortable?" Lola discussed her thoughts about the installation with a couple of artists, Julia Warr and Paul Hearn. "Paul thought it was about abandoning yourself to gravity, so I inverted that, because Hoeller's work is all about inversion. So my first piece is called Abandon. The second piece, because one of the slides from a particular angle looks like a trumpet, is called Sound of Silver - it's about letting yourself freely flow in the slide. For the third piece, I kept having this hymn coming back to me and I thought why? Julia said she imagined Test Site at night with candles, with a boy's choir. For her, it's something to do with birth, about futurism. With the left hand, I lifted it up so all the notes were playing within the range of a boy's choir. And when I did that, a sound right from the future came out! Which is exactly what Julia was talking about. Maybe like Ligeti or Arvo Pärt - it's very dissonant. The last piece is called Descent Into. Running through my mind, always, is Escher. Test Site is like an Escher because you go down, file up, go down, file up, so you're in this kind of Escher experience. Our society is descending; we're paying our leaders so that they can steal someone else's country. So it's a metaphor for going blindly down but thinking we have to have a party as we're going down. So my piece is very ironic." Lola's involvement with the video projections of The Gray Circle began after Thomas Gray attended one of Lola's concerts, and decided to make some projections for Perpetual Motion, a suite of compositions featured on her latest CD, Fragile Light. Another person who was persuaded to create films for Lola after hearing her perform was the acclaimed Indian film director Mahesh Mathai, whose first feature was Bhopal Express, about the Union Carbide scandal. "He's India's best features editor, who threw in the towel to come to London," explains Lola. "I was playing at Ray's Jazz (music shop in Foyle's bookshop) on an upright piano. I was thinking he'd do the Thomas Gray thing, but he went away and made an 18-minute film! I'm going to perform this after the Purcell Room in my next show - it's called The Wind is Older Than the World." This evocative, poetic title came from Lola's younger son who, she believes, has inherited her grandfather's literary leanings. "My grandfather was the first Jewish bus driver in New York; he wrote seven novels but couldn't get published and burnt them before he died. My son is my muse." Another startling observation from Lola's son occurred after the death of her mother, when he asked what had happened to the space she used to occupy. "That was the beginning of going down the route of Rachael Whiteread, the idea of containing a space." Rachel Whiteread, the first woman to win the Turner Prize, is best known for her sculptures made from casts of spaces, of which the most famous is probably House, a concrete cast of the space inside a Victorian house. "Rachel Whiteread was in the Arctic at the time and I began writing thinking of the space inside an iceberg. I did a whole suite based on this idea of containing space. A lot of the work wouldn't have existed without these artists." Compositions inspired by contained spaces include the suite Music from Fragile Light Spaces, which appears on Lola's latest CD. "I made that CD because I had a booking with the lovely Serious. It was self-funded. I'm very pleased with it, and I got distribution for it. It's a calling card, no marketing. Some of it's been used on BBC3, but there's no music budget; I've got no money from it but I get a credit. I want it to creep into the public consciousness." Lola's music also appears on XFM. "They get over 6.5 million listeners. It's run from the States but it's international. I've got a few gigs in Europe because of it. I have a particular sound and I'm very careful to stick to that sound. I have rules - if something's going to break one of the rules, I reject it." When I ask Lola what those rules are, she replies, "I have to feel very moved to accept a musical idea. I have to feel convinced I wrote it myself. It's got to be challenging, have some dissonance, a balance. Not repetition without emotion, which characterises minimalism. I like to stretch people's imaginations but not make music that makes people feel they're being hit over the head, or feel that it's a competition like a football match, scoring a goal. There's a lot of competition in bands; I couldn't stand this." I ask Lola who her main influences are. "Probably Satie, because I remember the power of that simplicity and his life. He was eccentric but simple, and lived in one room because he said you can only be in one room at one time. I like his style. But the really big influences are the ECM (record label) composers. I had to stop listening to them, because I was dreaming about them. Eberhard Weber - I love him so much! I wrote a piece to mark his 65th birthday as I was going to be performing during the birthday celebrations, right near where he lives in Germany. In the piece I wrote, the left-hand part is him, and the right-hand part is me. It moves onto where I'm actually dancing with him. It's called Light Trails. I also love Jan Garbarek, and Tutu (Miles Davis album) - it marks this bravery you get in Chagall. And Haydn. I've been very affected by his life, and the way he was isolated off in the countryside with his own orchestra. He didn't really hear anyone else's music, but he heard his own music every day." I ask Roland for his thoughts on the concert. "In terms of serious entertainment, its very different. I think it feels like a really good show, in that you've got Lola's style of music with the film projections: sort of inward, and a lot of my stuff is very outward. Groove is very important to me," he adds, stressing the importance of world music on his musicaluniverse. "As a combination of styles, it works well, especially with her going first. "It's funny, but when I was a kid - Lola's younger by almost three years - she was always way ahead of me in terms of passing grades and ability. And although I'm a very big classical music fan and I listen to it all the time, and I learnt a lot of what I do from classical music, I didn't really click with music until I joined a blues/rock band at school. Something very quickly went off in my head and I knew music was what I wanted to do with my life. Although that led me to jazz, subsequently I did get back to classical music. She's had kids, and that's a detour and a pressure I haven't had to deal with. It's a much more solitary pursuit for her than it is for me. As a jazz composer, you have to absorb and capitalise on what the musicians you hire can do. Although she has written orchestral work and it's really good, my music is more ensemble-oriented and her's soloistic." Roland's Blue Planet Orchestra blends Latin, Caribbean, African, jazz and European classical music. "You can have a kind of classical music that grooves. Normally with groove music, the construction is very simple, and if you're a composer you're an architect and what you're interested in is creating themes and harmonies and developing them, and trying to construct almost a city in sound. And that's the absolute joy of being a composer: telling a story, being like an architect. "Classical musicians think that as soon as you can tap your feet to it, it's lowbrow. But it's very spiritual, very fundamental to being human. It's a common currency - to most people now, music without groove doesn't mean anything. If you do it well you don't hear the construction. It's not as if it's anything intellectually challenging. The jazz thing of theme and solos? I'm completely bored with that unless it's the Miles Davis Quintet." Roland is particularly unhappy when the integrity of a musical performance is destroyed by soloists descending to crowd-pleasing tactics - but argues that it is not only jazz performers that can be guilty of this. "There's a parallel with 19th century opera. A lot of the lesser singers became stars and would mess around with the arias. People would clap and you'd lose the atmosphere. It was like the lunatics taking over the asylum, with solos taking over." So does Roland rein in his musicians in his compositional structures? "I'm pretty prescriptive, and the musicians I work with are happy to do that. My drummer is from Brazil, and my bass player is Cuban. We play a lot as a trio, so we're able to gather ideas. For example we can play a standard and it will go in one direction and I'll think, that's a good idea for a composition. If you want to be a composer, you have to approach it in the same way a musician learns his instrument. You have to write and write and write. If you say I'm not going to do head-solos-head, you have a problem to solve, and you have to build up a compositional technique. There's any number of brilliant jazz musicians who are lousy composers. Ellington and Monk didn't set themselves up against Bud Powell and Art Tatum - they considered themselves composers. "I'm onto something really special now. I'm giving people a beautiful present with beautiful wrapping paper, but substantial. But it's difficult to find my niche. If I set myself up on a jazz stage, people might think, 'Where's your saxophone hero?' But if I'm on a classical stage it's, 'Why are you using I-IV-V harmonies and not Schoenberg? Why's it grooving?' To open certain doors it's a bit harder, but artistically I can live for another 200 years and not run out of ideas." One of Roland's most intriguing ideas is creating a series of musical 'what-if' performances: for example, reworking Für Elise by imagining how it would have sounded had Beethoven been Spanish. "I've gathered a lot of stylistic information, so I pretty much know and I'm able to practise Cuban, South African and Brazilian music, to the extent that I can use that language. So it's really fun: if you have a piece of music in C major, what if you play it in C minor? And what if you apply the rules of Brazilian rhythm?" Reflecting on his musical answer to "What if Scott Joplin had been Cuban?" Roland observes, "The way that Scott Joplin works, the piano is not that far from the Cuban style in terms of how you're hands are spaced, so you think, 'there's a connection here'. They both come from European classical music being adapted by black people. I never want to get into the ethnomusicality of it, but I can feel that there's a connection. "There's a classical equivalent to the Real Book (a book of tune-plus-chords transcriptions for jazz musicians) but for classical music - just the themes with the chords." This liberates Roland from the original 'as written' chord voicings. "I'll play A minor as I want to. So you just make it your own." Roland has a new album, Suite Dreams, coming out on 15 March - the same day as the double-bill concert with Lola. "It's not really a concept album, but there are things linking it together. It starts with a lullaby, and the next track is called Yellow Train - and that's about a vision of an island that you could go to as an escape from the horrors of the modern world. It's a tropical island with a train that goes around the island with only one train station. I think of it as defining what a train is for. We have so much stress and compulsion, with having to make a living. It's just a happy yellow train, and you end up where you started. It's also getting away from everything being goal-related, which turns off spirituality, the non-verbal feeling world. "A newish addition to the band is my singer, who's called V. I'm really happy with the way I've integrated her into the music. I'm also very happy with the development of the themes. For one stretto I rewrote a section from the previous part, and wrote a new melody over it: I did a version of a previous section in a different way. I don't like collage. If you have a novel, when you reach chapter 8 you're not going to introduce a new character. You don't just keep introducing new ideas. I've also written a big chorus piece based on the poems of Bukowski; he said he liked Mahler because he had the courage to wander." By mixing minimalism with improvisation and video projections, and European classicism with Latin-American rhythms, it sounds like the Perrin Siblings share Bukowski's and Mahler's wanderlust. |
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| London Jazz Festival - Lola Perrin The Spitz, Old Spitalfields Market, London Sunday, November 19, 2006 Reviewed by Richard Whitehouse |
Lola Perrin's set comprised three lengthy solo pieces - the outer two being heard against film projections by Mahesh Mathai. The first of these set the pattern for what was to follow - Mathai's evocative if detached Cityscape images counterpoised with Perrin's lively blend of post-minimalist figuration and a harmonic palette whose debt to Debussy and Ravel was deftly underlined towards the close. The second piece, Magma, did without visuals in its calm if moody evocation of someone 'left behind' during the summer-holiday season. The third, Frailty, again combined with a film, East End 1, by Phil Maxwell and Huzan Hashim - though this time the nature of the visuals, capturing the pathos of its subjects with a gritty but revealing immediacy, drew from Perrin a greater poignancy and expressive nuance. The combining of music and images in such a way has been done to death this last decade, but the present partnership evinced a thoughtful approach too often lacking in the medium. |
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| Lola Perrin Fragile Light Reviewed by John Eyles www.allaboutjazz.com |
Lola Perrin's second album expands on the success of her debut, Perpetual Motion (Blue Planet, 2004), incorporating its Perpetual Motion Piano Suite III, plus two other suites. That use of "suites" may suggest that Perrin's music has affinities with classical piano music, and indeed she has drawn comparisons with Schubert, Debussy and Ravel, comparisons which she gladly accepts, although I find Perpetual Motion most reminiscent of Erik Satie. But that is not the whole story; there are also close affinities with the minimalism of Michael Nyman or Steve Reich, Brian Eno's ambient music, or chamber jazz players such as Keith Jarrett. However, most of all, Perrin‚s music is her own and she avoids any of the above labels by calling it "rave music for butterflies" which effectively conjures up its mood of tranquillity, combined with its affecting melodies and rhythms. It is music that tends to command attention. Recently when she played the last night of the London Jazz Festival to a crowded venue (Spitz, with a bar at the back, not noted for its silent, attentive audiences) she held the crowd spellbound and mesmerised. In concert, Perrin's playing is often accompanied by short films by the likes of Thomas Gray or Roberto Battista, and the sleeve of this CD carries still images from some of them. However, the music is not reliant on the visuals, and it's quite strong enough to stand alone. Perrin's compositions are often inspired by visual art; she was stimulated to write her Early One Sunday Morning Piano Suite by Edward Hopper's 1930 painting Early Sunday Morning of low sunlight on a row of shopfronts; the suite replicates the painting's mood of expectation, maybe even foreboding. The longest track here, one of two that are not parts of a suite, is "Barcelona: For Six Pianos". It is ambitious in its conception, and the multitracked piano parts combine effectively to yield a piece that will definitely appeal to lovers of minimalism. |
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| BBC Music Interactive Album Reviews Lola Perrin Fragile Light Reviewed by Pete Marsh www.bbc.co.uk/music |
Pianist Lola Perrin's music is hard to pin down. It's tricky to classify for one thing; which is not a problem for the listener perhaps, but a bit of a pain if you run a record shop (or write reviews for the BBC, come to think of it). |
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| Lola Perrin Interview by Jacques Prouvost December 2006 jazzques.skynetblogs.be |
After the recent "Motives Festival" which took place in Genk between 15th and 18th November (and by the way I'm working on a longer article to appear on Citizen Jazz shortly) I wrote a few lines about Lola Perrin's concert. It was a hypnotic and intriguing concert taking the spectator into the pianist's rather personal world. Fortunately, I had opportunity to exchange several e-mails with Lola Perrin afterwards, and to discuss with her how she works.
... by the way, how do you work? I remember emotions that move me, either a conversation with one of my children, a feeling I get from looking at a painting or other art, a feeling after an interaction with another person (for example: the story of the old man. Click on LolaSpace <http://www.lolaperrin.com/space.html> and see the short story from October '06) Do you compose before viewing images and editing? Film directors come to me and say "I am going to make a film for your music". But I do not say yes to all of them, I am selective and only want to work with the best. The director edits his film on your music? Or do you work sometimes together? In «The wind is older than the world» Mahesh Mathai and I "collaborated". This means, we talked a few times before I wrote the music, and while he made the film. We had some ideas and shared them before we worked individually. Do you work only on solo piano? Yes. I wanted to develop a very unique approach and keep it as concentrated as I could. I am not diverse, I like to specialise. However, I am now going to performing a work for 2 pianos with my brother, composer and pianist Roland Perrin. Did you play before with other musicians? (Duo? Trio? Symphonic Orchestra?) Yes, I had a band a few years ago. I was not happy doing this. A big problem was transport, trying to work out how everyone could travel to the gigs, my responsibility as it was my own band and music. Really boring problems! I also quite like isolation, playing with other musicians felt like I was a circle trying to fit into a square, it wasn't natural to me. Did you plan to do it again one day? I am asked regularly. I always say no. As you see, I'm a little bit curious... ;-) An interview is coming out at some point by John Eyles. I have been reviewed quite a lot - but this was my first long interview. We talked about a lot of things. It's very nice to be asked questions - not for the ego, but because I have been working for a long time alone at home (10 years) to develop the music. |
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| Jazzques Motives Festival, Belgium November 2006 jazzques.skynetblogs.be/ Programme: Lola Perrin with films by Mahesh Mathai, The Gray Circle, Roberto Battista and Phil Maxwell & Hazuan Hashim Nik Bärtsch's Ronin (ECM) Rabih Abou Khalil, Joachim Kuhn Trio & Jarrod Cagwin (Enja Records) |
[...] The next day the festival gave prominence to the piano. First with the UK's Lola Perrin, who develops repetitive music similar to Philip Glass, but tinted with Jarrett-like accents, to accompany artistic video projections. The films often feature stills photographs in close-up and tell of journeys, impressions and rhythms. Fascinating and spellbinding. [...] |
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| John L Walters The Guardian November 2006 |
"...the Perrin siblings were amongst the highlights of what many feel was the best festival ever, says John L Walters. " |
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| Richard Whitehouse www.classicalsource.com London Jazz Festival Perrin Siblings: Roland Perrin and Lola Perrin Lola Perrin Roland Perrin Blue Planet Orchestra |
The Spitz, Old Spitalfields Market, London As the 'gateway to the East', Spitalfields has experienced a fair turnaround in its fortunes over the last few years - with the presence of a restaurant and live-music venue such as the Spitz typical of this renaissance. On the last night of this year's London Jazz Festival, its upper storey provided the lively if somewhat airless environment for this gig by the Perrin Siblings - pianists Roland and Lola - in a two-part programme of contrasts that yet combined into a cohesive and complementary whole. Opening the bill, Lola Perrin's set comprised three lengthy solo pieces - the outer two being heard against film projections by Mahesh Mathai. The first of these set the pattern for what was to follow - Mathai's evocative if detached Cityscape images counterpoised with Perrin's lively blend of post-minimalist figuration and a harmonic palette whose debt to Debussy and Ravel was deftly underlined towards the close. The second piece, Magma, did without visuals in its calm if moody evocation of someone 'left behind' during the summer-holiday season. The third, Frailty, again combined with a film, East End 1, by Phil Maxwell and Hazuan Hashim - though this time the nature of the visuals, capturing the pathos of its subjects with a gritty but revealing immediacy, drew from Perrin a greater poignancy and expressive nuance. The combining of music and images in such a way has been done to death this last decade, but the present partnership evinced a thoughtful approach too often lacking in the medium. A brief interval, and Roland Perrin took the stage with his Blue Planet Orchestra - a five-piece jazz combo whose addition of trombone and clarinet, as well as the distinctive timbre of a Hawaiian-style guitar, appreciably opened-out the sax, piano, (upright electric) bass and percussion line-up of the ensemble. Beginning with the breezy Zippy, they proceeded through an insinuating number and the engaging Hello and Goodbye (not audibly a Beatles' homage) before two numbers in what Perrin explained was an ongoing 'What If' series: the self-explanatory - and highly danceable - What if Scott Joplin had been Cuban, followed by 'What if Beethoven had been Spanish', in which Für Elise was given an ingenious new refit. Yellow Train brought the smokily sensuous vocal of Vee to the fore, while A Child's View offered a tellingly understated take on the issue of armed conflict. The suitably ebbing and flowing interplay of The River was the most notable feature of an inventive trio for piano, bass and percussion, before The War Zone brought the set to a close with its incisive workout for all six members - while exuding an ominous quality apposite to the title and to the music-making as a whole. A diverse and appealing gig, then, which was clearly enjoyed by the large and enthusiastic audience which stood, sat, kneeled and lay-down to hear it. Individually and together, the Perrin Siblings are clearly musicians to reckon with, and just the sort of act that the London Jazz Festival should be promoting. |
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Lola Perrin |
"It's very difficult for me to describe my music. I don't think I'm in a movement called minimalism and I don't think I'm in a movement called jazz either. I've developed my own sound through isolation - I didn't listen to any music for about a decade. |
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| Johannes Künzel Kreuzer January 2006 Lola Perrin: |
"Quiet is the new loud": one could also apply this to Lola Perrin. Although she just doesn't create a doe-eyed - gentle guitar pop, like the representatives of the above mentioned movement. Lola Perrin plays the piano alone, and mostly her own compositions. Her playing is gentle and emits such |
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| France Musique (Eric Serva's 'Tapage Nocturne' programme) 17th November 2005 www.radiofrance.fr |
Lola Perrin is an English pianist whose first album 'Perpetual Motion' is a succession of seven uninterrupted, personal compositions for solo piano, followed by a piece by Brian Eno. Although recorded at home with very few means, this work marks the arrival of a great talent; one that is very close to the best period of Keith Jarrett but with a musical structure that is slightly more minimalist, and thus repetitive. Indeed, Lola Perrin could appear as a feminine version of a Steve Reich, or a rural Moondog, in love. But all these comparisons with known composers or influences are quite beside the point; this is above all Lola Perrin's album, and it is warm, graceful and enlightened; I strongly recommend it. Lola Perrin est une pianiste anglaise dont le premier album, intitulé Perpetual Motion, est une succession sans faute de 7 compositions personnelles pour piano solo suivis d'une pièce de Brian Eno également pour piano. Enregistré à la maison avec peu de moyens cet opus marque pourtant l'arrivée d'un grand talent, certainement proche des meilleures périodes d'un Keith Jarrett mais avec une structure musicale plus répétitive et plus minimaliste. Certes Lola Perrin peut apparaître comme une version féminine d'un Steve Reich amoureux ou d'un Moondog champêtre mais toutes ces ressemblances avec des compositeurs ou des compositions existants ou ayant existés sont ici fortuites, il s'agit avant tout de l'album de Lola Perrin, une œuvre chaleureuse, gracieuse et illuminée que je vous recommande vivement. |
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| Ben Eshmade Classic FM |
"...beautiful piano music..." |
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| Carina Prange April 2005 (also available on line) www.jazzdimensions.de Perpetual Motion |
Wonderful solo piano pieces that are also contemplative are to be found on this CD by Lola Perrin. In spite of its mainly quiet tone, the album still has a lively dynamism – Perrin is a pianist who transforms her ideas into sound with ease. Her "new piano moods" are divided into eight compositions; the final piece is by Brian Eno. Everything began when Perrin wanted to play the piano quietly and not disturb the neighbours – Lola Perrin explains in her CD notes how it became a fight with the neighbour's television. And thus the album shows an increasing power, a strong motivation and energy – meditative and inward turning whilst the single tracks simultaneously audibly radiate outwards. Lola Perrin seems to penetrate the depths of her soul and with peace and calmness she transforms what she finds there into music. "Perpetual Motion" should become a "must have CD" for all lovers of high quality piano repertoire. Very good! |
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| Carina Prange April 2005 (also available on line) www.jazzdimensions.de Perpetual Motion |
Wunderschöne, gleichzeitig besinnliche Piano-Solostücke sind es, die Lola Perrin hier |
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| Josef Engels Berliner Morgenpost 13th April 2005 (also available online) www.morgenpost.berlin1.de |
Lola Perrin and her Rave Music for Butterflies Lola Perrin, the American pianist living in London, is a rather unusual character. She composes piano pieces that are reductions to the bare essentials; they are defined by both concentration and by the utmost of care. She organises her stage career in a similarly minimalist way. Her concert in Berlin is just the tenth in her career. Nevertheless she is enjoying something of a cult status in London. This is mirrored in the rather complementary reviews that place her in the ancestral line of Satie, Reich, Glass and Jarrett. The 'Perpetual Motion' (Blue Planet Records – that originally only has been recorded for demo) has established itself in the Berlin jazz club, Kunstfabrik Schlot, as the one fixed piece of music that is played once the gigs are over. Naturally, the centrepiece of her live concert in Berlin is the seven pieces that form 'Perpetual Motion'. As the title indicates, 'Perpetual Motion' is about natural circulating movements, the turning of never-ending events. One example of this is when the pianist simultaneously allows a simple semitone interval to be surrounded by resistance and also resolved into playful harmonies. Her playing really goes with the impressive projections by the video artist Thomas Gray that actually only consist of filmed water. In an equally down to earth way, Perrin's work draws on the imagination of the listener; she just calls it 'Rave Music for Butterflies'. |
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| Joseph Engels Berliner Morgenpost www.morgenpost.berlin1.de Pianistin Lola Perrin und ihre Ravemusik für Schmetterlinge |
Die in London lebende Amerikanerin Lola Perrin ist eine eher ungewöhnliche Persönlichkeit. Ihre Klavierstücke leben von einer Reduktion auf das Wesentliche; sie sind bestimmt von Konzentration und von äußerster Sorgfalt. ähnlich minimalistisch verfährt Perrin offensichtlich auch mit ihrer Auftrittsplanung. Ihr Konzert in Berlin ist erst das zehnte, das sie gibt. Dennoch (oder gerade deshalb) genießt die Amerikanerin bereits so etwas wie Kultstatus in Großbritannien, was sich auch in den überaus lobenden Besprechungen niederschlägt, die Perrin in eine Ahnenreihe mit Satie, Reich, Glass und Jarrett stellen. Und im deutschen Hauptstadt-Jazzclub Schlot gehört ihr eigentlich nur für Demozwecke aufgenommener Silberling "Perpetual Motion" (Blue Planet Records) zu den meistgespielten CDs für die Stille nach dem Konzert. Natürlich stehen bei Perrins Berliner Live-Debüt die sieben Sätze, aus denen sich "Perpetual Motion" zusammensetzt, im Zentrum. Wie schon der Titel verheißt, geht es um naturkreislaufhafte Bewegungen, um die Wiederkehr ewig gleicher Abläufe. Dazuläßt die Pianistin beispielsweise ein einfaches Quart-Intervall minutenlang von mal widerstrebenden, mal lieblichen Akkorden umspülen. Es paßt zu denbeeindruckenden Projektionen des britischen Videokünstlers Thomas Gray, die im Grunde zwar nur aus gefilmtem Wasser bestehen. j.e. |
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Holger Brandstädt Lola Perrin at Vorpommerschen Künstlerhaus, |
Our life is determined over and over again by coincidences. One can certainly add to the list of beautiful moments the chance meeting at a gig in London between Marschel Schone (host of the Vorpommerschen Künstlerhaus at Heinrichsruh) and the London based New York pianist Lola Perrin, now on her first German tour. |
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Holger Brandstädt Lola Perrin at Vorpommerschen Künstlerhaus, |
Unser Leben wird immer wieder von Zufällen bestimmt. Zu den Schöneren kann man sicherlich die Begegnung Marschel Schönes vom Vorpommerschen Künstlerhaus mit der New Yorker Pianistin Lola Perrin auf einem Londoner Jazzfestival zählen, die nun zu einer ersten Deutschlandtournee der in London lebenden Künstlerin führte. Neben Auftritten in Halle, Hamburg und Berlin bot das kleine beschauliche Heinrichsruh als Veranstaltungsort einen größtmöglichen Kontrast zu den eingespielten Jazz- und Musikclubs der Metropolen. Doch gerade hier, abseits der großen Städte, fand sich ein so zahlreiches Publikum, dass der Gartensaal aus allen Nähten platzte und zahlreiche Gäste den anschließenden Raum besetzten. Allen gemein war eine erwartungsvolle Spannung, die Publikum und Künstlerin einte. In Zeiten der Reizüberflutung und des immer mehr, setzt Lola Perrin ganz auf die Kraft des Solo-Pianos und schafft musikalische Oasen, die zum Innehalten einladen. Ihre Kompositionen entstehen beim Blick aus dem Fenster auf spielende Kinder und vorbeiziehende Wolken, richten den Blick aber auch nach innen und fangen so Momente und Gefühle ein. Eines ihrer Stücke beschreibt "eine kleine Blume in der Mitte von Afrika" und dieser gleich schuf Lola Perrin an diesem Abend viele kleine Blumen, mit denen sie das Publikum verzauberte. Illustriert wurde ein Teil ihres Spiels durch eine farbenprächtige Videoprojektion des Londoner Filmemachers Thomas Gray. Wobei die Pianistin sich als klug genug erwies, den Zuhörern Platz für die eigenen Bilder im Kopf zu lassen und äußerst sparsam mit den verwendeten Bildsequenzen umging. So konnte der Blick immer wieder in den abendlichen Park gleiten und die Zuhörer ihren Gedanken beim Hören des auf leisen Schwingen daherkommenden Jazz nachhängen. |
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| Steffen Könau MZ : Halle 3rd March 2005 www.mz-web.de Each keystroke barely |
Halle/London/MZ. Renting a flat as a composer or musician can often be difficult. The other tenants complain: the piano is too loud, the bass thumps too much. "I didn't want my work to disturb the neighbours," is how Lola Perrin remembers the days when she started composing for herself after years of working on UK TV films. She plays her piano softly, each keystroke barely a gentle breath. "I imagined little creatures with wings dancing to my music," says Lola, sister of pianist Roland Perrin. That's exactly how her music sounds too. In any case a neighbour's TV one floor up is always louder than Perrin's music which is at home somewhere between that of her fellow musicians Philip Glass, Steve Reich and Keith Jarrett. A New Yorker by birth with Russian and Hungarian roots ("We're from the Rothschild family, only the poor side") and inspired by the paintings of Edward Hopper or Ansel Adams' photographs, she creates meditative sound sculptures of hypnotic strength. Pop pope Brian Eno, who since working with John Cale and David Bowie has become known as a crossover between electronic and underground music, allowed Lola Perrin to take on and arrange one of his own compositions. With her album "Perpetual Motion" in her luggage, this attractive mother of two is now on tour for the very first time, and one of her concerts brings her to Halle. Marschel Schöne, a native of Halle who got to know Lola Perrin during a lengthy stay in London, and who works with the "Red Salon" private cultural association, brings this exceptional performer back to his home town. In the Theatrale on the Waisenhausring in Halle, the artist will be playingminimalist jazz pearls from her album against a backdrop of video installations bymultimedia artist Thomas Gray. |
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Steffen Könau Jeder Anschlag nur ein leiser Hauch von Nichts |
Halle/London/MZ. Wer als Komponist und Musiker zur Miete wohnt, bekommt höchstwahrscheinlich Probleme. Das Klavier zu laut, der Bass zu dumpf. "Ich wollte nicht, dass meine Arbeit die Nachbarn stört", erinnert sich Lola Perrin an die Tage, als sie begann, nach Jahren der Arbeit für englische Fernsehfilme auf eigene Rechnung zu komponieren. Sie spielte ihr Piano sanft, jeder Anschlag nur ein leiser Hauch von Nichts. "Ich stellte mir kleine Kreaturen mit Flügeln vor, die zu meiner Musik tanzen", erklärt die Schwester des Pianisten Roland Perrin. Genauso klingt ihre Musik auch. Der Fernseher der Nachbarin eine Treppe höher jedenfalls ist immer lauter als Perrins Musik, die irgendwo zwischen den Musiker-Kollegen Philip Glass, Steve Reich und Keith Jarrett zu Hause ist. Inspiriert von den Gemälden Edward Hoppers oder Ansel Adams' Fotos schafft die gebürtige New Yorkerin mit familiären Wurzeln in Russland und Ungarn ("Wir entstammen der armen Linie des Rothschildt-Clans"), meditative Klangskulpturen von hypnotischer Kraft. Pop-Papst Brian Eno, seit seiner Zusammenarbeit mit John Cale und David Bowie als Grenzgänger zwischen E- und U-Musik bekannt, war so beeindruckt, dass er Lola Perrin bat, sich einiger seiner Kompositionen anzunehmen. Mit dem in Zusammenarbeit mit Eno eingespielten Album "Perpetual Motion" im Gepäck geht die attraktive Mutter zweier Söhne jetzt erstmals auf Tour - und ein Konzert führt sie dabei auch nach Halle. In Zusammenarbeit mit dem privaten Kulturverein "Roter Salon" hat der gebürtige Hallenser Marschel Schöne, der Lola Perrin bei einem längeren London-Aufenthalt kennenlernte, die Ausnahme-Perfomerin in seine Heimatstadt geholt. In der Theatrale am halleschen Waisenhausring wird die 42-Jährige zunächst gemeinsam mit dem Bassisten Davide Mantovani und dem Geiger Roberto Manes Stücke ihres Band-Projektes Polaris aufführen. Im zweiten Teil setzt sie sich solo ans Klavier und spielt die minimalistischen Jazz-Perlen ihres Albums, untermalt von den Video-Installationen des Multimedia-Künstlers Thomas Gray. |
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| Ulrich Gernand My Way Magazin, #58 Perpetual Motion |
Whoever admires Brian Eno, Michael Nyman or Erik Satie will surely also love the compositions of the pianist Lola Perrin. Mini Mali tables, meditative solo piano music that are both ambient and jazz; so simple and moving. Lola Perrin expresses herself on the piano completely in her own way; much love and care has gone into this album that is perfectly suited to rainy Sunday afternoons. A small masterpiece of quiet beauty. |
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Ulrich Gernand Perpetual Motion |
Wer Brian Eno, Michael Nyman oder Erik Satie verehrt, der wird sicherlich auch die Kompositionen der englischen Pianistin Lola Perrin lieben. Minimalistische, meditative Solo-Klaviermusik. Das klingt nach Ambient und Jazz, so einfach und so bewegend. Lola Perrin hat ihre ganz eigene Art sich auf dem Klavier auszudrücken. Viel Liebe und Sorgfalt steckt in diesem Album, das sich vorzüglich für verregnete Sonntagnachmittage eignet. Ein kleines Meisterwerk von stiller Schönheit. |
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| Mojo Mendiola www.global-mojo.com Perpetual Motion **** |
With the level of sound around it's like with the daily flood of pictures. Both are so high that their producers believe they should create ever more exciting sensations permanently in order to catch our attention, while indeed they are only increasing the inflation of stimulants. But every once in a while somebody breaks this pattern and reminds us in a surprising way of something we have all known for a long time: the comforting sound of calm. Lola Perrin, even though hailing from supposedly hyper hectic New York, is such an artist. When she sits down at her piano, solo and unaccompanied, she won't try to take us in by virtuoso cascades of notes and chords. Much rather she leads us to rediscover the charm and the meaning of the single note. During the first two or three minutes you might even wonder whether she is still checking the tuning of her instrument or has already begun her performance. You should give in to this in patience and you'll soon find out that one of the essentials of Blues also goes for other musical styles: A master of the art might express more in just one single note than many others in a dozen within the same given time. And Lola Perrin, drawing on compositions of her own and one by Brian Eno, does not only remind me of the dreamy searching passages from Keith Jarrett's famous Köln Concert. In her playing I also hear the somewhat wearily quiet yet determined tone of Schubert's Winterreise. She might be better known already to the British public, because Lola Perrin lives in London. German music lovers can experience her live in April 7th – 10th in Halle, Hamburg, Heinrichsruh and Berlin. But in any case you should grant yourself this disc. It'll be doing you good. |
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| Mojo Mendiola www.global-mojo.com Perpetual Motion **** |
Mit dem allgemeinen Geräuschpegel ist es wie mit der täglichen Bilderflut: Beide sind so hoch, dass ihre Produzenten glauben, ständig neue Sensationen schaffen zu müssen, um überhaupt noch unsere Aufmerksamkeit erregen zu können, und fördern dadurch natürlich noch die Inflation der Reize. Ab und an jedoch durchbricht jemand dieses Schema und erinnert uns auf überraschende Weise an etwas, das wir alle längst kennen: Den wohltuenden Klang der Stille. Lola Perrin, obwohl aus dem als hektisch verschrieenen New York stammend, ist solch eine Künstlerin. Wenn sie sich ans Klavier setzt, allein und unbegleitet, versucht sie nicht, uns durch virtuose Noten- und Akkordkaskaden zu gewinnen, sondern lässt uns den Reiz und die Bedeutung der einzelnen Note wieder entdecken. Man fragt sich während der ersten zwei, drei Minuten vielleicht, ob die Künstlerin noch die korrekte Stimmung ihres Instruments überprüft oder bereits ihren Vortrag begonnen hat. Diesem Gefühl sollte man sich mit Geduld hingeben, und man wird bald bemerken, dass auch in anderen Stilrichtungen gilt, was gute Blues-Musiker immer schon wussten: Wenn man seine Kunst beherrscht, kann man in einer einzelnen Note mehr ausdrücken als manch ein anderer mit einem ganzen Dutzend im gleichen Zeitraum. Lola Perrin, die sich für dieses Album auf eigene Kompositionen und eine von Brian Eno stützt, erinnert dabei nicht nur an die ruhigen, träumerisch suchenden Passagen aus Keith Jarrett's berühmten Köln Concert. Ich höre in ihrem Spiel auch den fast müde-ruhigen, aber dennoch entschiedenen Ton von Schubert's Winterreise. Dem britischen Publikum dürfte sie bereits besser bekannt sein, denn Lola Perrin lebt in London. Deutsche Musikfreunde können sie vom 7. – 10. April in Halle, Hamburg, Heinrichsruh und Berlin live erleben. Auf jeden Fall aber sollte man sich diese Platte gönnen. Sie tut gut. |
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| John Eyles Spitz Club, London June 2004 www.allaboutjazz.com |
June 10th. One of the most enjoyable concerts of the summer featured the contrasting talents of siblings Lola and Roland Perrin... Lola's solo piano set held the audience spellbound, and you could have heard a pin drop in Spitz. Lola's music is as much ambient as it is jazz; tellingly, her set opened with Brian Eno's "Forced to Choose", and her own "Perpetual Motion" suite has many of the same qualities, radiating a mesmeric sense of peace and calm. Parts of "Perpetual Motion" were accompanied by visuals by Thomas Gray, abstract images derived from natural forms such as animal fur, running water or grass blowing in the wind. This marriage of sound and visuals was as good as any I have seen, even the works of Philip Glass and Godfrey Reggio - praise indeed. |
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Kate Wharton Lola Perrin
(Blue Planet Records) |
It is easy to be over complex on the piano and rare for a player to hit less than 6 keys at once. It is a shame because the piano is so moving when used to play simple folk harmony, involving one root note repeated and a few others only as emotion dictates. |
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John Fordham (also available online) Lola Perrin at The Vortex, London |
…an audience that clearly knew where she was coming from paid respectful attention to her opening 45 minutes of minimalist, meditative solo piano music: quiet explorations of slowly unfolding harmonic movement that eschewed orthodox jazz improvising but none the less reflected the ambient aspects of Keith Jarrett's solo music, as well as the repeating-pattern forms of composers such as Steve Reich. |
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