Bloom
Bloom
Year: 2024
Heading: for percussion quartet
Record Release: August 30, 2024 click for details
Movements:
Bloom 1, morning
Bloom 1, noon
Bloom 1, night
Stem 1 click to watch video
Bloom 2, morning click to watch video
Bloom 2, noon
Bloom 2, night
Stem 2
Bloom 3, morning
Bloom 3, noon
Bloom 3, night
Instrumentation:
player 1: vibraphone, 2 bongos
player 2: vibraphone, 2 congas
player 3: marimba, 5 wooden slats
player 4: marimba, 4 tom-toms
Duration: 54”
Press:
With an exuberant, infectious rhythmic groove, it rides the visceral pulse of the contemporary dance floor. —The Listener’s Club
However tempting it might be to think of Bloom as his version of Reich's Drumming, the similarities, while they do exist (e.g., a swelling in volume as a movement approaches its end), only go so far. Reich focuses on different instrumental groupings in the separate parts of his ambitious work; Torke's more compact creation deploys consistent instrumentation throughout but involves a trio of three-part cycles interspersed with calming interludes. Further to that, the melodic dimension is more pronounced in Bloom than in Drumming. Here, as in all of Torke's compositions, his singular voice comes to the fore, even when certain aspects of the piece align it to classical minimalism. It's also fascinating to discover that even when instrumentation is limited to one section of the orchestra only, the piece exudes the same kind of expansive ‘colour' that distinguishes all of his works and mark them as Torke creations. —Ron Schepper, Textura
Program Note: BLOOM was written for and recorded by Sandbox Percussion.
BLOOM uses interlocking rhythms which, when played together, create a groove expressed through each player’s pitched and non-pitched instruments. Just as shoots push through dirt erupting in blooms, so too do the vibes and marimbas burst forth from the drums. In other words, this music has an organic profile, unlike other recent pieces of mine.
—Michael Torke