One at a time, quite slowly, each addition layering another tone, sometimes replacing a previous component, noticeably shifting the sensibility of the overall piece in the process, a key is pressed on Michiko Ogawa’s dusty old Hammond organ and the resulting drone changes its shape. This is “Ura,” the one preview track from Solo May / 2020, her new album. Best known as a clarinetist, Ogawa here applies herself to dense, dramatic music that is full of sublime portent, a minimalist’s take on the Phantom of the Opera, a mass for the wonders of sedimentary geology.
Album originally posted at hitorri.bandcamp.com. More from Ogawa, who is from Tokyo, Japan, and based in Berlin, Germany, at michikoogawa.com.