The album highlights the use of industrial and mechanical sounds in modern music, with Bartók's second quartet and Ligeti's work featuring indications like 'like a precision mechanism'.
Instruments
The musicians of Quatuor Hanson play on a variety of instruments, including a Don Niccolo Amati violin from 1737 and instruments by contemporary maker Yair Hod Fainas.
Album & Artwork
The album's title, 'Not all cats are grey at night', proposes the idea of a plural world where contemporary musical works contrast with each other, rather than resembling each other in obscurity.
Interpretation
The performers aim to make modern music accessible to all audiences, believing its language is closer to us than classical repertoire and can be apprehended directly if listeners are open to it.
Recording & Production
This album was recorded at the TAP - Théâtre Auditorium of Poitiers, whose acoustics are recognized as among the best in Europe.
Composer's Artistic Vision
The album features works by Ligeti, Dutilleux, and Bartók, which are presented as revealing different facets of 'modern' music and the night, moving beyond traditional associations like silence or obscurity.
Compositional Technique
The works on this album, like much 20th-century music, use language for realism and description, creating vivid imagery, similar to the advent of cinema and photography.
