Branca Ensemble: Symphony Nos. 8 & 10 - Live at the Kitchen Atavistic DVD (2004) Available at Amazon.

Branca started his career as an influential part of the seventies No Wave scene, writing material for both Static and Theoretical Girls. In the eighties, however, he formed the Branca Ensemble, a group of downtown musicians that featured alums from Theoretical Girls and, notably, Lee Ranaldo and Thurston Moore from Sonic Youth. In 1983, he released recordings of Symphony One and Symphony Three, lengthy works for strenuously amplified rock ensembles. Branca's presentation of feedback-laden experimental compositions labelled "symphonies", using an ensemble comprised primarily of guitars, challenged notions of what constituted "art music", eroding divisions between experimental rock and modern concert music.

Branca has branched out in recent years, composing for dance pieces and films and even for conventional orchestras, but the Branca Ensemble remains his principal artistic medium. While the membership has changed through the years (Moore and Ranaldo are no longer active participants), Branca has molded its sound into a personal and visceral vehicle for creative expression. The ensemble membership for this particular outing includes some important members of the New York downtown scene, including composer/guitarist Phil Kline and drummer Virgil Moorefield. Miriam McDonough, who not only plays bass and keyboards on the symphonies but serves as assistant conductor of the ensemble (conducting the first movement of Symphony Ten), is a pivotal contributor to the recording. Branca conducts the rest of the concert himself, adopting a surprisingly formal podium demeanor. His style favors energetic elicitation over clarity, but his enthusiasm serves as an almost choreographic illustration of the music.

Symphony Eight, subtitled "The Mystery", is cast in two movements: "The Passion" and "Spiritual Anarchy". It features drones, glissandi and a measure of dissonant counterpoint over insistent rock drumming from Moorefield. Branca has steadily worked toward refining his pitch selection, creating a greater sense of overall harmonic shape in Symphony Eight than in his previous symphonies. Indeed, it is a pity that the rhythmic background is not as subtle as the pitch movement in the piece. It often grounds what would otherwise be more intricate phrase lengths into the shackles of regular metric groupings.

Symphony Ten, subtitled "The Mystery, Part Two", is also cast in two movements: "The Final Problem" and "The Horror". Branca has addressed some of the concerns I had about rhythm in the Eighth Symphony -- Moorefield's playing is much more focused on textural articulations, with frequent rolls and fills, than regular pulsation. The Ensemble's phalanx of guitarists really gets to let rip in this one, creating scads of feedback and angrily repeated distorted drones. The effort required of the performers by this demanding work is etched into their faces; many are physically drained by its conclusion. The sonic onslaught is quite overwhelming, too -- Branca's symphonies have been a model for heavy decibel experimental rock by such groups as Sonic Youth and, later, Mogwai.

While much credit must go the ensemble for their ardent performance, the relentless character of these symphonies creates an interesting compositional problem: can ceaseless intensity create an environment that is so overwrought as to become parodistic? This lack of balance and variety is the principal reservation that I have when listening to Branca's music. While symphonies Eight and Ten are less monolithic in character and more developmental in formal design than his compositions from the eighties, I still find their steadfast avoidance of lyricism and delicacy troubling.

For me, the statement that Branca's symphonies make, a suggestion that boundaries between concert music and rock are arbitrary, is more important (and interesting) than the music itself. Inspired by his aesthetic philosophy, concert groups such as Bang on a Can have created concert series and festivals programming "crossover" works that employ both rock and classical elements. On the other side of the fence, in 1999 Sonic Youth recorded Goodbye Twentieth Century, an album of experimental concert music performed by rock musicians. This musical cross-pollination has left both genres with more choices, and fewer preconceptions, than they had before Glenn Branca began writing symphonies.

-- Christian Carey