Loop 7 by Phillip Golub

Pianist and composer Phillip Golub continues his acoustic loops project with Loop 7, dramatically expanding the project’s scope harmonically, technologically, and orchestrationally, while maintaining the emphasis on microscopic variation within tightly controlled repetition begun on his solo debut Filters.

Composed using a 22-note per octave tuning system, the studio recording of Loop 7 employs two microtonally-tuned Yahama Disklavier pianos controlled via keyboard controller. Golub is joined by a small ensemble—consisting of scordatura electric guitar, microtonal vibraphone, and live electronics—to create an absorbing realization of the piece, uncannily situated between chamber performance and imaginary studio creation.

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A 28-minute standalone composition for microtonal acoustic piano, vibraphone, electric guitar, and live electronics, Loop 7 continues the trajectory set forth on Golub’s solo debut Filters (2022)—a set of numbered “loops” designed for live performance—while dramatically expanding the project’s scope harmonically, orchestrationally, and technologically.

Like the four pieces on Filters, Loop 7 is characterized by an economical approach to composition—short, enigmatic forms repeated and subtly varied over time through variations in phrasing, dynamics, and tone color. But whereas Filters was realized in an austere solo piano setting, Loop 7 enlarges the sonic canvas with additional acoustic and electronic orchestration and an integrated “studio-as-instrument” production approach.

Perhaps more radically, Golub has jettisoned the chromatic language of his earlier loops, venturing into an exotic 22-tone equal divisions of the octave (22 EDO) tuning system. Working with these smaller intervals allowed Golub an expansion of his formal approach: short phrases are repeated at descending pitch levels, falling a mere 1/22th of an octave (~54 cents) on each repetition. Eventually, lower notes disappear and reappear as upper voices, giving the music an Escher-esque feeling of a never-ending descent. Rich resonances and striking dissonances abound in a field of shimmering microtonal harmonies.

To achieve such novel tunings on an acoustic piano, a feat of engineering from Greyfade founder Joseph Branciforte and the piano technicians at Yamaha Artist Services in Manhattan was required. Golub prepared a performance of the piece on a MIDI keyboard, capturing his unique approach to phrasing and dynamics. That performance was then played back through a Disklavier—Yamaha’s proprietary system for mechanical player piano-style playback—onto a microtonally-tuned acoustic piano in two separate layers. Each recording layer captured 11 of the 22 pitch classes, allowing the piano to be carefully retuned between passes, a solution devised to avoid excessive strain on the instrument. When combined, the two layers created a seamless acoustic representation of Golub’s performance on a Yamaha CFX concert grand piano—albeit one with 22 notes per octave.

Golub and Branciforte then worked together at Branciforte's studio to record the remainder of the ensemble: Ty Citerman on scordatura electric guitar, Aaron Edgcomb on microtonal vibraphone, and Branciforte on live electronics and synthesizer. Each player was given creative latitude to weave through Golub’s score, highlighting or sustaining pitches, finding hidden contrapuntal lines, and extending the piano’s registration.

Their contributions infuse Golub’s work with a quiet sense of narrative. Where the acoustic piano performances on Filters felt like a snapshot of a never-ending loop, here an undeniable sonic progression takes place. Microtonal vibraphone and guitar swells enter the fray, splintering into multiple layers of themselves. Live electronics emerge subliminally, grafting themselves onto existing sounds, before taking on a more active role.

Branciforte’s pristine recording and carefully balanced mix allowed him and Golub to achieve a production style that hovers between the natural and the synthetic—capturing the intuition of a human performer’s touch and phrasing, while giving the feeling of an immaculately perfected object. The result is a recording uncannily situated between the worlds of chamber performance and imaginary studio creation, marking an evolution not only in Golub’s musical language but that of the Greyfade label as a whole.

Phillip Golub (b. 1993) is a pianist, improviser, and composer based in Brooklyn, NY. Originally from Los Angeles, he creates highly original and expressive music, grounded in but not constrained by his engaged practice in jazz, creative music, and new music. Technically audacious, Phillip sublates distant sound worlds, negating conventions, yet building on traditions.

phillipgolubmusic.com