Thomas Larcher 
The Living Mountain (ECM)

THOMAS LARCHER is an Austrian composer who grew up in the Tyrol mountain region. His music reflects that intense and majestic geography and the composer is a keen skier and mountaineer. 

Larcher studied composition and piano in Vienna and his latest album, his fourth for ECM, contains three works. The first The Living Mountain, composed between 2019-20 scored for soprano Sarah Aristidou, baritone Andre Schuen along with piano, accordion and the Muenchener Kammerorchester conducted by Clemens Schuldt.

The piece draws inspiration from the Scottish poet and nature writer Nan Shepherd’s book of the same name published in 1977. The composer was taken by Shepherd’s unique approach to the topic. Speaking ahead of the album released he said: “I found it completely different it is from all the other literature touching upon this subject. There’s a particularly palpable connection between her introspection and the nature that surrounds her, the microscopic details that are elaborated in that context. 

“Being able to identify with her writing as much as I did, reading the book turned into my own introspective journey and immediately sparked the musical connotations that I elaborate in my piece.”

The Living Mountain begins up with a low drum pulse rhythm then a contrasting high tone wood block percussion effect, a modern effect that seems to summon up dramatic mountain atmospheres. From then on, melodic Aaron Copland inspired strings and insistent note repetitions and crescendos frame the powerful and evocative vocal performance of Aristidou. 

As well as Shepherd’s inspiration the piece also draws from a series of photographs by Dutch photographer Awoiska van der Molen’s landscape pictures taken in the mountains of Tyrol. The composer felt a deep affinity with the work and the album’s cover is one of his photos. Larcher summarises this influence: “I think both our work is characterised by the slowness of analogue composing and photography as well as constraint through erasing and concealing of content.”

The second work on the album is Ouroboros, an instrumental work in three movements featuring cellist Alisa Weilerstein set against the dramatic backdrop of the Munich Chamber Orchestra’s cluster harmonies and the pointillist accompaniment of pianist Aaron Pilsan. 

The final work is a setting of the 20th-century German author and academic W.G. Sebald’s Unerzahlt, a song cycle, about the function of fine art, performed by baritone Andre Schuen and pianist Daniel Heide. It consists of 13 sparsely designed miniatures that highlights Schuen’s expressive vocal range. It is poignant, and at times shines out with brightly focused optimism. 

Throughout the album is a commitment to deep thinking combined with a physical intensity to match.