Cécile Schott is a young Parisian musician and former teacher whose third full album as COLLEEN is to be released on the Leaf Label to follow a short UK tour this May.
COLLEEN's music has exploratory, minimalist and spiritual qualities. Listening to the 9 short pieces on Les Ondes Silencieuses is to follow an intensely attuned artist through explorations of sonority, silence, melody and texture.
The opening phrase of "This Place In Time" introduces us immediately to COLLEEN'S present passion - the viola da gamba. One line rises and falls with gracefully long, bowed notes in the deepest cello-like voice. A second accents it like sunshine, glinting a couple of octaves higher. Pairs of notes push the silence back and forth. It is unhurried and contemplative. A pattern is set for the whole cycle.
Resonance, gently decaying notes, repetitions and silences are given time to register and be noticed. There are emotional nuances, shifts in urgency or complexity that refresh our attention and satisfy our need for change and development. But always in the least demanding and most gentle of ways. The listener can take the opportunity to meditate, visualise or dream. Or, as I found myself doing, just loving COLLEEN's sensuous involvement with the physical nature of the acoustic instruments and the hedonistic richness of even their simplest sounds.
The viola da gamba itself is a medieval seven-stringed relative of the cello, but with frets like a guitar. The one we hear on this recording is one that COLLEEN had made for her, and her reverence for its beautiful tones (and for the luthier who made it) is clear. She is not a conservatoire player, her instrumental training seems to have been fairly minimal. Her musical talent is in exploring and revealing the beauty of the instrument as she performs and (in the present case) records. We are not bludgeoned by learning, we are invited to join in with the delights of gently patient discovery. It is a very agreeable experience for anyone who is happy to submit.
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As the album gently develops we are also treated to spinet, clarinet, crystal glass and classical guitar. Sometimes played solo, sometimes overdubbed. Each piece has a distinct feel of its own, but themes and tempi recur. In the final track "le bateau" there is a near reprise of those opening phrases on the viola da gamba.
The titles invoke Mediterranean coastlines and the stillness of the mysterious ocean itself - without the relentless surges of the Atlantic. And so it is with the music. Listening is to see clear pools rippled by a small stone dropped gently in, or to watch a sparkle of sunshine on distant waves. Soothing, healing and very warm.
www.myspace.com/colleenmusique
www.colleenplays.org
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