Klaus Janek - Casper²

a/l/l/ 8

Musicians are always on the hunt for pockets of inspiration. The search often leads them high and low and in the best cases, down the most unexpected paths. Case on hand, Berliner bassist Klaus Janek who chooses the life of Kaspar Hauser as the basis of his solo recital. For those like myself not versed in Hauser’s history he was one of the wild children that were the rage in scientific circles of the nineteenth century. Discovered in a ‘savage state’ near Nuremberg in 1828, he served as a controversial pawn in the ‘nature versus nurture’ debates when claims were made as to his noble ancestry. These alleged royal ties led to several attempts on Hauser’s life and he was eventually murdered by an assassin’s knife in 1833.

As I was reading the tale recounted in the disc’s accompanying notes with the first cut “First Years” piping through my ear goggles I was struck by how well Janek’s relentlessly chugging pizzicato fit the political intrigue of the story. His own brief biographical sketch references ‘abstract’ and ‘groove’ music as well as the guiding influences of Dave Holland and Peter Kowald. In line with both of these bull fiddle heavyweights, he favors the deep resonating regions of his instrument, milking a viscous tone from his tautly strung strings. “Arriving in the Box,” continues the chronological slide show with Janek working his bow like serrated crosscut saw, injecting scrabbling commentary with furiously rubbing fingers. He produces quite a racket and exerts quite a bit of effort as evident by his groaning asides. In spite of the energy expended, only sections achieve the sort of space-filling harmonics and accompanying sense of compressing captivity he seems so intent in conjuring. The remainder feels like well meaning, if founderous, worrying of the same provincial segments of his fingerboard.

“One Day of 16 Years” and “Free” also seem unnecessarily protracted, though there are some stunning moments peppered throughout each piece. During the opening of the latter Janek sets a revolving wheel of rasping tones in motion, approximating the flow of fetid air down the ventilation tunnel to a prisoner’s cell. But the artifice goes on too long and the same patterns repeat with very little appreciable variation. “Free” is more frenetic, but similarly obsessed with stitching another tangle of friction-saturated arco scribbles. Here it’s a case of too much rather than too little and Janek resorts to the sort of overly busy playing that periodically plagues even seasoned bassists like William Parker. The felling of trees for no apparently good reason. “Last Minuet” removes much of the clutter and finds Janek once again focusing on a clean, gorgeously crafted swathe of tones before turning to the staggered titular pattern for the close. “Epilogue” is even better, an all too brief return to Janek’s robust pizzicato style. If only the over-stuffed pieces of the program’s middle exercised equal amounts of frugality.

Janek’s presumable goal of translating Hauser’s powerlessness in the face of exploitative actors and agents feels only partially on target to my ears. An imbalance exists in terms of technique and outcome that is naggingly recurrent throughout the program. Still, an hour of solo bass couched in the context of a historical tragedy is at root an inspired undertaking. The disc has made me curious to hear Janek in the company of others where he has room to bounce his numerous ideas off those who would respond in kind.