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Whenever the opportunity arises, which it doesn't very often, I gleefully profess my love of what I puckishly term cheesy '70s serial music. For my own ironic reasons, I just can't get enough of the stuff. Really, the word cheesy doesn't have to carry a negative connotation. For me it certainly doesn't. I not only embrace my own inner cheese, I try to foster it. Along with wine and great European chocolate, cheese is one of life's greatest vices. So, suffice to say, I was literally floored by the utter refinement of Curt Cacioppo's succulent Klavierstück. Even the title hints, not so subtly, at the giants of serialism past. Of course I understand bestowing a piece with such a title, if you're actually German, but Cacioppo was born in Ohio when Stockhausen was arguably at his compositional peak, and now teaches in Pennsylvania. Whatever. I think his students are lucky to be in the presence of someone able to inject so much ethos and passion into the number crunching restraints of 12-tone composition. The music skids and smears its way through mushy lushness on its merry way to angular peaks. Luckily, the composer spends ample quality time in the murky valley I like to call anticlimactic. It gives the piece humility, not to mention listenability. Best part, composition on the piece was completed in 1976.
—RN
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