10 Seconds: Olivia Petryszak

"Big thanks to George for getting me to think about some of my favourite tunes in a way I never have before. I notice, in retrospect of this, that many of these moments are moments of connection, whether between performer and audience, or the unspoken synergy between performers. Easy to take for granted, but this made me remember how powerful it can be…" https://www.oliviapetryszak.com/bio

1. Orion Weiss - Brahms’ arr. for piano left hand of Bach’s Chaconne from the Partita for Violin, No. 2, BWV 1004 (06'52" - 07'02")

"This piece was originally written by Bach for violin, but I first heard it in this Brahms arrangement for piano left hand, so it felt fitting to honour the soundworld in which I first heard it. Bach wrote this Chaconne following the death of his first wife. The whole (long!) piece is full of emotion, but this moment is one of my favourite moments in any piece of music, ever. Up until this point in the piece, we’re stuck in this minor soundworld, and suddenly, 7 minutes in, we move to major. You’d expect it to be happy, but somehow it’s the saddest part of the whole piece. It feels like we’re having this crazy build up of anger and frustration, and suddenly he accepts what has happened, and we enter into this world of some crazy heart wrenching reflection on his wife’s life.

Fucking hell, I want someone to love me enough to write something like this for me when I die."

2. Rydvall Mjelva - Skinntrøya (2'18" - 2'28")

"I had the pleasure of watching these guys live at the Barbican a few months ago with the Lodestar Trio (who you should also check out, btw). This music, to me, is like some kind of groovy meditation - so built on pattern and repetitiveness, yet I never lose interest because it is constantly decorated by little heterophonic nuances and variations.

Forever insane to me that two instruments which are (from the outside) similar, can create such a varied and rich soundworld… and this exact moment in this tune where this kind of ‘drop’ happens… just makes me want to be right there in the room playing with them."

3. Raphaël Imbert, André Rossi, Jean-Luc Di Fraya, Michel Péres, Quatuor Manfred - The Art of Fugue, BWV 1080: Contrapunctus 1 (Improvisation) (02'15" - 02'25")

"I don't have a lot of words for this, which is weird, because its maybe the one I feel the most passionate about.

Improvising over baroque music is frowned upon by many early music purists, but to me it encapsulates exactly what baroque music is. Creativity and spontaneity on stage. Bach’s music is so full of emotion. Its also really really complex, I mean, harmony sometimes changing every half bar. Its not easy to improvise over, but done well, it can just emphasise the deep emotion already in the music. Love it or hate it, and whether or not its what Bach intended, this improvised baroque soundworld is one of my favourite things in the world…"

4. Abel Selaocoe - Tshepo - I (2'15" - 2'25")

"The most recent release I’ll mention here, this guy has the most beautifully open approach to making music, and you can hear it. I immediately teared up the first time I heard this shift from the soft sound of the strings and delicate voice fading away over the top into this short moment of complete openness and expression.

Actually, Abel doesn’t use a lot of vibrato in his voice, and part of me thinks that it’s what makes me believe him so much. This idea of singing without vibrato was introduced to me through early music, where vibrato isn’t a constant but rather an ornament, to be used sparingly. I prefer it, because I feel like it prioritises the rawness of the human voice, and somehow everything suddenly becomes more real. Abel is one of the few vocalists where I truly believe his voice as a true representation of self-expression.

I believe “Tshepo” means “Hope”, and that’s exactly what I feel listening to this. I pray for more people to make music like this….!"

5. Donnacha Dennehy / Liam Byrne / Nadia Sirota - Letter D (00'06" - 00'16")

"I am an unashamed huge fan of the viola da gamba. I’m an even bigger fan of people who want to experiment with it. For those who don’t know, it’s like a kind of fretted cello, with 6 or 7 strings. But to me, it has even more resonance and warmth. Liam Byrne is absolutely at the forefront of this crazy explorative viola da gamba world.

I have listened to this album on and off for years, and every bit of it is great. The mix of viola da gamba and viola creates this blend of deep warmth combined with this crazy microtonal instability, which makes me feel both comforted and uneasy at the same time. To me, this is real imagery music strongly recommend closing your eyes and imagining what world you find yourself in…"

6. My Brightest Diamond - Fight the Real Terror (02'33" - 02'43")

"I saw Shara play this album at the end of last year in Belgium, in a super small, intimate venue. I sobbed for the entire gig, and about an hour after (this never happens to me). The whole album covers everything we should care about: feminism, racism, love, insecurity, you name it. Watching her on stage is watching a person who can so unashamedly be herself and can touch on everything from what it’s like to be a woman, to gender in and of itself, to creating a safe space for yourself before you create a safe space with someone else, deep stuff…

The lyrics at this particular moment of the song are “Who’s gonna stand with me shoulder to shoulder, to take down another untouchable”. I feel like you can hear her pain, her anger at the world and her passion in this moment and it’s so powerful. I’m not sure I’ve ever felt so empowered as a woman and human being as I did on that particular November evening in a small hall in Antwerp. Take it as your reminder to go to that gig you’re not sure about - you never know when they’re gonna hit you really hard!!!"

7. This is How We Fly - What What (02'27" - 02'37")

"I first heard these guys in a beautifully intimate gig in Barbican Conservatory. I was so struck by the attentiveness of all four of them. Four such different voices but brought together in this totally unfamiliar but beautifully resonant soundworld.

I was totally drawn in by the delicate balance between each of them, but was maybe the most struck by the relationship between the percussion and percussive dancer. This moment perfectly encapsulates the playful energy between them and I think it's amazing - so cool to see two people so engaged with each other on stage."

8. Giovanni Battista Pergolesi - Stabat Mater Dolorosa (03'46" - 03'56")

"Might seem strange to choose 10 seconds which are almost entirely silence, but as we all know, silence can be just as powerful as sound…

Pergolesi composed this piece on his deathbed (at 26 years old..!). It’s full of painfully beautiful harmonic progressions and dissonance - feels as if he was trying to express the depth of his suffering. The music moves constantly, until this moment at the very end, where the sound momentarily fades away to nothing. I feel my heart tighten every time I hear this moment in the piece, like the music is holding its breath and we’re holding ours with it, suspended in this insane moment between life and death.

In that moment, all the emotion from the piece lingers, as if Pergolesi’s soul is still present for a tiny moment, before he lets it go for the final moments of the piece."

9.  Odd (Toby Kuhn and Gaja Sušelj) - Wendy’s Tune (01:05 - 01:15)

"I'm on a lifelong search for musicians who know how to make their instruments make sense on their own. As soon as Toby Kuhn popped up on my Instagram feed, it was clear that he was one of these people.

He has this totally effortless groove with his cello-picking stuff, and I spy him as a musician who is always on the lookout for other interesting musicians too - coolest trait you can have as a musician, in my opinion.

I love their connection in this moment. Duos are somehow the scariest thing and most beautiful thing you can have in music. It's like this crazy love story between two people on stage together and it's so hard to execute it well, but I love witnessing two musicians in moments like this when they meet for a moment of silence before carrying on on their way…"