Reviews of Sti.ll [12k2060]

Branciforte’s vibes and Madison Greenstone’s clarinets are most responsible for the music’s glowing pulses and woody textures,

Sti.ll serves to highlight the conceptual closeness of ambient electronic music to modern minimalist composition, bridging two seemingly distant realms and sounding quite natural.

Sti​.​ll is a one-of-a-kind deep listening experience that will probably feel fresh to me forever, as I am constantly finding new shades of beauty as I notice more details and small changes.

It doesn’t happen often that a new recording or reinterpretation touches me as much as “Sti.ll” does.

A fascinating set of four compositions that both mesmerise and stimulate, working with intriguing sounds outside the usual expectations of chamber music.

Meticulously transcribed and arranged by Greyfade’s Joseph Branciforte and performed by an ensemble of notable New York creative musicians.

Ambitiously remaking a 2002 ambient-glitch album with clarinet, vibraphone, cello, and other acoustic instruments, New York composer Joseph Branciforte discovers new depths in a minimalist classic.

Sti.ll is overall smoother and more pleasant, which is really fitting for the intimate and subtle sentiment of the original LP, making it a re-listen that fans of the original should not miss out on.

Counter-intuitively, an album centered around the concept of stillness turns out to be a celebration of flow.

It turned out to be quite a painstaking process that took years to complete, with no less incredible results.

What this book isolates, like an overpowered floodlight, is how an acoustic version of an electronic piece is constantly and consistently different. And so the listener is lead into a world of paying close attention to timbral differences, to getting their ear-hands all around the distinct shapes of digital vs acoustic instrumentation.