The adjective "wistful" is defined as "showing pensive sadness." Many aspects of this definition are apt in a lot of modern classical music. While the definition itself often insinuates a sort of self indulgent melancholy, few things could be said about many of Peter Broderick’s releases that had any negative connotations. Much the same is true in Broderick’s latest offering, Float. Like many of his peers in the "modern classical" subset, Ólafur Arnalds for example, Broderick uses a multitude of devices to get his message across; synthesised drones and loosely scattered tidbits of banjo combined with euphoric string and piano sections.
What is different about this particular album is that it is basically written entirely using the rondo form. It has several oft repeated themes throughout that segue into each-other effortlessly. Whether this is to remind the listener that they are listening to a whole album and not an iPod on shuffle or to give a sense of continuity and defined purpose is unclear. Knowing the previous output of the artist and his almost perfect sense of compositional techniques and aesthetic construction, I would put good money on the latter being the case.
As soon as the album began, I was reminded of the restrained melody inherent in Arnalds’ Eulogy For Evolution. A simple piano riff rests on a cushion of lengthy violin notes and soon takes the lead, presenting a simple cue for the choppy, almost cinematic burst of staccato instrumentation which springs from the gloom. Later on, the wryly titled "A Simple Reminder" does exactly what it says on the tin, reprising the leading voice from the first track and understating the accentuation inherent the first time around. This serves not to renew the emotion heard from the initial burst, but rather give a strong sense of concept and purpose to the two pieces in-between.
The slow paced and overtly sentimental "A Glacier" is also revisited later on, adding a duo of vocals that epitomize the aforementioned wistful analysis. Barely decipherable words move with the music becoming clear only for choice intervals to reveal such assonant phrases as ‘slowly’ and ‘pieces’, which act to heighten the feeling that this is a firmly rooted concept album (of sorts). This isn’t a ‘concept album’ in the traditional sense of the word, rather a living breathing whole which conjures up images of rain and wind and other vague situational senses.
Clearly, the most concise and effective track on the album is the majestic "Something Has Changed." Combining the elements introduced up until this point, this piece moves the listener through phases of dark and light, the tangible and the convoluted, in only two short minutes and 24 shorter seconds. The piece ends with a staggered, almost computerized sounding reprise of the violin and piano riffs only off-beat and (almost) unaccompanied, bar a few choice samples very low in the mix and a constant tape-loop which only reveals itself when the main motif has stopped.
The repetition doesn’t stop there either, oh no. The final two tracks "An Ending’"and "A Beginning" both contain reprisals of the original riff from "A Snowflake" with differing outcomes. This is an extremely competent and impeccably conceived whole, which takes the listener on an emotional journey through a beautifully crafted rendition of moderate sadness and tentative hope. My only criticism is that the constant repetition can sometimes feel patronising, that maybe we, the listener, actually like what he does now and will remember what has gone before.
-Barry Smethurst