Wayne Alpern is a remarkable composer, arranger, and multi-style musical culturalist. He has just released Secular Rituals, his most recent in a long line of innovative and fascinating music. His compositions and arrangements are clearly influenced by his own life—living in Detroit and New York City and studying at Oberlin College to Yale to City University of New York to Harvard to Juilliard and Penn. As far as musical exposure, Alpern has had much to choose from. He composes and arranges anything from Marvin Gaye to Jerome Kern to Mozart. Revisit his 2021 albums Frankenstein and Jukebox.
Alpern describes his music this way: “My musical grammar is neither radical nor experimental. Its vitality lies in the familiarity of genres, recollection of themes, and the unpretentious interpolation of the dance floor, the saloon, and the iPod. It tempers serious music with the social, inviting listeners to come as they are. It opens the window to the street and lets in fresh air. And though it may aim slightly lower than the concert hall, what it concedes in erudition may hopefully be compensated in charm. If it succeeds, its reward is less an applause, and more a smile.”
Alpern explains his music and its effect flawlessly. The results are just as he says.
Of Secular Rituals, Alpern states: “Symbolic patterns of being infuse our lives with meaning, transforming the ordinary into the extraordinary. These are secular rituals — this is their sound.” All compositions, instruments, and sounds are by Alpern himself.
The music can be described as ambient, atmospheric, electronica, or even techno, but all of that falls far short of the mark. There is a development of the expositions that cannot usually be found in the afore-mentioned genres. The 11 tracks of Secular Rituals reveal the struggle of order against chaos. It is a drama well-told.
It begins with Utopia, a dream-like layer upon layer of progressive tones that belie the disorder of life. Victims of Venom proceeds with a more aboriginal or indigenous rhythm and is punctuated by whistles and bells. It is almost a depiction of the introduction of superstition and/or religion into our history. Millennium is a paean to technology. Or maybe it is a lament.
The feel and tone changes with Schenker’s Dream. Is Schenker the German logistics company, founder by Gottfried Schenker, who dreamed of a connected world through telegraphy and, now, information technology? The rhythmic, almost algorithmic, processes of the track would make this a plausible interpretation.
Gemoah Fettah is a coastal town in Central Ghana. The West African rhythms are easily identified and the quirky insertions of tone create a native feel that is fascinating and rewarding. Brave Art returns to a simple, ambient melodic line that is highlighted by intermittent whistles and drum stabs. The digitized choir vocals are intoxicating, to be sure. Sadly, the choir is supplanted by what sounds like emergency or even combat communications.
Sista Re is an honest-to-God Motown riff with a delicious taste of Gospel. Then Bach Cmp returns to a Baroque precision that is exemplified by the Master himself. More innovative than the early 1970s’ ode to Bach via Apollo 100’s Joy--a computerized rendering of JS Bach’s Ode to Joy. This uses Bach as a springboard into something entirely and wonderfully different.
Afterglow is a trance-like reminiscence that is an exemplary meditative piece. The pace changes with Triangularity and its pulsing rhythms and melodic ostinatos.
The CD concludes with the sitar and table sounds of Vishvakarma. Vishvakarma is the divine architect and craft god of Hinduism, the one who crafted the weapons and chariots of the gods. The mesmerizing sounds of India convey a return to early ideas while acknowledging the present reality of technology and struggle.
Wayne Alpern’s Secular Rituals is not despairing nor is it optimistic; it is a statement of what is and a description of the world as Alpern sees it. And he sees it clearly and well.
~Travis Rogers, Jr. is The Jazz Owl
Alpern describes his music this way: “My musical grammar is neither radical nor experimental. Its vitality lies in the familiarity of genres, recollection of themes, and the unpretentious interpolation of the dance floor, the saloon, and the iPod. It tempers serious music with the social, inviting listeners to come as they are. It opens the window to the street and lets in fresh air. And though it may aim slightly lower than the concert hall, what it concedes in erudition may hopefully be compensated in charm. If it succeeds, its reward is less an applause, and more a smile.”
Alpern explains his music and its effect flawlessly. The results are just as he says.
Of Secular Rituals, Alpern states: “Symbolic patterns of being infuse our lives with meaning, transforming the ordinary into the extraordinary. These are secular rituals — this is their sound.” All compositions, instruments, and sounds are by Alpern himself.
The music can be described as ambient, atmospheric, electronica, or even techno, but all of that falls far short of the mark. There is a development of the expositions that cannot usually be found in the afore-mentioned genres. The 11 tracks of Secular Rituals reveal the struggle of order against chaos. It is a drama well-told.
It begins with Utopia, a dream-like layer upon layer of progressive tones that belie the disorder of life. Victims of Venom proceeds with a more aboriginal or indigenous rhythm and is punctuated by whistles and bells. It is almost a depiction of the introduction of superstition and/or religion into our history. Millennium is a paean to technology. Or maybe it is a lament.
The feel and tone changes with Schenker’s Dream. Is Schenker the German logistics company, founder by Gottfried Schenker, who dreamed of a connected world through telegraphy and, now, information technology? The rhythmic, almost algorithmic, processes of the track would make this a plausible interpretation.
Gemoah Fettah is a coastal town in Central Ghana. The West African rhythms are easily identified and the quirky insertions of tone create a native feel that is fascinating and rewarding. Brave Art returns to a simple, ambient melodic line that is highlighted by intermittent whistles and drum stabs. The digitized choir vocals are intoxicating, to be sure. Sadly, the choir is supplanted by what sounds like emergency or even combat communications.
Sista Re is an honest-to-God Motown riff with a delicious taste of Gospel. Then Bach Cmp returns to a Baroque precision that is exemplified by the Master himself. More innovative than the early 1970s’ ode to Bach via Apollo 100’s Joy--a computerized rendering of JS Bach’s Ode to Joy. This uses Bach as a springboard into something entirely and wonderfully different.
Afterglow is a trance-like reminiscence that is an exemplary meditative piece. The pace changes with Triangularity and its pulsing rhythms and melodic ostinatos.
The CD concludes with the sitar and table sounds of Vishvakarma. Vishvakarma is the divine architect and craft god of Hinduism, the one who crafted the weapons and chariots of the gods. The mesmerizing sounds of India convey a return to early ideas while acknowledging the present reality of technology and struggle.
Wayne Alpern’s Secular Rituals is not despairing nor is it optimistic; it is a statement of what is and a description of the world as Alpern sees it. And he sees it clearly and well.
~Travis Rogers, Jr. is The Jazz Owl
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