Part:: Tabula Rasa

This music, to me, is timeless in it's simplicity - it's beauty echo's long after the CD has finished. Part is able to craft the most beautiful melodies out of pure minimalism. I don't possess the musical language to really do this review justice, but what I can say is that all the tracks moved me - especially the Cantus in Memory of Benjamin Britten. From the lone church bell at the start, the strings swell and ebb, a single passage doubled up over the orchestra. Each instrument playing the notes at different speeds until this becomes a true wall of sound until all the instruments have ended, staying on the one note until the last mournful ring of the church bell fades out. This, to me, is the ultimate expression of simplicity and shows how beauty, true beauty can be created from the most simple of idea's.

I was lucky enough to hear the song, Tabula Rasa, live, and every time I hear this ECM version I am transported back to that momentous evening. It is an awe inspiring song - one that travels from hypnotising silences to orgiastic crescendos and back again.

This wasn't the first time I had listened to Arvo Part, but it cemented his place in my life and I consider my life richer for having his cd's in my collection.