Oskar Aichinger Synapsis - Btl10199 - Jazz - by Between The Lines

Austrian pianist/composer Oskar Aichinger once said: “I dream of music which is unequivocally committed to art and its complex mysteries – but is still understandable: simple yet sophisticated, like a good joke”. Deliberately old-fashioned – he steadfastly refuses to be taken in by the consumerist behaviour of the cell phone society – the artist who has chosen to make Vienna his home is a consummate master of this intelligent interplay between simplicity and complexity. A fact he has already proven on two between-the-lines CDs (Elements of Poetry btl 005, To Touch a Distant Soul, btl 014). In Synapsis, Aichinger conjures up various significant biographical memories and, by some kind of musical biochemistry, reawakens them in a wide field of associations. Clarence, the cross-eyed lion from the TV series Daktari, for instance, gave his name to one of the compositions, just as the mysteriously dangerous “zone” from Andrej Tarkovsky’s legendary movie Stalker served as a source of inspiration in this highly personal amalgam. Oskar Aichinger is the secret star (although “star” is just the opposite of what he wants to be) of Vienna’s underground scene, and with the delicate chamber music on Synapsis, he realises what is perhaps his most essential musical postulate: “It is possible to find forms that have immediate impact without being banal”.