INTERVIEWS
FRONT
Interview by Ruben van Dijk
August 2021,
NL
Leo Svirsky, componist en pianist, heeft een voorliefde voor het vergankelijke van dat wat ooit tot grote hoogtes kwam. De Japanse liveshows in het laatste levensjaar van John Coltrane, etnografische opnames van verdwenen culturen, een nooit afgemaakt pianostuk dat het einde van de wereld in zou luiden. Met zijn laatste album River Without Banks en de bijbehorende liveshow hoopt hij op zijn eigen manier het verstrijken van de tijd te kunnen vastleggen. […]
CONCERTZENDER
Interview by Nico de Rooij
May 2021,
EN
The Hague-based artist Leo Svirsky in conversation with Nico de Rooij in Black and White Radio.[…]
BOMB MAGAZINE
Interview by Michael Pisaro
Feb 2017,
EN
“Mysterium.” This was the answer Leo Svirsky gave me some time ago, when I asked what his end goal with music was. Began by Russian symbolist Alexander Scriabin in 1903, Mysterium, is an unfinished musical work that the composer worked on until his death in 1915. The piece included an orchestra, a large mixed choir, an instrument with visual effects, dancers, a procession, and incense. It was to be over a week long, take place in the foothills of the Himalayas, bring about the end of the world, and replace humanity with “nobler beings.” Listening to Svirsky speak about the present state of music, politics, and culture, one senses that such a spirit of upheaval is alive and kicking. […]
JAZZ-NU
Interview by Maud Mentink
Sept 2015,
NL
De man van de tegenstelling: hard of zacht. Zo ook dit interview. Zijn eerste album ‘Songs in the Key of Survival’ bracht hij uit in 2012 en kenmerkt zich door subtiele klanken en doordringende stiltes, want die stilte zegt eigenlijk zo veel meer.[…]
ALBUM REVIEWS
For River Without Banks
DAILY BANDCAMP
By Peter Margasak
September 03, 2019
EN
Hague-based American composer Leo Svirsky makes a radical departure from his overtone-soaked 2017 album for solo accordion, Heights in Depths, with this unabashedly melodic suite, where he scrupulously creates waves of soothing sound by layering two related piano parts. The writing is lush, with the two primary components inextricably linked, as if each part is a watery reflection of the other. That quality makes sense given the album’s inspiration: an idea posited by musicologist Genrikh “Henry” Orlov that the history of sacred music has witnessed the blurring between the physical and the spiritual. […]
For Heights in Dephts
NATIONAL SAWDUST
By Steve Smith
2016
EN
…Heights in Depths is something else altogether: two side-long compositions for solo accordion, each a tightly focused study in minimalism in the original La Monte Young, Tony Conrad, and Eliane Radigue sense of that term. The title track in particular concentrates on a slow ascension of sustained high tones; an alternation of lean and thick intervals and clusters produces a dizzying span of pealing overtones and disorienting beats. […]
See article
For Heights in Dephts
POSTAMBIENT
By Tomoyuki Fujii
26 November 2016,
JP
… The A-side “Heights in Depths” is an extremely minimalistic performance based on a long tone in a high range that extends straight in one direction, with complex growls, harmonic changes, and unstable moire stripes. The B-side, “Depths in Heights”, has a relatively undulating structure in terms of harmony, playing style, and breathing intonation, and the rough texture of the midrange and the transition of the chords that increase in color towards the second half are particularly beautiful. Although both sides are based on the framework of the composition, changes in texture are immediately triggered, and the balance is maintained as if hiding in the fluctuations of contradictory things such as tension and relaxation, paralysis and awakening, sedation and elevation. It is progressing secretly. […]