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Tuesday, July 10, 2012

Terrible Baubles, CD, 2012 Terrible Baubles poetry chapbook published by Alternating Current, 2009





Terrible Baubles, CD, 2012
Terrible Baubles poetry chapbook published by Alternating Current, 2009
Lo Galluccio, Eric Zinman, and Jane Wang

A Collaboration That’s Just Pure Brilliance

 Review by Gloria Mindock

Sometimes, it is not easy for musicians to put poetry to music or for the poet, to put words to music.  This is not the case with “Terrible Baubles.”  The poet, Lo Galluccio, who is also a singer with an avant-garde flair, brings her poems to life.  She intertwines her words with the musicians who sometimes improvise and other times play composed music.  They all collaborate so well together that this drives them to new heights and they just soar.

Lo Galluccio reads her poetry, sings, chants, speaks on this CD with guts, emotion, tenderness, and does so with a blues style voice.  Her poems are surreal, edgy, playful, and go where you don’t expect them to.  Some of my favorite lines from her chapbook and on this CD are: “Silver fish in black waves keep secrets/gesturing with fins” from Center of Gravity.  “Like dark birds/the grass at my left wrist/is pulled into the dream” from Three Dollar Poem.  The music in Three Dollar Poem sounds improvised.  The instruments paint the picture and intensify as the words and singer does. 
Another I liked is “Someone offers their eyes/and I must find a cake of stones/to give” from Birthday.  This song provides a break from the rest of the CD with a gentler melody.

Lo Galluccio has collaborated with Eric Zinman several times.  He plays piano, percussion, keyboard, and does voice on this CD.  He has been in the Boston/NYC scene for years.  Jane Wang is a composer, music improviser and is a performance and installation artist.  With these two musicians in Lo Galluccio’s corner, she can do no wrong.  Even if she didn’t have these musicians, she still could do no wrong.  She is that good.

Jane Wangs cello in “I Had a True Love” is beautiful.  The song and mood blends well and all of them compliment each other. This song is more pop sounding with a more lyrical melody.   On the song Adam, the prominent music introduces each chanted phrase with intermittent cymbals.  In Grief as Frenzy, the piano accompanies the singer with a repetitive motif in the beginning and the end.  The percussion plays varied rhythms and Lo’s wide vocal range is extended with the notes she sings.  The music and vocals climax in the middle section where it breaks the repetitive movement and the music range expands into a freer sound.  This piece highlights the cellist rich lyrical tone.  When Lo and Eric sang in Grand Failed Experiment, it was brilliantly done with both cello and percussion musically having a dialogue with each other.

This CD has a good sense of ensemble and the instruments compliment the singer.  I highly recommend this CD.  Order it, you will love it!

This is Lo Galluccio’s third CD.  Her first two are Spell on You and Being Visited.  For more information about these artists, please check out their websites.

 http://myspace.com/logalluccio

http://www.ericzinman.com
www.mobius.com

***   The CD is available at www.cdbaby.com


****** Gloria Mindock is the founder of the Cervena Barva Press

 

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