Kathy Parsons of the MainlyPiano.com fame has published a review of Visions:

Visions is the first solo piano album by Indonesian-born ade ishs. Now based in Melbourne, Australia, ade ishs has studied classical music and jazz from early childhood through his doctorate in music information retrieval. He has also performed with various bands and singers over the years, making him a well-seasoned musician! The nine original tracks on Visions are an effective blending of classical, jazz, and meditational styles, and some of the pieces are quiet and peaceful while others are much bigger and more powerful. The track lengths vary from 5–9 ½ minutes so the music has time to evolve and develop organically. Often compared to Lyle Mays of The Pat Metheny Group, ade ishs’ playing has the effortless quality of a pianist who is completely at one with his instrument.

Visions begins with the serene “Birth of Love,” a beautiful meditation that feels spontaneous, carefree, and utterly at peace. This is one of my favorite tracks—an inspiring way to start! I also love “Matahari dan Rembulan,” another gorgeous piece of musical tranquility. Opening with a soft, ambient voice, the piece gently picks up energy as is it evolves but never becomes “big.” At the peak, it begins to taper off, returning to the original theme. “Sky” is also a beauty. Graceful and flowing, it depicts various “moods” of the sky from very tranquil to strong and powerful. “Morning Vision” is more of a jazz piece with a sensuous slow-dance tempo and dark, smoky images that build to a triumphant climax and then wind down to the end—my favorite! “Soil” reminds me a bit of Philip Aaberg’s spacious Montana tributes. Passionate and intense, it feels free and unforced. “Rain 1” and “Rain 2” are cool and refreshing—totally relaxed yet elegant. “Awan 1” is more experimental, with passionate and fiery themes woven in among the more subdued ones. If you were meditating to this music, you might find those couple of themes a bit jarring, but for active listening, they demonstrate a different aspect of ade ishs’ outstanding musicianship. “Morning Feeling” closes the album with a warm feeling of hope, peace, and contentment. Very melodic and flowing, I wonder if this lovely piece has lyrics.

Visions is an impressive introduction to the solo piano music of ade ishs. It is available as a physical CD and as a download from www.adeishs.com, cdbaby.com, amazon.com, and iTunes. Highly recommended if you like solo piano with depth and substance!

I had an interesting chat with Amir. It stemmed from one of my tweets, where I said that I hadn’t really played digital pianos and electronic keyboards for years (from memory, 2006 was the last time, when I played with Gadsby), and he responded that he now rarely practised that his skill deteriorated. My response to his response is the gist of this blog post.

To quote what I had said, “one of my routine exercises is pretending to be deaf, and ‘listening ahead’ (i.e. knowing the sound before playing every note)”. This is one of the exercises (breathing is one other) taught by my late teacher. Well, he never really said the “pretending to be deaf” bit, but I guess the spirit is the same: We should know the sound before playing every one. In other words, we should be aware of what we plan to do, which is a principle also worth practising in daily life.

How useful is it? For one thing, we won’t just willy nilly press the keys. We will estimate how hard we’ll do it and when, and also how the notes will relate to each other. We will play better melodies, harmonies, and rhtyhms. We will be a better player overall.

[Photo by xamyxjayx]

Here’s the review of Visions by Janet Mawdesley as published in the September 2009 edition of Conscious Living Magazine:

Delightful, refreshing and uplifting are just some of the words that can be used to describe this musical smorgasbord of compositions presented through the medium of acoustic piano.

Effortlessly you move from the mellow Birth of Love to the more melodic Sky, with each of the pieces forming meaning based on how the listener perceives the tones and cadences of each offering. In this first solo recording, ade ishs has managed to compose in a collation of jazz and classical idioms to form an effortless presentation of tracks designed to be listened to in a range of different mediums: from relaxation, contemplation and a teasing fascination, to down right fun. ade ishs’s Indonesian culture has also been woven through the music like a gentle wraith drifting in and out, bringing with it the subtle hint of the East.

Enjoy!

I just got a news from my dad, that my long-time music teacher, Peter Ferdinandus (born 6 October 1942), passed away on 15 August 2009 at the age of 67.

I was under his tutelage from early 1990s for about a decade. Initially, I saw him as merely a piano teacher. However, he was capable of more than that. He wasn’t merely a piano teacher. He was a music teacher.

For living, he also worked as an archaeologist. He was an authoritative figure in the field, and his passion for music was also obvious in his music archaeology research. Actually, re-thinking what I wrote in the previous paragraph, he was more than a music teacher. He encouraged me to be confident and to dare to face obstacles in my various fields of endeavour.

He taught me playing classical music and he supported my delving into contemporary jazz by training me with the necessary skills. His musical influence to me has been undoubtedly big. While he mentioned that techniques were important for high accuracy, he also said that expressions were important to shape musicality.

He has returned to God and he will be dearly missed. May he rest in peace.

[Photo courtesy of Kadam Choeling Bandung, used with their permission.]