At the record convention this past Sunday I passed on an inexpensive disc I'd seen at the same vendor the year prior, a new-age looking collection of Howard Skempton piano pieces as performed by John Tilbury. 
It did peak my interest though, and when investigating later it turns out it's a disc that I'd already heard and forgotten about. Previously it had been packaged by Sony as Well, well, Cornelius, a piece on the disc and a reference to the late Cornelius Cardew, whom Skempton helped in his formation of The Scratch Orchestra around 1969.
The piano works do bear a similarity to Cardew's late piano works, but they're more focused on existing in a post-Satie, post-Cage domain. Cool, innocuously simple and beautiful piano evolves over time into a stark and difficult listening experience while never straying too far from the path it started on. It's the sort of musical sleight of hand that could make you think it was an accidental effect or flaw in the work, but it has more to do with the character of the work being devilishly complex. In a way, the music is flawed because of the unabashed humor in its presentation as both a serious work and a work of over sentimentality and devastatingly dark mood. Still, I find it to be important to relate to music in this mode. It may be difficult to listen amongst an audience, but as a personal record it has a refreshing and affirming truth to it. When is it not difficult to try and be an individual, deeply, amongst a crowd?
