VITAL WEEKLY

The name Ingar Zach appears in reviews mostly in connection with other musicians, such as his  duo Labfield with David Stackenäs, the trio Looper with Nikos Veliotis and Martin Kuechen,  Huntsville and Mural or the many more ad hoc works of improvisations with people like Jaap Blonk,  Derek Bailey, Ivar Grydeland, Wade Matthews, Mazen Kerbaj, and many more. 'Le Stanze' is his fifth solo record, and I am not sure if I ever reviewed any of his solo work before. Zach is a percussion player who also quite a bit of electronics and the results are amazing. 'Le Stanze' opens with 'La Bugia Dello Specchio' in which sounds seems almost absent, and reduced to a few strokes here and there. By total contrast is then the piece 'Il Battito Del Vichingo' in which Zach taps out one steady beat with his feet and another hand for a steady one, but with variations for the cymbals; that's the start as in other parts of the piece he moves into something wilder yet sparser, and overtones are created (how I don't know; maybe by rubbing objects on the skin of the drum) and it remains sparse throughout. The surface scanning returns in 'L'Inno Dell' Oscurita', as a solo play it seems and it depicts something very low and very spooky; like a big monster slowly roaming the streets at night. The closing piece is 'E Solitudine' which is the album at it's heaviest I think. It opens with a controlled feedback environment which turns out to be some kind of slow moving drone (I assume this Zach's most electronically played piece on this release) of further control of the various resonating skins which he also plays, I presume snares and toms, which objects moving about from the electronics making those skins vibrate. This means that the four pieces on this album are all very different from each other and they provide us with a wonderful insight in the musical abilities of mister Zach. An album that sounds like a journey through life; from quiet beginnings to a powerful end, expertly painted. An excellent work.