String Quartets: 1986-1996

Sharp's distinctive style is very rhythmic, "groove-oriented" as he says, but not likely to lead to foot-tapping or dancing. It's more like the propulsion in minimalism, though otherwise sounding nothing like the cool, sleek sound of Steve Reich -- Sharp seems to have incorporated similar influences from Africa, via blues and rock. "Digital," which was recorded by the Kronos Quartet on their album "Short Stories," involves amplified tapping on strings prepared with metal strips, resulting in a sound Sharp likens to a "mega-mbira" (mbira, the African instrument). The other compositions do not involve such unorthodox technique, but are certainly challenging in their form. A review in The Wire criticized this disc for being too harsh, but if you are of the post-punk sonic era, and periodically feel angry about the state of the world, harshness may sometimes be a virtue. "Shapeshifters" and "Twistmap," from January 1991, reflect Sharp's anger as the first war on Iraq began, and could not be more timely 12 years later.

Sharp, like Xenakis, has employed algorithms as part of his compositional process, including, I believe, the Fibonacci series and fractals. Interesting that Sharp, frighteningly adept across multiple instruments and genres of music, can himself be explained in fractal terms. From an aerial view, all that is visible of music are its broad outlines -- the large-scale structures of pop radio, arena and stadium performance, the established symphonies. Now zoom down into the fractal edges for a high resolution glimpse of the interstitial areas of places like Downtown NYC and discover what strange hybrids can be found in highly differentiated ecological zones. There's Elliot Sharp, along with John Zorn, William Parker, Bang On a Can, and myriad others surviving in what appears from afar as a microscopic niche, but is teeming with creativity and boundary-transgressing life!