PETER MICHAEL HAMEL

Astute fans of Hamel's Indo-Krautrock ensemble BETWEEN might spot a brief quotation from the 1973 album "And the Waters Opened", just before the 16-minute mark of Side One's "Dorian Dervishes". The moment provides a nice touch of continuity in the middle of an otherwise loosely-organized improvisation drawn from Indian musical traditions: meditative drones under light-fingered synth arabesques.

The effect is dreamy and drifting, but there's a rigorous intellect behind the music that keeps it at arm's length from anything resembling New Age narcissism. Hamel is no DEUTER, in other words, despite the obvious parallels: two German composers finding inspiration in the Far East, both represented on the Kuckkuck record label.

The 26-minute title track breaks that mold, with its massive chords from what sounds like the largest cathedral pipe organ in Europe. It can't begin to approach the empyrean rapture of Florian Fricke's likeminded "Vuh", but when played loud enough this is transcendental stuff: lighter than air but totally grounded, anticipating the even richer tapestry of Hamel's upcoming "Organum" album in 1986.

It may not leave an indelible impression, but the album is evidence that challenging electronic music didn't become extinct in the 1980s.

The two long tracks, each filling one side of the original LP, are equal halves of a unified synth, sequencer and organ improvisation, flowing over its forty total minutes like a braided mountain stream: turbulent on the surface but placid underneath, and deeper than it first appears. The spirit of the music is entirely Eastern, reflecting Hamel's years of travel throughout India and Asia. And the mood throughout approaches a plateau of not-quite-blissful meditation, hypnotic in its gently agitated monotony.

Despite the apparent lack of any direction there's a larger structure to the overall album, albeit stretched so far over two complete sides of vinyl that it's hard to recognize. But in the end there's very little to distinguish the music from a crowded field of likeminded keyboard explorations, dating back more than a decade to the obvious taproot of Terry Riley's "A Rainbow in Curved Air" (1969). Hamel and Riley were in fact label mates on Kuckkuck Records in the early 1980s, and the Munich composer was a guest on two Riley albums recorded shortly after this one.

In retrospect the saving grace here is a welcome lack of symphonic pomposity, synth-pop commercialism, and vapid New Age conformity...in other words, it's a work of rare integrity for the nascent 1980s. Hamel's solo career was always closer aligned with academic trends in electronic minimalism, and can be enjoyed on the same erudite level.

As a cheerfully heathen Proghead I suppose I could have added my own 32-cents to the dialogue (2-cent opinions having lost their value in these tough economic times). I would have argued that music, by itself, has always been a sacred thing, and cited this 1986 album by Peter Michael Hamel (not to be confused with Peter Joseph Andrew Hammill) as a textbook example of pure instrumental divinity.

Hamel was a kindred spirit to Popol Vuh's Florian Fricke: a visionary keyboard artist possessing a wide academic knowledge of world music and musical theory (he would later gain renown as an author and educator). This was his eighth solo album, essentially a one-man live performance on a massive pipe organ at the München Academy of Music, enhanced by discreet overdubs of Tibetan cymbals and Vedic conch. The music is closer to legitimate Western classical sources than to modern Progressive Electronics, presenting 56-minutes of truly celestial Old World minimalism, with the occasional Oriental accent reflecting Hamel's interest in other cultures and alternate beliefs.

The album is generally very quiet. And like any true piece of devotional music it doesn't require any Born-Again bombast in order to reach a higher plane. But what truly separates the effort from the usual keyboard-based New Age karmic noodling is the depth and integrity of its scholarship, and the powerful serenity (not an oxymoron) of the music itself.

The album's cover illustration was borrowed from a 17th century allegory, "The Harmony of the Divine Creation"...the perfect title for any true act of musical invention, and in particular this small miracle of spiritual understatement. "Sic Ludit in Orbe Terrarum", reads the cover inscription, in part. In other words, Play it Loud.

It is not surprising that Peter M Hamel's musical route always stood closer to contemporary classic music songwriting than prog, any kind of it. Adopted here in PA in the electronic sub genre, does not change that fact a bit.

So "Transition" 1983, as guessed, has all the type of qualities and attributes, to be forgotten or underrated by the average prog audiophiles, who dig mostly unending repetitions of the same formulas with their respective preachers.

As mentioned, this work main proposals run in a different musical universe. Piano, pipe organ, PPG Wave and synthesizers conform the instrumentation, but soloing fast and slow micro-minimalism piano compositions are the frequent environment found, among an excellent electronic percussions song and a 20 minutes, obscure and massive, pipe-organ and organ composition.

Musical references for those interested in this small-masterpiece of an album are Claude Debussy, Steve Reich, Phillip Glass and of course another invited master figure here in PA, Terry Riley.

****4 "if you like contemporary classical music" PA stars.

Maybe also, a not so distant connection to Terry Riley's ideals and aesthetics in music composition ("Fire of Holy Eyes", track 4 is proof of it).

Michael Peter Hamel founder member of "Between" a Krautrock 70's band, kind of got his way out of the average "prog" scene, due to his actual work with not exactly "rockers" or "proggers", John Cage could hardly be considered neither.

In short, "HAMEL", 1972, has everything in terms of proposals in musical language. Some are true to the progressive electronic spirit (his own of course), others are more inclined to Cage's sonic experimentations with unorthodox approaches and intervention of their acoustic instruments. (eg: the use of the acoustic guitar's body as a percussion instrument.). Others are slow minimalistic "drone-like" pieces, which as Riley's music, also project a more "spiritual" cadence with enticing and mysterious musical lines.

Rich and sober, original in its variety of musical ideas and true to its own musical quest, this project has stood the test of time, by sounding in this 2014, fresh as new.

What else is needed to become an "essential" Progressive Electronic lost jewel? For electronic proggers only.

****4 PA stars+my review.