Ostinato Press · Copenhagen & Montréal

Ostinato
a score for reading

A quarterly of new music, field recording and the strange craft of notation — printed on paper that remembers the pencil.

Andante con moto — ♩ = 72 · four movements, thirty-one bars

Begin the score

Vol. IV  ·  No. 2  ·  Op. 142  ·  Spring

Incipit — click a notehead

pdolce

I. ContentsAllegro risoluto — the long reads

quattro battute · sempre legato

mp
Bar 01 · Feature

The Pencil Always Wins

Four engravers describe the moment a printed score gets overruled by a conductor's 2B. Notation is a proposal; rehearsal is the negotiation.

Craft Marta Vestergaard · 14 min
Bar 02 · Field

Six Rooms in Reykjavík

An impulse-response diary. What a swimming pool, a fish plant and a stairwell each do to a single struck triangle at 3 a.m.

Acoustics Jonas Þór Lund · 9 min
fmarcato
Bar 03 · Essay

Against the Metronome

Maelzel sold certainty and we bought it wholesale. A short polemic on rubato, breath, and the tyranny of the click track in the streaming era.

Opinion R. Okonkwo · 11 min
ff
Bar 04 · Investigation

The Missing Bar 47

For sixty years the Kaunas manuscript has been one bar short. We took it to three archives, a spectrometer and a very patient cellist.

Archive Ilse Brandt · 22 min

← swipe the staff →

II. Field NotesScherzando — short, fast, from the road

cinque battute · staccato, poco a poco cresc.

pp
Bar 05

Ferry, Hardanger

Diesel drone at 47 Hz, gulls a minor ninth above. The whole crossing sits on one unchanging pedal note.

poco
Bar 07

Night Tram, Line 7

Every set of points is a snare hit. We transcribed forty minutes and found a stubborn 5/8.

mf
Bar 08

Bell Foundry, Asten

A bell is tuned by removing metal until it apologises. The hum note is the one nobody hears on purpose.

f
Bar 09

Wind Farm at Dusk

Thirty blades, thirty phases, one enormous slow beating. Infrasound you feel in the sternum first.

← swipe the staff →

III. The EnsembleLargo — who plays this issue

tre battute · con sordino

tutti
Bar 10 · Voices
  • IMarta Vestergaard Engraver, Copenhagen
  • IIR. Okonkwo Critic & percussionist, Lagos
  • IIIJonas Þór Lund Field recordist, Reykjavík
  • IVIlse Brandt Archivist, Kaunas
psotto voce
Accompanying record: Ostinato IV.2 — 41 min, one side, cut at 45 rpm.
a tempo
Programme · live edition, Hall 2
TimeWorkForces
19:30Prelude for Tape & RoomFixed media
19:52Bar 47 (reconstruction)Cello, voice
20:15Hardanger PedalOctet
20:48Coda: Thirty BladesTutti

← swipe the staff →

IV. SubscribeMaestoso — four issues and a record each year

due battute · ritenuto al fine

mfrisoluto
Bar 30 · Join

Posted flat, never folded. Cancel at any double bar.

ppmorendo
Bar 31 · Libraries & schools

Institutional rates

Conservatoires, public libraries and community ensembles pay what they can, from €0. We ask only that the copies stay on open shelves and get written on.

No paywall Print + PDF Since 2016

← swipe the staff →