02/04/2026
Album: BALGWEGE 1 + 2
Artist: MOTUSNEU
release 3rd April 2026
digital
Bruno Angeloni
Steffen Deller
“Balgwege” is a technical term. It describes the movement of the bellows with which the accordionist produces the airflow. Musical processes and expression are (co-)determined and shaped by technical procedures. Pushing or pulling. The more precisely the player studies the movements of the bellows, the clearer their expression becomes; the deeper the music; the greater the sonic diversity and the larger the treasure of improvisational subtlety.
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The present album Balgwege is the third album overall by the Leipzig-based group MOTUSNEU and the second created in collaboration with guest musicians. Collaboration in changing line-ups is not limited here to a spontaneous first encounter, but is improvisationally developed through regular rehearsals and concerts. The result is now documented on this album.
Susanne Stock, a distinctive interpreter of contemporary composed chamber, orchestral, and solo music through her experimental curiosity and attention to detail, adds a harmonic layer to the former trio which, together with the other instruments, sometimes unfolds in cluster-like textures and sometimes in multiple intersecting lines. The pieces are freely improvised. The musicians take every freedom in sound production, from airflow to stroking to striking the instruments. Everything is part of their own language and is newly formulated and contextualized each time.
The work’s division into two parts is due to media progress. In a purely digital release, the moment of pause is missing—a pause that used to be predefined by the physical medium. Turning over the LP or inserting CD 2 no longer exists. For this reason, there are now Balgwege 1 and Balgwege 2, which form a whole but are not necessarily intended to be listened to in a single sitting.
