Antwerp-based Wim Henderickx directs the Hermes Ensemble in three of his own works, on the group’s own label. Nada Brahma is the third part of Henderickx’s Tantric Cycle, completed in 2010, which continues his fascination with eastern sound-worlds and philosophies. Earthly instruments vie with electronic sounds that represent the cosmos, while soprano Hendrickje van Kerckhove declaims and soars above in a kind of made-up pseudo-Sanskrit. The spiky syllables and hectoring repetitions of the faster movements can be numbing, yet the slower ones have a searching, many-layered quality that is genuinely beguiling. The Kerouac-inspired On the Road is a moody meditation for bass flute, performed by Karin de Fleyt. Atlantic Wall, at half an hour long, was written for performance alongside a video inspired by the wartime bunkers on the French coast; audio-only, with the almost wordless singer stark against the instrumental sound, it’s a curious mix of the meditative and the confrontational.
