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Review by Beagle November 18, 2005 (7 of 7 found this review helpful)
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Two weeks ago, I had never heard of Gerd Zacher (and I had heard of 13,125 composers). So I was intrigued by the appearance on this site of a SACD of works by this complete unknown. I went to a vendor site with sound samples and became truly intrigued: this music was DIFFERENT. So, while ordering the Mendelssohn Quintets and Octet/Sextet, I tossed Zacher into the shopping cart as well. The 3 discs arrived together this Friday evening. With nothing else on the agenda but a shot of scotch and a leather recliner, I listened to a few minutes of the very familiar Octet, then a bit of Quints, just to satisfy myself that all was well there. But curiosity was building, to hear what this Zacher fellow had to say to the SACD world. Well, hey! I am very glad I threw his disc into the shopping cart, because I LIKE Zacher's music. It just happens to be played on an organ.
Zacher's music? "Mind-bending" is not an hyperbole but the succinct descriptive phrase. Zacher does things to your mind (and the hairs on the nape of your neck!). There are some utterly unheard of hybrid glissandi-plus-arpeggio-plus-powerchords (rockers take note). There are vast landscapes filled with a cold sigh; there are emphysemic bagpipes and floorboard-quivering thunder.... Oh yeah, the sound is TERRIFIC, probably the best sound in all my 85 SACDs. It's chocolate for the brain.
Who is Zacher? A German, he studied with Olivier Messiaen, who wrote heart-gladdening things about this pupil. Zacher is a bit Messiaenic (one thinks of Vingt Regards...), with a bit of John Cage thrown in, and some Arvo Pärt maybe -- a combination I would never have imagined. But, enough name-dropping already. Zacher is something else, something one might call an Audiophile, as in "Lover of Sound", because his music is dominated by overwhelming, subtle sound. It could be said that Zacher's music has been "waiting for SACD"; a marriage made in heaven, that.
This disc is a World Premiere Recording, leaving no doubt about which recording is "The definitive Zacher Disc"; this is it, recorded "in pure DSD", unquote. And the ideal interpreter? Surely Zacher himself.
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