The level of pure athleticism required to play the violin reveals the pained rock faces of the classic rock axe-slingers to be a dramatic ruse. The touch it takes to make an electric guitar sing is unbelievably light, and there’s a strap to hold it in place. Violinists (and violists and string bassists, for that matter) not only must hold a not-insignificantly heavy wooden body up for an extended period of time, they also have to maintain a steady bowing arm and pivot carefully to maintain control of the sound. Composer and violinist Sarah Neufeld — a career-long touring and recording member of Arcade Fire — delivers her fair share of grimaces in the band’s energetic live show, and she’s clearly earning them.
In her compositions as a solo artist, the relentless physicality of her technique is part of the listening experience, and immediately central to its appeal. In the short pieces that make up Neufeld’s latest album The Ridge, the sound of her bow moving frenetically back and forth across the bridge of her violin often settles into a blur. There is a sharp contradiction between the gossamer blocks of sound we hear, and the limber, near-constant motion that makes them possible. Neufeld presses down on the strings to create a whistle-like harmonic that surges in between notes and chords; it’s the violin equivalent of the otherworldly-sounding tones her comrade-in-arms Colin Stetson (who appears here playing lyricon) favors in his sax playing. Reverb and delay effects enhance the atmospheric effect of Neufeld’s playing, creating moments where sound seems to be coming from another room.
While Neufeld’s previous solo outing Hero Brother daringly explored the overlap between classical minimalism and regional American fiddling techniques, The Ridge’s musical vocabulary is more familiar and less transportive. It starts unconvincingly with the title track, a piece of high-dramatic "chamber rock" which recalls the Arcade Fire-related instrumental unit Bell Orchestre in which Neufeld participated in during the '00s. Wringing out a few unsurprising chords for maximal self-importance, it’s a propulsive, amelodic piece which seems like it could work better on traditional rock instruments, or with a denser ensemble.
Neufeld largely avoids linear melodies — her feathery, very intermittent vocals add little in this regard — in favor of rhythmic cells in the Philip Glass tradition. Often, with the help of effects, these are reduced to synthetic-sounding pulsations. Like a good several-times-removed disciple of the minimalists, her writing is best when it revels in contradictory rhythms overlaid on top of each other -- when complexity is more of a focal point. The appealing, fractured Afrobeat cadence of "We’ve Got a Lot" gradually falls together like gears locking into place, and the explosive pizzicato of "The Glow" experiment with unsteady meter changes.
Though compositionally The Ridge feels less exploratory than Neufield’s previous work, it is still a moving document of her engaging, virtuosic playing. It’s hard to make strings-based, indie-rock-tinged instrumental music in this vein sound fresh. But as in her past work, Neufeld’s focused, restless recordings invite the listener to share in the intensity of her ritual as a performer, creating a necessary and refreshing air of intimacy.
