Flotation Device 2023-09-17 - Hildegard and her progeny

East meets West, Old meets New, and Hildegard the incorruptible meets Miles the incorrigible in this edition of Flotation Device. We begin by celebrating the feast day of Hildegard of Bingen, the famous Medieval composer, abbess and mystic, with one new and one classic recording of her magnum opus, Ordo Virtutum, as well as two contemporary works that use her music as a launchpad. KBCS-FM turns 50 this year, so we also revisit the September 1973 zeitgeist when our fledgling station coexisted with the densest, darkest period of Miles Davis’s career, the little-known sequel to Takemitsu’s November Steps, and a long-buried landmark of European minimalism that's just been retrieved from the vaults after half a century.

Plus, Elliott Sharp and Zafer Tawil mix oud and electric guitar. Lucas Niggli channels his inner John Zorn, and the Allochtone sextet finds a Francophone angle on Downtown improv. We close with a homage to Steve Roden and his remarkable practice of "lowercase music".