AMN Reviews: Haralabos [Harry] Stafylakis – Calibrating Friction (2023; New Amsterdam Records)

While another entry in the “classical music with heavy guitars” microgenre, Calibrating Friction by Harry Stafylakis is better thought of as chamber music. Admittedly, said chamber music includes distorted 8-string guitar as one of its instruments, rock-oriented drumming, and lively tempos. But the overall sound is more reminiscent of progressive rock groups Univers Zero and Present than either classical or metal.

Assisting Stafylakis in this endeavor are musicians from Bang On A Can All-Stars, Sirius Quartet, American Brass Quintet, Contemporaneous, and the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra. They contribute additional guitar as well as drums, percussion, piano, strings, horns, and reed instrumentation. The album runs 50 minutes, split roughly equally across 5 tracks.

There is a driving and cinematic quality to Stafylakis’s writing. Originally composed as chamber music, he reimagines these earlier pieces as a fusion with aggressive hard rock. Somehow, he manages to merge the nuance and complexity of their classical orientation with the looseness and groove of the latter.

Case in point, Flows Obsidian includes majestic string flourishes accompanied by power chords, interlocking rhythmic elements, jagged riffing and percussion with flute, piano, and strings, introspective quieter passages, and tasteful soloing. The writing and playing are tight without sounding stifling or forced.

Calibrating Friction will be released on September 15 by New Amsterdam Records. It is an album of the year candidate and deserves recognition as one of the more compelling amalgams of classical music and heavy metal in recent memory.