At Wigmore Hall in November, a solo piano recital by Vijay Iyer was like a set of rough clouds in a humid summer, breaking in brief, awesome moments. Hearing “Love in Exile” at the Barbican a few months earlier, the trio (Iyer, Arooj Aftab and Shahzad Ismaily) made a thick haze like a hot-warm drunkenness. Iyer’s music, something music journalists like to describe as cerebral, has a palpable sense of feel and feeling, particularly of late. It’s often complex music, emanating from complex bodies.
Iyer wrote his first piece for orchestra when he was 35. His first album of orchestral music, “Trouble,” was released on the BMop/sound label on June 11. We spoke on that day, as he was midway through a new piece for the Norfolk Chamber Music Festival in Connecticut, scored for Pierrot ensemble and percussion.
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