Hunter Noack Releases Debut Album 'Hunter Noack-in a Landscape'

Hunter Noack, classical pianist, naturalist, and founder of the award-winning, groundbreaking wilderness concert series, IN A LANDSCAPE: Classical Music in the Wild™ has released his debut album on Heinz Records globally yesterday, Wednesday, June 8.

Noack's 2022 season of 55+ concerts in national parks, state parks, ranches, farms, and gardens across the Western United States also begins today. Tickets for many concerts are still available, though several have already sold out. More ticket details and a full list of this season's performances can be found here.

Noack and Heinz Records have also released the first official music video from the album, for the track "Kara Toprak (Black Earth)" composed by Turkish pianist and composer Fazil Say.

Noack grew up exploring, hunting, fishing, and kayaking the rivers of Oregon, forming a strong connection to nature. He started piano at age 4 and by the fifth grade he was up at 4am to light a fire and practice piano before taking the bus to school. After intensive training at Interlochen Arts Academy, San Francisco Conservatory, University of Southern California (B.M.), and Guildhall School of Music and Drama, London (M.A.), Noack returned to Oregon and founded IN A LANDSCAPE. Noack's partner, Thomas Lauderdale, pianist and bandleader of Pink Martini, says "IN A LANDSCAPE is the most exciting classical music project in America, hands down."

Noack, an occasional guest performer with Pink Martini, is inspired by the work of John Muir, who said we need "beauty as well as bread, places to play in and pray in, where nature may heal and give strength to body and soul" (John Muir, The Yosemite (1912)), and Frederick Law Olmsted, who believed our parks and public lands are our most democratic spaces. With music in magical landscapes, IN A LANDSCAPE brings together a wide cross-section of people who would otherwise rarely be sharing a concert experience together.

Cowboys, city folk, children, hipsters, and matrons flock from cities and deserts alike to hear Noack perform on a 9-foot Steinway grand piano on a flat-bed trailer. They sit with a picnic or wander through the landscape listening to classical music through wireless headphones.

Noack also collaborates with guest artists who are atypical of traditional classical concerts, including poets, Native American musicians, dancers, singers, and visual artists. IN A LANDSCAPE has won multiple awards and has been featured on CBS This Morning, in the Los Angeles Times, and as part of TEDxPortland.

After 7 years of performing outdoors, Noack's will celebrate the release of his debut album, also titled In a Landscape, today with a performance at the iconic Silver Falls State Park, as part of the 100th anniversary of Oregon State Parks.

The album features select favorites from the classical piano canon like Maurice Ravel's Ondine and Robert Schumann's Forest Scenes, as well as collaborations with Native American flutist James Edmund Greeley, psychedelic electronics by Dave Friedlander, a spacious movement from a Ravel piano concerto with the Salem Orchestra, and an arrangement of Franz Schubert's "Serenade" with Pink Martini's China Forbes and Thomas Lauderdale.

The album, which aims to transport listeners to the secret glens and sunny meadows that inspired the composers and performers featured in this contemplative collection, will be released on vinyl, CD and digital.

"The title track, "In a Landscape" by John Cage, inspired the name of the album and the concert series. Cage, like other post-war avant garde composers, challenged us to reconsider what 'music' is and asked us to consider all noise - and its absence - as music. My challenge is to reconsider the environment in which we experience art.

"While this album is conservative by Cage's standards, it may be scoffed at by purists because the flow of the album is intuitive, and I perform select movements instead of complete works. My education was demanding and conservative: hours of practice, goals of perfection, and high stakes competitions. I struggled with hypertension, tendonitis, and memory issues. But, after performing hundreds of concerts in the great outdoors, I can see how my playing has changed and become more intuitive. I am less nervous, a better listener, more flexible, and have more fun at the keyboard. I think that comes through in this album. It is imperfect, but it has heart and is representative of

where I am now, which I like. In a world of autotune and binary thinking, this album feels refreshing and organic. It is complex but not overwhelming.

"The selections are spacious and gorgeous... music that lends itself to daydreams. I think this album works as a playlist for a solitary walk in the forest or as an accompaniment to dinner. I wanted this record to be accessible, easy to listen to but not 'new age.'"

Listen to the new album here:

Watch the new music video here:

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