As time loses its meaning, the music of Morton Feldman gains new resonance

I’d listen to him at the gym to feel myself move through space while running in place.And now, as the days repeat with barely perceptible variations like one of Feldman’s figures, his music isn’t just lending form to time as it drifts by, it’s recalibrating my sense of scale. And I’m not alone.Cellist Stephen Marotto recently recorded Feldman’s 80-minute “Patterns in a Chromatic Field” (1981) with the pianist Marilyn Nonken for a forthcoming release on Mode; but before he did, he put a piece of tape over the clock on his iPad.“I strongly did not want to know what time was elapsing,” says Marotto on a recent Zoom, who compares performing Feldman to running a marathon — right down to the lactic acid buildup. Nonken compares the journey to a long hike that ends at a grand vista.“It’s like being one of the guys working on the pyramids or something,” says pianist Stephen Drury over the phone, who has performed “Patterns” as well as the nearly 90-minute solo piece by Feldman, “For Bunita Marcus.” “There’s this awareness that there’s something really significant and amazing and long-scale happening. Highly not recommended.)Divisive and daunting as it may sound and seem, Feldman’s music can provide a valuable escape for quarantined listeners — if not from the bounds of our apartments, than at least from the hours we spend in them.“His music has a healing capacity,” Marotto says.