With Being and Time, Norman Yamada presents a recording of his occasional compositions. The album opens with excerpt one of the title track, which is a piece that utilizes text from Martin Heidegger's book of the same name. The next piece, "One, Two, Three," is an interesting vehicle for contrabass, and was composed in 1994 for bassist Sebastian Steinberg. Chris Lightcap fills Steinberg's role for this 1998 recording, playing the single-note strums framed by percussion, background organ action, and guitar. "Deterioration #1" was commissioned by the Czech new-music ensemble AGON Orchestra. For this piece, Yamada drew inspiration from the experimental techniques of composers of other AGON recordings, including Rudolf Komorous and Anestis Logothetis. The next composition finds Yamada conducting Lightcap, guitarist Marc Ribot, Christine Bard and Jim Pugliese of EasSide Percussion, and more. The album closes with another brief excerpt from "Being and Time." Overall, the compositions aren't particularly engaging, making Being and Time one of the more insubstantial releases in the Tzadik catalog.
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