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Towerlig tema
reed flute
- a haunting melody, a contemplative call to take in the beauty of sundown
Seisoene
reed flute
- watching the change of the seasons, the the last warm days of summer, or a quiet, misty dawn just
before winter
Allah akbar
penny whistle
- based on an Arabic chant, repeating the musical melody with a phrase proclaiming 'God is great'
Production note on the above recordings:
these are simply compositional sketches, pre-production recordings made on the p/c
November 2002
Tall trees; temple grounds (full version)
(sample)
Recorded and mixed 12 April 2003 at home on p/c. The unusual time signature on a West African jembe drum (created by an unorthodox and laborious loop) juxtaposes with the complete freedom of an unplanned and improvised first take on the flute. The drone is a few heavily treated notes on the bass string of an acoustic guitar. The bells gave it a kin dof a Zen/temple feel, hence the title - i imagined the other worldliness of a solitary walk in a forest of trees of the beautiful grounds of the Zen temple - an auster, meditative place with the stillness, a hypnotic calm of disciplined temple life.
I recorded this piece during a walk in the remote mountain forrest behind the place where I work. It was a gorgeous late summer day, I had an hour free between teaching classes, and wanted to meditate somewhere on my own. I walked a way along an unused road winding along the tall pines, and sat down in a clearing cushioned by their needles. I looked up at the tall trees, dark brown against the pale orange forrest floor, green tops still against the blue sky, and closed my eyes, just feeling the trees. Instead of quietly meditating a melody came into my head, and I started singing it. I had recently seen 'Heroes', the follow-up to 'Crouching tiger, hidden dragon', and its visual images, all those flying people, lakes and forests and mountains, and the soundtrack music was very much on my mind. I wanted to record the melody before I lose it; and took out my almost brand new little Power Book, opened up the recording studio and sang into the mike. I was so impressed with being able to record there and then that I wanted to do more. I love multi-tracking on a home studio; one can add layers and layers of sound without worrying about studio time or feeling self-conscious about how off-beat some of the parts may sound in stand-alone form. So I added an ohm here, a bass drone there, and a sort of throat singing I was experimenting with at the time. Each track added more noise of course; bees, birds, an airplane, and, the fan of the computer, picked up directly from the mike build into its casing. It felt really great though. Later when I listened back to it at home I was disappointed by the noise interference, but excited by the possibility of putting down song sketches on the laptop, anywhere, anytime, especially in beautiful, inspiring locations. And I loved the melody, and the sound I got on the singing-melody. Sometimes I just love the feel of a certain take, and though I thought I would re-record the piece with proper microphones and a sound-desk sometime later, I also thought I would not get that exact same sound again - all creative moments are unique. Since then winter has come and gone, and I never made time for the recording. Almost a year later I sat down at the kitchen table, opened up the multi-track session for a re-mix. With the help of little plug-inn earphones I reduced as much of the noise as I could without losing the space in the sound, tweaked a big as possible natural sound, mixed it all together, all in under an hour. Only problem was that the songs sounds rather sad than uplifiting - spiritual yearning I guess. 9 October 2005.
complete piece (5 min 54 sec / 2,776 KB)
Recorded at Sunset Studios in 1996 for a SABC soundtrack for a documentry on poet Sinclair Bates
a short sample of the melody
cello by Stefan Grove
the middle vocal section
voice by Birgit Otterman, piano by Zigrum Paschke
Triest
- a simple composition, done on an early 1970's keyboard
Three guitarists - Rob Bolton, Winton Palmer and Johann Kotze, a once-off gig project.
Hear the practice jams recorded.
Use the index to other mp3's.