This is music we believe in deeply. A collaboration between Jaron and Robert Dick, the king of experimental flute technique.
To buy a copy, email robert@robertdick.net or, for an intriguing retail purchase experience, visit Tribal Soundz at 340 e 6th in NYC.
The title refers to how sound is made in a wind instrument and also what's left of the WTC in my old neighborhood in NYC.
First broadcast: New Sounds, WNYC, with John Schaefer Monday, Nov 24, 2003.
Album release live event: Tuesday, Nov. 25, 2003; Joe's Pub, NYC.
Aramaic
All Night Blues is a trio in which Robert and I are joined
by Alan
Kushan, who sings in Aramaic and plays a special santur (Persian
hammer
dulcimer)
he built that has extra bass strings and other innovations. I'm
playing
an Andromeda synth keyboard, as well as the percussion, which I
overdubbed
after the initial session. This track introduces some of Robert's
many sounds: He sings through the flute in his first phrase, plays
through
a weird distorting toy megaphone in the second, and then uses a
headjoint
with a buzzing membrane, as is found in the Chinese di-tse, in
the
third phrase. Of course this is all in the service of expressing
a wobbly New Orleans matron confronting alien gipsy hoodlums, but that
should be obvious. If you listen carefully, you'll notice that
there are sheets of overlapping rhythms instead of one single dominant
beat. This idea comes from Nancarrow.
Perelandra is
a duet for contrabass flute in G and Gu Zheng (a Chinese harp.)
Charge
of
the Luminous
Brigade is another trio with Alan Kushan on santur.
I'm
playing the khaen, a Laotian mouth organ.
What's
on my Mind? is a duet for Clavichord and flute.
The vocal part is Robert speaking through the flute as he plays.
Andalusian Fog
has me on Oud and Robert on contrabass flute.
Sliding Botticelli is a duet for flute and pipe organ- no overdubs. The flute is tricked out with Robert's "whammy bar" glissando headjoint. The organ was made out of pipes and other parts salvaged from 19th century Boston pipe organs.
After the Dust started out as a duet for flute and baritone 12 string guitar. Robert overdubbed some extra flute parts and I added percussion, oud, the clarinets, and everything else. All the instruments I played were damaged in the attack on the World Trade Center (my old studio was a little too nearby). This was recorded fairly soon after we were allowed back into the area- thus the title.
Contrarians
is for contrabass flute and contrabassoon. This is the token
"difficult" track that should appeal to giant wind instrument
fetishists.
Lullaby in
Glass is for flute and Glass Harmonica.
If you want to play or use any of this stuff
commercially
or play or display it publicly, please contact me by
email:
jaron at well dot com