A very special session with cellist Emily Burridge yesterday – focused and with a lot of depth – sometimes fragile and at others intense. She very much inhabited the sonic world being created on this album and developed some fascinating conversations with Kevin, John and Simon.
Worked again with bassist Simon Edwards on Sunday – always a great pleasure. He brought along a huge array of instruments to the session including a Guitarron (Mexican six stringed bass), Marimbula (a giant thumb piano), Ngoni (from the kora family), bass harmonica and a baritone ukulele, as well as his electric bass. His playing was exquisite.
For this album I am creating sensory environments in the studio for the musicians to play within. This is producing some very focused and inspiring performances.
Image is of Simon’s Ngoni.
The new album, working title ‘The Conversations’, is developing well. Spent the other day recording double bassist John Edwards who improvised completely ‘blind’ to the piano recordings. Amazing mastery of his instrument – switching seamlessly between bowing and plucking. Now editing that material and preparing for next sessions – more bass and then cello. The image is of John’s very well loved double bass.
Paul Tingen’s interview with Philip Clemo is now on the biography page (first item) or on Paul’s site at www.tingen.org/clemo.htm. Paul, who writes for Sound on Sound amongst other publications, is best known for his book Miles Beyond: The Electric Explorations of Miles Davis, 1967-1991.
Work continues on the new album. Yesterday Phill Brown, Kevin Pollard and myself were back in Yellowfish Studios in Sussex, England recording piano. We spent a lot of time finding the ‘bite point’ of the keys on the Bechstein Grand and how quietly Kevin could play it. Beautiful material came out of it – quite hypnotic. Back with Phill recording John Edwards on double bass in a month’s time.
NOTE: TURN THE HD BUTTON ON (TOP RIGHT OF MONITOR) TO WATCH IN HIGH DEFINITION.
Aurora Borealis (The Northern Lights) – shot in northern Norway in February 2010. This is the first time this material has been available on-line. The grainy quality of the footage is due to the extreme difficulty of capturing this phenomenon on camera. We saw this display on the first night we were there – in the mountains a long drive north east of Tromso, and around an hour’s snow mobile ride from the nearest habitation. Then there was nothing more for the rest of the trip but that one night was amazing. It had been -42c a week before we arrived but only dropped to around -20c when we were there.
The soundscape is from atmospheres that came from The Rooms sessions.
You can now watch the 6 min. trailer for the non verbal feature film Breath here. More info. about the project, which is currently in development, is on the Film page.
NOTE: TURN THE HD BUTTON ON (TOP RIGHT OF MONITOR) TO WATCH IN HIGH DEFINITION.
Will be back in the recording studio in October with Phill Brown engineering and Kevin Pollard at the piano. The beginnings of a new album. The last one explored spaces in ‘The Rooms’ and this one starts off with some ‘characters’.
New images from a pilot being put together prior to the Cannes Film Festival.
Just back from a filming trip in northern Norway. Filmed the Aurora Borealis (Northern Lights) on the first night. An amazing display of dancing ripples of colour across the sky. All part of the ongoing ‘The Air Holds Still’ project.
Off to Berlin Film Festival (Berlinale) on Sunday.
