windwaterphone, violin 17.3.2021

Words and image by Sarah Boulton. 

Written for Fenham Ensemble, director Simon Davies-Fidler and cellist Gabriel Waite and premiered 18th March, 2023 at St James' and St Basils', Newcastle.

Recorded and mixed by Jorge Boehringer.

Swan - Fenham Ensemble & Gabriel Waite

A tranquil piece I wrote.. trying to depict the night. 

Recorded at Windmill Lane mixed by Federico Truzzi

De Rerum Nocturna

Rooster SingingwiththeFox: voice, matthias boss: violin
february 24, 2019

the great henhouse concerto

[See below for English]
Escrita inicialmente para el Trío Apolo de Cochabamba, esta pieza es la primera de algo que a su debido tiempo se convertirá en una serie de Beethovenianas bolivianas. 

Se trata de propiciar un diálogo entre Beethoven y las tradiciones y prácticas del folclore boliviano. 

Naturalmente que esto no estaría ocurriendo si no fuera por el precedente inspirador de las Bachianas Brasileiras de Heitor Villa-Lobos, a quien, además de a Bolivia y a Beethoven, esta serie rinde homenaje.
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Written initially for Trío Apolo of Cochabamba, this piece is the first of something that in due course is intended to become a series of Beethovenianas Bolivianas. 

The intention is to propitiate a dialogue between Beethoven and traditions and practices of Bolivian folk music. 

Naturally this would not be happening were it not for the inspirational precedent of Heitor Villa-Lobos's Bachianas Brasileiras. This new piece pays homage to him, as well as to Bolivia and to Beethoven.

Beethovenianas bolivianas No 1

Giorgio Bianchi - Fragment

Giorgio Bianchi - In A Quiet Place

An old tape from my father's collection of nature and science magazines, processed through the compass script  https://llllllll.co/t/compass/25192, running on Fates, a diy clone of monome norns.

Le voci e i canti degli uccelli

This is track one from our EP called Crossing Over - Hope you like it.

The NRC - New River Train

an improvisation between me and Stefan Ostersjo on a giant "tree-guitar" in the woods outside of Morpeth - a very slow start, listening to the distant sounds gradually coming into focus. An old guitar is wedged into the branch of a tree, and then fishing line strings stretched from the tuning heads about fifteen to twenty feet, around the trunk of a nearby oak tree. I am mostly playing the long strings with a stem of dry nettle (the brittle stinging hairs, when dry, act rather like horsehair), and Stefan is playing the strings as they pass over the guitar neck. A hazel branch serves as a mobile bridge/whammy bar. I should also say that we are also improvising with the environment itself, being influenced by external sounds, which at two points in the music include the delicate percussion of icy pellets of snow falling on the guitar body, and (if you listen closely) the strings too. These moments really capture the exquisite stillness when the poise of the environmental sounds - the wind and the snow - seem to offer us the gift of holding back the flow of time for a few moments.  

Bennett Hogg and Stefan Ostersjo - a gift of wind and snow

A different mix of our song Dragon Hills (A Wistful Reminiscence of Longed for Landscapes) on the latest volume of Cold Spring's John Barleycorn Reborn series.  The version on the CD was recorded and realised in the dark days of lockdown in April 2020; this version presents Rachel's original unedited voice & guitar take to which Sean adds an ostinato on the bass synth (taken from the Cioconna of Marcello's Sonata #12, op. 2) and glissando guitar.

All hills are Dragon Hills.  August 11th 2020

Words & Music : Venereum Arvum / Sean & Rachel. 2020

Image : Colmers Hill, Dorset, May 2017.

Bennett Hogg and Stefan Ostersjo - a gift of wind and snow

bennetthogg

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