hidden paradise #3

This is a 5 minute preview of Yumi's full sound bath. To listen to it in full please  listen on Insight Timer. https://insig.ht/TqRtNZydNSb
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Yumi gives regular gong baths around Hong Kong. Her humorous and welcoming character complements the emotional sound baths that she performs. Yumi has practiced Reiki for many years and spends her time between Hong Kong and Japan with her family.

This was recorded at Ore Art in Sheung Wan. It was the first solo gong bath I had recorded and it blew me away. I had no idea a single gong could have so much power. Her symphonic gong is very musical with each hit creating a new layer of sound upon the last resulting in an overwhelming wave of sound that fills your mind. I felt new ideas and inspirations emerge perhaps because deep down that was what I was seeking. I would anticipate our future recordings as a time of creation and release.

In the middle of the recording, I had heard a unique sound inbetween the layers. She revealed that she sang into the gong with her voice. It was amazing how it became one with the sounds of gong softening it, making it more human.

Sound Bath Sessions

✨Listen to more here

Sound Bath 024- Yumi

As I entered her studio in Kwun Tong, she had two small groups of crystal bowls. “I have a surprise for you, see if you can hear it.” She said. The piece started with a very somber tone. I felt there was a yearning, a calling in the beginning. She slowly transitioned to the second group which was more hopeful, and lively. This session was interesting because there was a predetermined concept for the composition that allowing her to freely improvise within its own limits. Ana has a large collection of crystal bowls and intimately knows each one. She does have a passion for music and her approach to singing bowls was more personal, molding her own style by exploring and experimentation. Her studio is next to a highway and a large construction site in Kwun Tong which is softly heard through the window of her space.
More information here: http://www.sbsemergence.com

Emergence

sbsemergence.com

Sound Bath 059- Ana Chung

This was the final composition during the performance. After several weeks of making 'prepared' reels to perform, I finally showcased the instrument for the first time. 

The entire 'performance' improvised even the preparing of the reels. I recorded some of the recordings on reels then improvised re-recording them on other reels. I also spliced and re-spliced the reels many times during this process. This led to many interesting reverse sounds and short cuts.

Performance at Rockbund Museum

done using a Jupiter 8 and Boss effects unit.
Roland Is Boss

Thank You Mr. Kakehashi (Roland is Boss) Absolutely

ilia belorukov - alto saxophone
konstantin samolovov - selected drums, objects, radio

Ilia Belorukov & Konstantin Samolovov – live at Kuryokhin Center 2018-03-15

White Knight

Pre-order now available via Imprec.com 

No Date Tapes is the first official cassette release from Harry Bertoia's tape archive and it contains two of the longest recordings yet discovered, each over 30 minutes. This cassette is packaged in a gold shell and produced on super-ferro tape for incredible analog sound. First printing of 100 copies.

Both sessions on this cassette are sourced from a collection of Bertoia tapes that were found without dates. While it's unknown when these pieces were recorded, the artist's notes are included on the packaging so it's clear how he felt about these recordings. These pieces were selected, in part, because of the contrasting opinions Bertoia had for each session.

Side A was considered by the artist to be a "good performance" which was "rich in variety" and had "good structure and fine tonality." This particular tape has aged quite well and provides clear audio insights into the sonic territory that Bertoia pioneered. 

Side B provides a fascinating sonic contrast to side A. The artist's notes suggest that he was pleased with some tonalities but the composition was "not properly developed" and contained, in Bertoia's words, "too much music." 

It's our hope that by releasing pieces like this, paired with the artist's own notes, an attentive listener can gain insight into the processes that determined the outcome of the artist's work. What does Bertoia mean by "too much music?" What is the tonality being pursued? What type of compositional structure did he find to be appealing? 

These are some of the questions we're attempting to answer as we digitize and release the pioneering sonic sculpture of Harry Bertoia.

Bio: 

Harry Bertoia first gained some artistic visibility in the early 1940s, then came into prominence with his sculptural, ergonomic chairs, produced by Knoll Furniture beginning in 1952, which quickly became classics of modernist furniture. Inspired by the resonant sounds emanating from metals as he worked them and encouraged by his brother Oreste, whose passion was music, Harry restored a fieldstone "Pennsylvania Dutch" barn as the home for this experiment in sounding sculptures which he had begun in the late 1950s. Bertoia was an obsessive composer and relentless experimenter, often working late into the night and accumulating hundreds of tapes of his best performances; Oreste, too, would explore and record the sculptures' sounds during his annual visits to his brother's home in rural Pennsylvania.

Harry Bertoia's recently dismantled Sonambient barn collection was an attentive listener's paradise full of warm, expressive instruments that were gorgeous visually and audibly. Nothing could prepare you, even on return visits, for the overwhelming experience of entering the spacious wood and plaster interior where gongs, some of them giant, hung among the ranks of standing sculptures of various metals. Over nearly twenty years of adding, culling and rearranging, Bertoia carefully selected nearly 100 harmonious pieces ranging in height from under a foot to more than fifteen feet. He considered this barn a full experience, sights and sounds comprising not a collection of works, but one piece unto itself. It was here, deep in the woods, that his Sonambient recording work took place.

No Date Tapes

Harry Bertoia - No Date Tapes - Cassette C60 - Pre-Order

Bivouac Recording is a sound label based in Hong Kong.
Bivouac Recording是一个录音品牌且提供录音服务的公司，致力于推进独立现场录音项目。

For a richer experience of the field recordings and audio please read the descriptions for each track. 

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Thank you!

Performance at Rockbund Museum

Bivouac Recording

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