‘How to breathe like a stone’ is the third release from the ongoing collaboration between Dutch, ambient and experimental guitarist Anne Chris Bakker and British, minimal pianist Andrew Heath. Their work charts a slow moving, lower case journey inspired by place and process. Combining tonal washes and textural recordings, punctuated by pointillist piano and guitar notes to produce music that creates an ephemeral, dreamlike state.

Previous releases have been on Chihei Hatakeyama’s small Japanese label, White Paddy Mountain (Lichtzin) and the English, tape cassette label, Rusted Tone Recordings (A Gift for the Ephemerist).
Having been aware of each other’s music, Chris and Andrew finally met when Andrew invited Chris to play in the UK’s Resound festival several years ago. This cemented a friendship and mutual admiration of each other’s music. Various visits to both The Netherlands and the UK offered opportunities to record and improvise together before a file exchanging process followed, allowing their work to be edited and further refined.

Both artists are experienced performers and collaborators, with Andrew having played at Iceland’s Extreme Chill festival and working with Hans-Joachim Roedelius and Toby Marks; Chris Has performed with the trio Kleefstra/Bakker/Kleefstra, touring Europe and Japan.

How To Breathe Like A Stone utilises Chris’s mainstay, the guitar, often processed with a huge 20 second delay and placed alongside Andrew’s piano and electronic sounds. Two different church pianos were used for their natural tones, one recorded in Noordlaren and the other in the village of Sheepscombe. Additional textures derived from field recordings and reel to reel tape machines, providing a layer of subtle detail to complete the aesthetic. One of the more unusual recordings on the album was made at the Kröller Müller museum in The Netherlands in the large sculpture room. The sun outside was causing the building to emit various quiet creaks and clicks, amplified by the acoustics of the space. It was as if the weather had its own improvised response to the collaboration, creating further notable moments that became woven into this story of chance.

This album does not have a mapped out concept, more that it uses the artist’s evident love of process and improvisation as a springboard into their sound world. It is hoped that the listener will pause to absorb this environment, both contemplating and losing track of time.

releases March 20, 2021
Written and produced by Andrew Heath and Anne Chris Bakker
Art and Design by Andrew Heath

How To Breathe Like A Stone

wlr089 Andrew Heath & Anne Chris Bakker - How To Breathe Like A Stone

sleeping

This week Valencia was struck with horrific flooding - yet another tragedy in a landscape filled with bad news.

Valencia

🌌 SuperMassive 🌌

SuperMassive is a cosmic journey through expansive soundscapes inspired by the mysteries of the universe. Each track combines deep, resonant tones and ethereal melodies, evoking the awe and wonder of exploring vast celestial realms. Perfect for meditation, stargazing, or moments of deep reflection, SuperMassive invites you to lose yourself in the boundless beauty of space. ✨🌠

#SuperMassive #SpaceMusic #CosmicVibes #TranquilSoul #MeditationJourney #CelestialSounds #InnerPeace #ExpansiveSoundscapes #UniverseInspired #Serenity

Spiral

a song inspired by one of my favorite places, pillar point harbor in half moon bay, ca. play this one loud.

off of my split with paperbark on seil records. cassettes still available here - https://seilrecords.bandcamp.com/album/reasons-to-live

pillar point

Second collab with The Fade Beta, you can find their awesome music here:
https://soundcloud.com/thefadebeta
their track "Secret Window":
https://soundcloud.com/thefadebeta/secret-window
and their latest album:
https://thefadebeta.bandcamp.com/album/yesterdays-eden
always thank you my friends!

secret window

The Fade Beta - Secret Window (Dr. Crow, i presume? remix)

Shadow

Opening track for my new record - Expanding lands, that was released on 15th of March 2020 via secret press
https://secretpress.bandcamp.com/album/expanding-lands

This melancholically meditative track is combined of synths improvisation with tape processing.

https://blearmoon.bandcamp.com
https://instagram.com/blear_moon
https://facebook.com/blearmoon
https://youtube.com/blearmoon

Expanding lands

download on bandcamp

Blear Moon - Further discovery

itwasthewires : modular synth
Marco Lucchi : mellotron

14 maggio 2020

Bandcamp

itwasthewires & Marco Lucchi - Adagio for Mellotron and Modular synthesizer

track 8 from “On the Sorrow of Firn” by @Hilyard
https://hilyard.bandcamp.com/album/on-the-sorrow-of-firn

On the Sorrow of Firn

Hilyard - Neve

Simple experiments geared towards performance, these pieces were recorded using Monome mlr & Grid, Organelle/Orac, Montreal Assembly CT5, Chase Bliss Audio Mood, and Mutable Instruments' Rings & Clouds.

I hope you'll enjoy!!

Performed/Recorded by D.Harper 6/2020

Mastered by Porya Hatami
http://poryahatami.com/

Poppy botanical by Walter Müller, 1910

Seed

exploring many sides of electronic music as a producer and a listener