As it grows increasingly apparent that humanity lacks the wherewithal to unify over the existential threat of climate change, my response has been to write music intended to evoke, in the hearts and minds of those who hear it, a comprehension that it is humanity's obligation to act as caretakers, rather than destroyers, of the life that surrounds us. This album includes three orchestral works from my Music for the Earth series.

GAIA’S LAMENT. In the background, music for violin and orchestra was playing for quite a while, but I didn’t quite muster the courage to embark on writing it down until recently. At the time I began to think seriously about writing a concerto for violin, the United Nations was in session and what, if anything, would come out of the climate change discussions was the hot topic of the day. The young activist Greta Thunberg had sailed to the U.S. on a solar powered sailing vessel and having been invited to speak before the assembled members, gave all of the adults in the room the thrashing they well deserved. With all of this going on, somehow a scene from the 1960 film of H.G. Wells “The Time Machine” kept coming to mind – a brief scene where he travels to the far, far distant future to arrive to find a dying earth, a huge red sun suspended on the horizon, and a desolate landscape nearly devoid of life.

It was with this somber vision that I set about writing music, filled with sorrow at what our species is doing to our only home, with little hope that we have the awareness, rationality or willingness to act as we must.

GAIA’S SONG.  A companion work to Gaia’s Lament, this bucolic music was nearing completion when the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change published its Sixth Assessment Report, Climate Change 2021. While reading the findings of the report was, unsurprisingly, deeply distressing, my vision for the earth which helped inform the writing of the music is the opposite. A vision for humanity that is built on hope rather than the reality of human nature, one where humans come to recognize our responsibilities as caretakers rather than destroyers of the earth and the living creatures with whom we share the planet. This is gentle music, intended to inspire a gentler approach to living.

Whatever anger or despair I feel at the realization that our species will prove, in all likelihood, incapable of taking the necessary actions to stave off environmental catastrophe in the coming decades, I laid those feelings aside when writing this song. Let Gaia sing, not a song of lament, but a song of peace and hope.

SEASON OF RAIN. A symphony in four movements, composed during a mostly rainy season. The music is also a rather somber reflection on the state of the world, as it becomes devastatingly apparent that climate change is a certainty and, at the same time, the rise of populist politics around the world makes it equally certain that humanity will not respond to the alarms.


Gaia's Lament (Andante)

A track about scrolling back to her...

Here are the lyrics:

I've been around for so long
dig in the ground 
it's time to go
Nothing that i'm afraid to lose 
there's noone who'll miss me

I felt that i was strong
i did not hold my tongue
I could not stand of being ignored
like i was not there

I know it's true, that all i do
trying to get a clue but i'm just 
crawling back to you

Another day is through
it's over and that's true
She is not coming back
and i don't want her to

Well it's late at night
and i'm returning home alone
Man, this is what you get
when you 're out of date
you're thrown away

I know it's true, that all i do
trying to get a clue but i'm just 
crawling back to you

So Long

Before You Were Real and Sugar Raffle

This movement is constantly shifting and discovering itself as it unfolds, so I didn’t assign a particular key center to this movement; it is like experiencing the world for the first time with fresh senses. It ends inconclusively, leading to the next movement.

String Trio, First Movement

I See Colour

Philippe Janin est l'auteur et l'interprète de cette chanson.

J’ai pris le grand virage 
Juste après le garage 
Ombragé de platanes 
Où les voitures en panne 
Attendent sagement 
Comme des vieux gréements 
Qu’un jour on les dépanne. 
Et puis j’ai remonté 
L’impasse des meuniers 
Témoin d’un temps passé 
Dont résonnent les âmes 
C’est la dernière trame de ce qui a été 

Comme je fais chaque fois 
Quand je passe par là 
Mais vous savez déjà 
Ce que je vous raconte 
Des rues en pente qui montent 
Et des trottoirs pas droits 
Ah non, vous savez pas ? 
Vous n’êtes jamais venus 
Flâner dans ma rue ? 
Alors, vous savez pas 
Par ici c’est chez moi 

Tout au fond de l’impasse 
J’ai poussé mon chemin 
Jusqu’au plus clandestin 
Des passages secrets 
Rejoignant la bâtisse 
Aux murs décrépis 
Qui servirent d’abri 
Aux frères à Jean Matisse 
De toit, y’en avait pas 
Il s’était envolé 
À la fin d’un été 
Comme se sont envolées 
Les traces du passé 

Et puis finalement 
Écartant la glycine 
Qui semblait orpheline, 
Comme livrée aux vents, 
J’ai retrouvé l’enfant 
Qui sommeillait en moi 
Ah non, vous savez pas ? 
Vous n’êtes jamais venus 
Flâner dans ma rue ? 
Alors, vous savez pas 
Par ici c’est chez moi

Comme je suis chaque fois 
Quand je passe par là.
Mais vous savez déjà 
Ce que je vous raconte … 
Des rues en pente qui montent 
Et des trottoirs pas droits 
Ah non, vous savez pas ? 
Vous n’êtes jamais venus 
Flâner dans ma rue ? 
Alors, vous savez pas 
Par ici c’est chez moi 
Vous n’êtes jamais venus 
Flâner dans ma rue ? 
Par ici c’est chez moi 

Par ici c'est chez moi (avec Philippe Janin)

Space In The Shade

Amsterdam

The composition of this piece came almost instantly and was the longest freestyle I have done so far. It definitely came from somewhere or someone. This was made for a very special someone, with love.

Danielle's journey

Discover more about this track and its story by checking out the playlist.
--
https://soundcloud.com/guiville/sets/old-friends
--
Way up there, where the air thins,
your shadow still climbs the sky,
a lantern burning in the frost,
a name I can’t remember right.

I send words like kites into silence,
they tangle in branches of cloud.
You are a constellation unpronounced,
a map I was never allowed.

The ground is heavy with absence,
stones hum with your old refrain,
I tried to follow the trembling wires,
but the signal dissolved in rain.

Way up there, you’re drifting farther,
a song the horizon stole.
I am earthbound, stitched to soil,
pulling threads from a tattered soul.

Way Up There

Always cool to participate in @cosmic-ratzzz funkin' with his guitar friend Torben Schmitt !
My part is the Sax - I love Hendrik's "angry" organ in this hot track !
Image by Hannibal Height from Pixabay

Lunatics 240 / dead fish funk / Schmitt - joerxworx & Ratzzz

Je suis surtout compositeur et parfois parolier.
Merci à tous les interprètes qui mettent si bien en voix mes musiques.
Les arrangements sont faits à partir du logiciel Band-in-a-Box.

Par ici c'est chez moi (avec Philippe Janin)

Christian Devienne

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