Using a Laos field recording from the Hmong Village as a stating point, “stars rain sun moon” came to life seemingly all on its own. Reminding me of happiness and the joyous sounds of summer, like the The Great Gatsby quote by F. Scott Fitzgerald: “And so with the sunshine and the great bursts of leaves growing on the trees, just as things grow in fast movies, I had that familiar conviction that life was beginning over again with the summer.” The title of this piece comes from an E. E. Cummings poem, which says it all:

“anyone lived in a pretty how town
(with up so floating many bells down)
spring summer autumn winter
he sang his didn't he danced his did

Women and men(both little and small)
cared for anyone not at all
they sowed their isn't they reaped their same
sun moon stars rain

children guessed(but only a few
and down they forgot as up they grew
autumn winter spring summer)
that noone loved him more by more

when by now and tree by leaf
she laughed his joy she cried his grief
bird by snow and stir by still
anyone's any was all to her

someones married their everyones
laughed their cryings and did their dance
(sleep wake hope and then)they
said their nevers they slept their dream

stars rain sun moon
(and only the snow can begin to explain
how children are apt to forget to remember
with up so floating many bells down)

one day anyone died i guess
(and noone stooped to kiss his face)
busy folk buried them side by side
little by little and was by was

all by all and deep by deep
and more by more they dream their sleep
noone and anyone earth by april
wish by spirit and if by yes.

Women and men (both dong and ding
summer autumn winter spring
reaped their sowing and went their came
sun moon stars rain”

― E. E. Cummings

Stars Rain Sun Moon

Shortwave Transmissions Project - Cities + Memory

“Across the Ether” features a ham radio recording (from The Shortwave Radio Archive) made in 1974 with the operator from the Argentine Antarctica Station. This radio contact conversation was the inspiration for this electronic piece, because it really brings to life the personal aspects of history. It has a timeless quality about it that allows the listener to drift along with the shortwave transmissions. This project really does help us understand that all of humanity is truly out there to be listened to at the turn of a dial.

Across The Ether

“The Bridge of Sighs” is a new piece for the Cities + Memory Italy Project.
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“The Bridge of Sighs” was composed featuring a field recording from the Bridge of Sighs Fondamenta della Canonica in Venice Italy. The Bridge of Sighs (Ponte dei Sospiri) was built in the year 1600 and connects the Doge's Palace to the historic prison across the canal. Prisoners that were tried in Venice were initially held in the underground prison chambers inside the Doge's Palace. As the number of prisoners grew, the prison was expanded to a building across the canal named the New Prison, and the Bridge of Sighs was constructed to shuttle passengers directly from their trial into their cells. According to legend, the name of the bridge comes from the sighs of prisoners who crossed the bridge on the way to their prison cells or the execution chamber, catching their last glimpses of Venice through the tiny windows. The arched bridge isn’t open air like many of the bridges in the city, there are just two small rectangular windows with a lattice-like screen. Inside, a stone wall divides the interior into two narrow hallways, so prisoners who were entering and leaving could never cross paths.
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I was interested in the idea of creating sounds from repairing not just the bridge, but in a larger context, reflections of what the prisoners experienced as they saw this last view. Hopefully my piece “The Bridge of Sighs” helps the listener consider for just a few minutes what it might have been like to see such beauty before being imprisoned underground. I do think that sound can reveal a history all of its own if one listens closely enough. Enjoy.

Bridge Of Sighs

The Romans had a phrase: solvitur ambulando, meaning ‘it is solved by walking’. 

VIDEO - https://vimeo.com/772196697

Solvitur Ambulando

All this had always been and he had never seen it; he was never present. Now he was present and belonged to it. Through his eyes he saw light and shadows; through his mind he was aware of moon and stars.

— Herman Hesse, Siddhartha

Moon Shadow

Cities + Memories: Obsolete Sounds Project

I was drawn to the mathematical precision of the sample “Calculating Machine”, using it as the foundation for my reimagined composition “Algebra applies to the clouds”. I pictured the disappearing sound floating away into into the clouds as they reflect in a calm lake. A fitting farewell to a soon to be extinct sound. The sound may no longer be common in todays urban world, but it goes on to live another life somewhere, somehow. Composing the layered tracks, I used mathematical patterns, created in the moment, that opened up the possibility of chance to hopefully capture the beauty of this calculated randomness . Like all of my music, this was a sound experiment without preconceived intentions. It can also be looped to create a soundtrack for ones imagination. Close your eyes, listen and float away.

Algebra Applies To The Clouds

Cities + Memory: Spring Project
I was attracted to the field recording from Hanoi, Vietnam of an old French wall clock playing the Westminster chimes because of the immediate surreal quality it had for me. Different levels of different cultures and places embedded into such a simple sound. So I wanted to express that surreal quality in my springtime composition. I was also thinking about the Lotus flower, the national flower of Vietnam. It is known as the flower of the dawn: a symbol of purity, commitment and optimism for the future. At night the flower closes and sinks underwater and rises and opens again at dawn. I thought the field recording of the chimes had this sinking and rising quality, along with the underlying multi-cultural origins. My hope was to express these feelings through my composition. So here is “Hanoi Blossom,” my slightly surreal take on springtime in Hanoi.

Hanoi Blossom

This was created for the Cities & Memory project - Music for Sleep. I reimagined a field recording of folk songs being sung by old men at a cafe in Malta. This was my starting point for opening up memories of tranquillity, gently leading one to rest and sleep. My approach of spoken word combined with ambient textures and calming electronic patterns lure ones thoughts to take a back seat to total relaxation and sleep. I was inspired by a recent visit with my 11 month old granddaughter, watching her drift when she was tired. I imagined deep relaxing sounds that would would aid her travels into slumberland. Just by watching her eyes slowly close, my sonic approach became clear. Close your eyes, listen, relax and sleep.

Malta Lullaby

La Mer Gelée (The Frozen Sea)

This was created for the Cities & Memory Autumn Project. I used a field recording from a frozen beach (Munkkiniemi Beach) in Helsinki, Finland. I was immediately drawn to the the idea of sound coming from ice crystals that literally touch the sea. My head filled with ideas for reimagining these frozen sounds into music. I was focused on glitching sounds, using fragments of electronic and minimal acoustic tones along side the original field recording. I was seeking to find the beauty of a frozen world within a microsound environment. Not mechanical, but an organic world containing interferences and errors that reveal harmonic undertones from the natural world. Enjoy!

La Mer Gelée

Ümlaut is Jeff Düngfelder, a U.S. experimental composer/sound artist now based in the northern Connecticut countryside. The thematic concepts distinguishing his work are absence and silence; the ineffable exchange between viewer and image; random moments of stillness within a landscape in flux. Using a minimalistic, electro-acoustic approach, his elusive patchwork of field recordings and electronics merge the world of shadows and colours. His memory recordings expose the complex relationship between music and silence. 

In addition to his solo recordings as Ümlaut, Jeff Düngfelder mixes his own electronica with downtempo and jazz elements as a member of Intelligent Life, the trio that equally features Mike Brown on contrabass, and Joshua Trinidad on trumpet.

Ümlaut

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