Built out of a short extract from an improvisation between @stellato-strings (violin) and myself (piano) there's some Audacity pitch change going on and I'm keeping this week's @naviar-records Haiku Challenge as sparse as possible, with organ stop shifting and very low growling Garageband string ensemble. The picture is from a sunset this week in Margate.

without a voice
the heron would disappear –
morning snow

Widely regarded as one of the most important female haiku poets, Fukuda Chiyo-ni was a Japanese poet of the Edo period. She started writing haiku early in her childhood and was strongly influenced by Basho’s poetry (probably because her teachers were his students).

The fundamentals in Basho’s poetry include: sabi (detached loneliness), wabi (poverty of spirit), hosomi (slenderness, sparseness), shiori (tenderness), sokkyo (spontaneity), makoto (sincerity), fuga (elegance), karumi (simplicity), kyakkan byosha (objectivity), and shiZen to hitotsu ni naru (oneness with nature). Fukuda Chiyo-ni was particularly interested in the latter, since most of her poetry deals with the realm of nature.

Seven days to make music in response to the assigned haiku: to participate visit https://www.naviarrecords.com/about/naviar-haiku

Deadline: 26th October 2022

haiku by Fukuda Chiyo-ni http://haikukan.city.hakusan.ishikawa.jp/english/about/index.html

morning snow (naviarhaiku459)

This piece was created from materials created by a recorded improvisation of @stellato-strings playing violin and me on the piano. It's this week's response to the @naviar-records weekly Haiku challenge:

Icarus
the pelican hovers
mid flight

We discovered Kimberly’s writings on Twitter. If you find the haiku we chose inspiring, make sure you explore her Twitter profile for more evocative poems.

“I am blessed to live by the sea. This informs a lot of my ‘ku. I also try to write honestly about my struggles with depression. Not sure how successful I am on that topic. It’s hard. The nature poems come easier. I began writing haiku about four years ago. I try to write daily, giving myself Sundays & holidays off. ‘Ku is a kind of discipline for me—much like a daily walk or yoga practice. Haiku quite simply saved my life.”

Seven days to make music in response to the assigned haiku: to participate visit https://www.naviarrecords.com/about/naviar-haiku

Deadline: 16th November 2022

haiku by Kimberly A. Horning https://twitter.com/everydaydeath12

the photograph was taken by me in Holborn this morning.

Icarus (Naviar 462)

This week's response to the @naviar-records haiku challenge is a cut from the improvisation session I did with @stellato-strings a few weeks back. It really is the gift that keeps on giving. This a live excerpt, no editing or adding. 

the fall
of memory
leaves
Jim Young [haigo – Oyoguhito] is an old poet writing from his beach hut on the Gower peninsula, Wales, UK.

Seven days to make music in response to the assigned haiku: to participate visit https://www.naviarrecords.com/about/naviar-haiku

Deadline: 23rd November 2022

haiku by Jim Young https://haikueye.blogspot.com

I took the picture on a walk southside of the river opposite the Houses of Parliament a few days ago at sunset.

The Fall (naviarhaiku463)

Coming up, I've got my first piano commission to write (thanks @drakemusicscotland). Had been thinking I have to explore range and dynamics of the piano but increasingly, with the @naviar-records prompts I've been aiming for simplicity and space inbetween.

Here's this week's prompt that closes today:

Lost in tranquil seas
Where spring feels melancholy
Another sunset

Gary Clarke joined a social media platform to raise awareness about an infrastructure issue in his local area by creating a website at Whaligoe Eye in August, 2021. During this time, he stumbled across a poetry and writing community which provided support and encouragement for his creativity.
 
Living right on the coastline in the Highlands of Scotland provides Gary with plenty of inspiration for his poetic endeavours, and through moments of sunrise and sunset gracing the North Sea it proves to be a motivational muse.
Seven days to make music in response to the assigned haiku: to participate visit https://www.naviarrecords.com/about/naviar-haiku

Deadline: 3rd May 2023

haiku by Gary Clarke https://whaligoeeye.co.uk/

lost in tranquil seas (naviarhaiku486)

In responding to this week's @naviar-records haiku challenge, I was exploring the live loops capabilties of Logic Pro. hHere I am taking nine tiny sample slices of improvising with @stellato-strings and slooooowing it right down to five.

Here's information about this week's prompt:

in dream world
was I laughing at a turtle?
winter seclusion

Among the four great masters of Japanese haiku, Kobayashi Issa was the most prolific: during his lifetime he wrote over 20,000 haiku, hundreds of tanka, and several haibun. If you want to find out more about this prolific author I suggest you check out this database of his haiku.

From the Haiku Guy website:

“Perhaps Issa’s dream is symbolic. Like a turtle, he is hunkered inside his shell (hut), waiting out the harsh winter weather. Or, William Nicholas offers a different interpretation, noting that the turtle is linked with good luck and longevity in Japan. In 1812 Issa was still a bachelor; he married two years later. At this point in his life he longed for the good luck of marriage and family life, hence the dream turtle’s teasing laughter?”

Seven days to make music in response to the assigned haiku: to participate visit https://www.naviarrecords.com/about/naviar-haiku

Deadline: 17th May 2023

haiku by Kobayashi Issa https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/kobayashi-issa

picture by Todd Trapani https://unsplash.com/photos/ymEcUhbjCrI

in dream world (naviarhaiku488)

I saw organist Frédéric Blondy play Éliane Radigue's first work for organ, 'Occam Ocean XXV' at the Union Chapel, Islington in 2018, it was an incredible piece to hear played live. That performance and piece inspired me for an earlier Disquiet Junto (https://soundcloud.com/leonclowes/kept-an-octave-apart-disquiet0564) and this one too (https://soundcloud.com/leonclowes/disquiet0554).

So it was a delight to strip this back even further this week. Playing just the note F I recorded and panned this same note five times using the cinematic preset Still Moment on Logic Pro X, slowly manually adjusting the filter, filter gate, panner and harmonics for 111 bars at a 120 tempo. While it's all about the magic numbers (111) for me, I heard a glitch at just under 30 seconds in when I saved the track as a WAV file and opened it up on Audacity to add in a fade in and fade out (I don't know how to do that yet on Logic... tiny steps self training...)

More on this 595th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Filter Progression (The Assignment: Make music by processing a static sound), at: https://disquiet.com/0595/

About the Disquiet Junto: https://disquiet.com/junto/

Subscribe to project announcements: https://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/

Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co: https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0595-filter-progression/

Filter Progression (disquiet0595)

Uncannily I had been working on this piece this morning using the harmonics from piano chords I'd played and recorded a while back. I'm exploring and teaching myself how to compose usimg the editing and effects of the Logic Pro X multiverses. I'd been drawn to soft quiet sounds and was using delays and echoes to create subtle patterns that play off one another.

I was halfway through this and then @disquiet Marc sent this email prompt out saying this ...

"Step 1: The underlying idea is to produce music that, so to speak, listens to itself. This would be music that employs techniques to revisit itself — repurposes itself — as it proceeds. From reverb to echo to tape loops to granular synthesis to accessing a buffer, various techniques serve such a compositional and performance purpose. Consider a means to achieve this result."

... which was exaclty what I was doing anyway. I must be psychic.

More on this 611th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Music That Listens to Itself (The Assignment: Record a piece of music that repurposes itself as it proceeds), at: https://disquiet.com/0611/

Some of the music resulting from this project may be included in a September 29, 2023, event at the Berkeley Alembic in Berkeley, California: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/expanded-listening-music-that-listens-to-itself-tickets-712124101357

About the Disquiet Junto: https://disquiet.com/junto/

Subscribe to project announcements: https://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/

Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co: https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0611-music-that-listens-to-itself/

Music Itself Listens To (disquiet0611)

I took some of @kate-gallaher's recorder loops from yesterday to make this response to the @naviar-records weekly haiku. 

Here's the details about this week's challenge:

'Disappearing
snow on mountain peak
unfurls a rainbow'

Sôen Nakagawa was a key figure in the transmission of Zen Buddhism from Japan to the Western world. Author Sean Murphy, in his “One Bird, One Stone: 108 Contemporary Zen Stories”, tells us an interesting story about the Zen Buddhist master during his time in the U.S.:

“Soen loved to walk around New York City. He’d stare at the lighted skyscrapers, at their tops, he claimed he saw Buddha figures in the lights. “Look at the Buddha,” he’d point, “Shining Buddha!” He’d fill the sleeves of his robes with nuts and berries from Central Park or herbs growing in the sidewalk cracks, and add them to his bowl at the next meal. He loved the musical Fiddler on the Roof, and when asked a question about why some particular point of ceremony needed to be performed in a certain way, he might burst into song, responding “Tradition…!”

Seven days to make music in response to the assigned haiku: to participate visit https://www.naviarrecords.com/about/naviar-haiku
 

Deadline: 11th October 2023

A cut up of the Haiku poem by John Hinks is used for the title https://soundcloud.com/flownblue

excerpt of picture used here is from Joe Hu https://unsplash.com/photos/ZXaCeb7rwfE

Disappearing On Mountain (naviarhaiku509)

For this week's @disquiet challenge I returned to the use of field recordings that I'd mash together to create sound-based pieces when I got back into creative practice during lockdown in 2020. I was recording bird song this weekend, and by accident I'd switched the Zoom recorder on in my pocket when I got back to @kate-gallaher's house, so there's a speeded up version of me going through the door and making coffee that runs throughout all echoed up. I've taken fragments of @stellato-strings trying the looping machine alongside some of the bird and stream sounds I had taken that morning. So the piece becomes like entering a 5D portal of exterior and interior worlds, mixing up how I started making artworks and blending this with the editing composition practice I started developing first using Audacity, and now on Logic with all the big spangly effects 'n fings.

More on this 614th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Alternate Route (The Assignment: Do something you often do, but differently), at: https://disquiet.com/0614/

About the Disquiet Junto: https://disquiet.com/junto/

Subscribe to project announcements: https://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/

Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co: https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0614-alternate-route/

loopy delay (disquiet0614)

In the second part of the three week @disquiet Junto Project, I took @triermusic's Ableton Live track of street musicians and added three Logic Pro X bass. I panned Nate's track halfway left and my basses to the middle of the right and kept the tempo of 81bpm.

More on the 637th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Right (2 of 3) — The Assignment: Record the second third of an eventual trio — at https://disquiet.com/0637/

Right 2of3 Disquiet0637- with Nate Trier

Using slowed down fragments of recordings of pedalled piano notes, @stellato-strings touching her violin with the bow, a creaking piano stool and ticking clock, I created this piece using loops and effects on Ableton Live.

It's my contribution to this week's @naviar-records haiku prompt.

The title 'along' is taken from this haiku poem by Takashi Matsumoto:

'Flowing along
changing its colors
a soap bubble.'

Takashi Matsumoto was a Japanese poet originally from Tokyo. Born into a family deeply interested in nō theater, he also devoted himself to it in his youth until 1921, when he came into contact with Hototogisu magazine and haiku poetry. Beginning the following year, Matsumoto became a student of Takahama Kyoshi. In 1946, he launched the magazine Fue 笛 ('The Flute').

The image is from a fraction of a picture by Rodion Kutsaiev.

For more information about @naviar-records and the weekly haiku challenges please visit: http://www.naviarrecords.com/about/naviar-haiku

along (naviarhaiku533)

A few months back using a Zoom mic I recorded @kate-gallaher playing recorders in the nearby woods to her home. Many birds were around us singing. This piece, 'spoke no' takes a short rhythmic fragment that she improvised which I compressed slowed down on Logic. I used echo and reverb to build rhythm and dictate paste, and then created new pitches through Ableton, combining this with the layers already created on Logic. This is the first time I've use Logic and Ableton to work on one piece.

This piece is a response to this week's @naviar-records weekly haiku challenge. Here's the information about that:

they spoke no words
the visitor, the host
and the white chrysanthemum

For this week's challenge, I picked another poem by Ōshima.

Ōshima Ryōta was a Japanese poet of the Edo period. Some sources say he was a disciple of Yosa Buson, while others say his master was Hattori Ransetsu. He's mostly remembered for his essay “Bashō ku kai” 芭蕉句解 ('Study of Bashō's haiku') published in 1759, a magnum opus of his studies and literary theories on Matsuo Bashō's work.

Haiku by Ōshima Ryōta
Picture by Ioann-Mark Kuznietsov

Submission deadline: 28th August 2024

spoke no (naviarhaiku555)

In 1987 I first got my hands on a polyphonic (Elka) synth and with a Roland Boss drum machine and a Tascam Porta One, wrote and recorded my first synth pop song, 'A Love Divine'.

After re-recording this in 2022, musician @ashgre asked to remix it. Much more than that, they reworked it! I'm absolutely delighted with this 80s 12 inch-stylee revisit, thank you Ash :))

Ash also made the image art based on this photo: https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-arm-with-tattoo-holding-apple-20088223/

A Love Divine - the AshG Rework

This is my response to this week's @naviar-records haiku challenge https://www.naviarrecords.com/haiku-music-challenge/

one by (naviarhaiku578)

This is my response to this week's @naviar-records haiku challenge, which you can find more information on here: https://www.naviarrecords.com/naviarhaiku579-mount-asama/.

The haiku this week is by Yosa Buson:

Mount Asama
amidst its fumes and ash
fresh young leaves!

The image used is a portion of a picture by Wyxina Tresse.

fresh (naviarhaiku579)

In response to this week's @disquiet projetc, using six Alchemy presets on Logic Pro X I tried to capture that brief moment after dreaming upon awakening. More on the 684th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Early Bird — The Assignment: Record not so much an alarm as a guided wakening — at https://disquiet.com/0684/

early bird (disquiet0684)

using 20 resonance tones I recorded on a toy piano and acoustic guitar, I've responded to this week's @naviar-haiku music challenge, of which you can find details about here: https://www.naviarrecords.com/haiku-music-challenge/

quiescence!
touching not the blossoms,
temple bell's voice

Kawakami Fuhaku was a tea master and the founder of the Edosenke, a school of tea ceremony. He was also an accomplished haiku poet.

Haiku by Fuhaku

Extract of picture by Ming Han Low

bell's voice (naviarhaiku580)

As @disquiet's project landed in my inbox I'd been working on ideas for a sound design I'm developing for a live artist's performance next month. That I was using percussion (Ultrabeat on Logic Pro X) fitted with the pick up sticks game, and I'd been playing with panning via automation, which also felt a good fit with the deft art of manoeuvring the sticks in the game.

More on the 685th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Pick-Me-Up — The Assignment: Treat a set of sounds like a game of pick up sticks — at https://disquiet.com/0685/

Pick-Me-Up (disquiet0685)

This is my response to this week's @naviar-records haiku challenge:

"plunging my hand
into the lake...
billowing clouds"

Among the four great masters of Japanese haiku, Kobayashi Issa (1763-1828) was the most prolific: during his lifetime he wrote over 20,000 haiku, hundreds of tanka, and several haibun.

Haiku by Kobayashi Issa
Extract of picture by Atsushi Tsubokura

Submission deadline: 26th February 2025

To find out more and participate, visit https://www.naviarrecords.com/haiku-music-challenge/

billowing (naviarhaiku581)

Thinking about this week's @disquiet project, I drew on my daily meditation this morning. I took samples of wheels from Splice to represent the shape, length and cycle of breath.

More on the 686th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Catch Your Breath — The Assignment: Listen to yourself inhale and exhale; make music from what you sense — at https://disquiet.com/0686/

oldface (disquiet0686)

Thinking about the differences between the “behavioral” and the “physiological” music making activites as instructed in this week's @disquiet project (see more on the 687th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Applied Science — The Assignment: Record a piece of music that includes physiological and behavioral techniques — at https://disquiet.com/0687/) I made an instinctual first take riff on the 70s modular synth in Alchemy on Logic Pro, in response to the synth's rhythm, then layered this pattern in tracks knowing it would phase and create new rhythms inbetween.

The appliance of science (disquiet0687)

This is my response to this week's @naviar-records haiku music challenge.

"here and there
upon scorched fields
wild violets"

Arii Shokyu-Ni was a haiku poetess during the Edo period who began a wandering life after running away from her husband at 29 with the haiku poet Kohaku. Just like Matsuo Basho, "the Nun Shokyu" traveled to the Deep North of Japan.
 

Haiku by Arii Shokyu-Ni

Extract of a picture by A C

here (naviarhaiku582)

In response to this week's @disquiet project, I picked this road sign I saw in central London. I'm working on a sound track for a live artist's performance work, and while I've still got much to do, this morning I completed the final piece of the work, which is what you hear here.

More on the 688th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Sign Up — The Assignment: Interpret a routine public sign as a musical instruction — at https://disquiet.com/0688/

The End (disquiet0688)

I'm working on sound design for a performance and installation by zack mennell at Dadafest in Liverpool next week. This is one of my favourites, and it fits well with this week's @naviar-records haiku challenge:

"out of the blue
of early morning light:
a paulownia leaf"

Ōshima Ryōta was a Japanese poet of the Edo period. Some sources say he was a disciple of Yosa Buson, while others say his master was Hattori Ransetsu. He's mostly remembered for his essay “Bashō ku kai” 芭蕉句解 ('Study of Bashō's haiku') published in 1759, a magnum opus of his studies and literary theories on Matsuo Bashō's work.

Haiku by Ōshima Ryōta

Extract of picture by Thomas Kinto

Submission deadline: 12th March 2025

To find out more and participate, visit https://www.naviarrecords.com/haiku-music-challenge/

out (naviar583)

This week's @disquiet project aligned with a couple of pieces that I've created for the sound design for a live art performance by zack mennell that's taking place this weekend: https://www.dadafest.co.uk/event/ddfi40-rage-reactor, this one in particular.

The basic ingredients of this are the tapping and sounds I generate when using my laptop, including some unintentional vocal breath sounds. Further, my daytimes are often disrupted by drilling that is taking place in the shop near to my flat, so the intention was to include these 'unsupporting players' too.

Through Ableton, these sounds were all slowed down and various effects were added and this piece was generated through playing a live set which I then tweaked until I was happy with the result.

More on the 689th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Supporting Players — The Assignment: Elevate the presence of your non-instrument equipment — at https://disquiet.com/0689/

Supporting Players (disquiet0689)

This week's response to the @naviar-records haiku challenge uses elements of sound design I've created for zack mennell's "Rage Reactor" performance installation which they will be realising in Liverpool's Dadafest this week: https://www.dadafest.co.uk/event/ddfi40-rage-reactor

"heaven and earth:
neither exists apart from
snow fluttering down"

Kajiwara Hashin was born in 1864 and studied under Kyoshi. Although Hashin is not very well-known as a poet, this particular haiku that he wrote is quite popular worldwide: it was first translated by Miyamori Asataro and later by R. H. Blyth.

Haiku by Kajiwara Hashin

Extract of picture by Simon Berger

Submission deadline: 19th March 2025

To find out more and participate, visit https://www.naviarrecords.com/haiku-music-challenge/

neither snow (naviarhaiku584)

This track was created in response to this week's @naviar-records haiku challenge:

"fog dissolves to rain
- cool breezes clear the vista,
showing cloud-topped hills"
 
Raymond Cobley (@ray_cobley) is an experimental composer and regular participant in our Haiku challenge. Now retired, Raymond aims to explore the possibilities afforded by open-source software, which he uses exclusively for creating and editing both sounds & images. All his works are published ​under a Creative Commons licence, and free for anybody to download or remix.

haiku by Raymond Cobley
extract of picture by Inggrid Koe
 
Submission deadline: 2nd April 2025

To find out more and participate, visit https://www.naviarrecords.com/haiku-music-challenge/

showing (naviarhaiku586)

This track was in the first activation of zack mennell's "Rage Reactor" at DadaFest in Bluecoat Gallery, Liverpool, March 2025.

2. ACTIVATION 1 - nuclear circles 1

7. ACTIVATION 1 Coda

This track was in the second activation of zack mennell's "Rage Reactor" at DadaFest in Bluecoat Gallery, Liverpool, March 2025.

8. ACTIVATION 2 part 1

4. ACTIVATION 1 nuclear circles 2

This track was in the third activation of zack mennell's "Rage Reactor" at DadaFest in Bluecoat Gallery, Liverpool, March 2025.

19. ACTIVATION 3 part 3

9. ACTIVATION 2 nuclear circles 1

12. ACTIVATION 2 part 3

16. ACTIVATION 3 nuclear circles 1

6. ACTIVATION 1 nuclear circles 3

21. ACTIVATION 3 coda

18. ACTIVATION 3 session 3

I'm preparing a soundtrack to my residency shows at Volcano Theatre in Swansea this week and my response to the current @disquiet project might well be the transition music. Using samples of room ambience to bookend a series of looped pad chords, these fade in and out, overlapping.

More on the 696th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Chain of Layers — The Assignment: Make music change by altering its layers — at https://disquiet.com/0696/

leon clowes

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