Fly free

This is the 1st track in the "Seven Dreams of the Orb Weaver" medley.  It serves as a prelude to the rest and for the subsequent track "Ocean Star" in particular.  (If you like this one, you might like listening to the whole medley in sequence--you can find it in the album section soundcloud.com/skai-eriksson/sets/seven-dreams-of-the-orb-weaver.)  I wrote this track after the others were finished.  The medley overall is rather dark and emotional, so in this prelude I aimed for something light, calm, and peaceful with just a hint at some of the later darker themes.  The impressionist-style waterfall just after the middle of the song is indeed Debussy-inspired (it is just a simple pentatonic pattern similar to ones that appear in plenty of songs, but for me this type of pentatonic run is iconic of Debussy's Arabesque).  I like how the 6/4 time signature gives a little extra space to elaborate on this riff, and I was pleased with how it sounds as a resolution to the cadence leading up to it.  While the song has a shifting tonal center, it is certainly not as tonally destabilized as Debussy's music, and this (along with the simplicity of the locomotive rhythm) affords an opportunity to prepare the listener for a climactic sense of arrival as the pentatonic run appears.   I wanted the middle section of the song to offset the minimalism that is present at the beginning and end of the song, and this Debussy-style riff serves as a nice centerpiece for that.

Ripples In Spacetime

Composer / piano and violin : kianoush koureshi

Out of my hands

Extremely grateful to have received the opportunity of some film mentoring via the Universal Hall Promotions 'In the Spotlight' professional mentoring programme. 

I wanted to make a music video, so I re-recorded the vocals from my 2021 version of this song to use as a soundtrack and this is the result - still a home recording. You can view the video on YouTube here: https://youtu.be/AnXY-S6ama4

TRAiN
Train, it's the way to go
Gets you there, without driving woe
Read a book, or watch the world glide by
Train, it's the way to go
Don't get stuck in no traffic jam
It's so easy, to go with the flow
Be wild, with your spare time
Have a little buffet, say a little rhyme

I'll tell you why you should take the train
It's going to save you hours of pain
Why get there grumpy, tired and bored
Why not snooze on the go?

Train, it's the way to see
Parts of the country, that you've never been to 
Find a map, and pick a place to see today
Train's the way to go
Travel express, or station to station more slowly
Night or day, a friendly guard is there
To smooth your way

Train it's the way to go
Gets you there with a happy glow
Why sit in that traffic jam pumping your hand on the horn?
Won't get you anywhere, except bored
Train, it's the place to be
For writing that essay
Or watching that show on TV
As the world passes by
Plug in your headphones, happy sigh

Choose train
Choose train
Choose train

© S Barr 2021

TRAiN

Guitar Dialogue(Guitar solo)

A song about the golden age of steam trains. 
A 4-Star Commended Entry in the 'Adult Contemporary' category of the UK Songwriting Contest 2023.

A train is waiting at the station, waiting to take you for a ride,
All you have to do is buy a ticket, where you're going to you decide,
Electric, diesel, inter-city express  ... and steam,
Electric, diesel, inter-city express  ... and steam,
Long time ago there was the steam age, I just about remember when that was,
Travelling with my mum on a steam train, looking back that now seems very odd,
Electric, diesel, inter-city express  ... and steam,
Electric, diesel, inter-city express  ... and steam,
You may recall the Flying Scotsman, it really was the train you couldn't beat,
Travelling up and down the west coast line, fireman generating steam and heat,
Electric, diesel, inter-city express  ... and steam,
Electric, diesel, inter-city express  ... and steam,
Riding on the Great Western Railway, it must have been quite a thrill,
Travelling through all the valleys, steaming up and down the hills,
Electric, diesel, inter-city express  ... and steam,
Electric, diesel, inter-city express  ... and steam,
They call that the golden age of steam, it's hard to do anything but agree
The trains back then caused much pollution, but they were so magnificent to see,
Electric, diesel, inter-city express  ... and steam,
Electric, diesel, inter-city express  ... and steam,
Now we have the modern trains to go on, buy your ticket on your mobile phone,
All the trains are usually quite fast now, taking people to and from their homes,
Electric, diesel, inter-city express  ... and steam,
Electric, diesel, inter-city express  ... and steam,
A train is waiting at the station, waiting to take you for a ride,
All you have to do is buy a ticket, where you're going to you decide,
Electric, diesel, inter-city express  ... and steam,
Electric, diesel, inter-city express  ... and steam,
Electric, diesel, inter-city express  ... and steam,
Electric, diesel, inter-city express  ... and steam,
Inter-city express, inter-city express.

Inter-City Express

Inter-City Express (Graham Williams)

Although quite simple to record, it took me a few weeks to write down a text and sing it over this beautiful guitar piece from Neno J. I used the original title as an inspiration for the text.

Circle of Circles 

Planets move in the dome of stars in surprising ways.
Sometimes forward, sometimes backward  in the celestial orb.

Since perfect circles are the only way of gods,
Ptolemy used circles within circles 
to explain those planetary retrogressions.
That was such a powerful idea 
that Fourier would later use.
Indeed, any periodic smooth motion
can be described by a large enough set of epicycles.

And yet, it all became history, 
thanks to Copernic, Kepler and Newton.
The epicycles were cast out from heaven
by the Occam's razor curse.
And I'm trying to learn the sobering lesson:
Everything gets simpler 
when we don't place ourselves in the center.

Your perfect circles, woman, are the chosen shape of gods.
But will the Fast Fourier Transform ever explain your beauty?

I watch you move in this world of scars in surprising ways.
But what is forward and what is backward in this oblivious maze?

Circle Of Circles JFC (Over Neno J. Guitar Piece)

Picture: Chopin concerto (Henryk Siemiradzki, 1843-1902)

Nocturne

OUT 22nd December 2023
Bandcamp and most streaming platforms. Links to follow. 
Full track will be posted soon. :) 

Lyrics: 

If we're not one then let's be water,
If we're not floating, we're not real.
I love your colour when you falter,
You're glowing sapphire in the steel. 

Step out your world and drape it around me,
I'll slide my arms through what's undone. 
We are the could and would and should be,
Where rivers blush under the sun.
~
And be that as it may, still, still,
There's something inexplicable 
In finding all of me could be all of you.

(Just for a while, don't speak and listen...)

I lost the girl in me but caught her,
Your boy was tired of everyone. 
They bound together in the water
And shimmered silver in the sun. 

Words & Music © Nic Evennett & Philip Dupuis, 2022.
Mastered by Adam Ellis ~ Deadline Studios

If We're Not One Then Let's Be Water

if we're not one then let's be water ~ Radio Version

This piece starts off from the repeating 4 notes of the 3rd movement from Beethoven's Tempest Sonata (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZRoZgmqlfso) but takes off in a much different direction with new melodies. The piece borrows from Beethoven only those repeating 4 notes and the figuration of the left hand... everything else being my own. Though the feeling is overtly Beethovian too (with all due distances, of course)... And do you sometimes hear echoes of the Für Elise? (To my ear, the Für Elise itself has echoes of the Tempest's 3rd movement, even in its opening theme.)

The title "After the Tempest" has double meaning. It "takes after" Beethoven's Tempest's 3rd movement. And it also represents the sunlight and freshness felt after a storm's atmospheric depression has passed. Triple meaning, actually, as we endure this terrible worldwide depression and wish for the day it will past us somehow...

Played by software, sorry...

The painting shown is by Thomas Cole (1836), entitled "The Oxbow" and represents an oxbow in the Delaware River after a passing storm. Beethoven's Tempest sonata was written 1801-1802 and Für Elise dates from 1810.

After The Tempest (#piano)

Is love an improvisation? In his modern piano composition "Love Story" American composer Geoffrey Kirk Caughey avoids clear structures and gives his music the free flow of melodic sounds.
More about Geoffrey here: http://movingclassics.tv/classicpeople/geoffrey-k-caughey/

Geoffrey Kirk Caughey -Love Story: Is there no love, in all this world for one whose heart is true?

Moving Classics TV is a popular platform for new piano music www.movingclassics.tv It is curated by a concert pianist and founder Anna Heller.

Geoffrey Kirk Caughey -Love Story: Is there no love, in all this world for one whose heart is true?

Moving Classics - New Piano Music

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