Glass Bell

A semi-minimalistic improv, built around a repeating rhythmic pattern.

I think I successfully managed to make toy piano even creepier than it normally is.

INSTRUMENTATION

Timbill: Toy Piano, Javanese Hand Drum, M-Audio Oxygen8 w/ Alesis QSR (Eno Pad)
Tréteque: Baritone Sax
Pheatherwäit: Stylophone, Bass Flute, Flute

• play
• pause
• min volume
• max volume

posted by askmeaboutLOOM (3 comments total)

The mood of the bari sax, upon its entrance, was unexpected: injecting a curiously jarring humor into the proceedings, which previously (until that big horn charged into the room like a rhino on speed, wearing a party hat and a spinning bow tie) had held the promise of something darker and more somber. Then the sprightly flute (at first reminiscent of Romantic pastoral drift and shimmer) quickly sizes up the room and shifts into some kind of tres tres Moderne-ism, weaving its way flirtatiously around the gregarious bari, now hanging around the punchbowl telling off-color jokes. They converse, they chat, they wink and giggle. Then comes a moment of repose and introspection, the stillness and emergent unfolding melody through minute four or so. An elegant, stately moment. But then... whoa! That bari explodes in raucous honking and screaming! Red in the face, that bow tie's twirling like a pinwheel now! He doesn't care whose toes he steps on! But, as though suddenly aware that he's making an ass of himself, he drops right back down again into the quieter mood. "Quiet" is not his true nature, though, so then what does that crazy horn do? He starts pounding the wall! Knock knock knock knock knock! Bang bang bang bang bang! Will his incessant primal pulse be acknowledged by the ever-increasing din of the party, now veering dangerously out of control? Or will his persistent thudding be drowned out and carved up by those crazy knife-edged reverse delays? Aha! He's joined by the whole party! But, then, what? The knocking stops! And suddenly, as if hiding from the Jazz Police, everyone falls quiet: the lights are turned out, and the party comes to a rapid close.

And so, another little chapter in the Story of Organized Noise is written. Goodnight, all.
posted by flapjax at midnite at 7:55 PM on January 15, 2010 [2 favorites]

Bravo, flapjax. I'm always glad when our improvs are able to conjure such vivid imagery in a listener's mind.

The Story of Organized Noise...Well, I dunno if it's intentionally organized, but that would certainly make a helluva title for the next Demons of Gyrophonia album. We are only two weeks away from RPM2010, after all. I'm excited!
posted by askmeaboutLOOM at 10:50 PM on January 15, 2010

Glad to provide you with a potential album title LOOM. I was just expanding on Edgard Varèse's definition of music as "organized sound".
posted by flapjax at midnite at 2:04 AM on January 16, 2010