way out west

Soundscapes

I came across this blog/work of "sonic-artist" Phil Harding (ex member of the Mod band "The Scene"!)

phill harding is a freelance composer/soundartist based in the pennine hills of west yorkshire, england [uk]. much of phill’s current work involves the use of environmental field recordings—focusing on the sounds we usually ignore or filter out—to point out the beauty in the mundane.  this blog is phill’s attempt to document his daily life.

many of these tracks were recorded binaurally—ie with tiny microphones placed in the ears, and are intended for playback over headphones only. listened to via headphones, binaural recordings tend to have excellent spatial properties, reproducing the way we actually hear, so playback feels [aurally, anyway] much as it actually felt to be in the space recorded. playback over speakers is not the best way to appreciate such recordings.  other pieces here were made using more traditional recording methods, and will sound fine over speakers or headphones.

Interesting

Technorati Tags: Art: Media: Music: Sound: Web 2.0

Terry Callier and Massive Attack

Terry Callier has been a favourite of mine for some years... one of my Greenbelt highlights was lying on my back listening to Callier play in the early hours of the morning a few years back... dream like and wonderful!  The guy's a legend and he has a new Album out "Hidden Conversations" on which heo collaborates with Massive Attack including several tracks written by Robert Del Naja including the brilliant track "Live with Me"... which if I recall correctly was released as a single a few months back! 

The Album is on Mr Bongo Records, Amazon and already available on Spotify

Technorati Tags: Music

Bored with Worship?

I never know whether it's worth bothering re-posting a link from Jonny Baker - I mean doesn't everyone read his blog anyway?!  But this is interestingt - an article from Musicademy.com... funny how things come around, but it seems even some of those most aligned with "Praise and Worship" culture are realising that something isn't right!  They respond to an interview with Joel Edwards (Evangelical Alliance) where he says...

There is something about the charismatic movement which brought something new and fresh. It came out of something new God was doing.

I am thirsty for something new again. I have to confess to you that mostly on a Sunday morning I am bored! And I wonder if one of the reasons why people are not singing is because they too are bored.

It may be a good thing to discover what you would write down if you spent two months noting what songs are sung on a Sunday morning. I cannot believe that so much of our repertoire has become so narrow. So predictable. That the formation of what we do on a Sunday is so utterly predictable. And I think to myself, how come the God who has formed the constellations and put the stars in place and has a new idea every second, doesn’t have something new for us for a Sunday morning? I wonder whether he might not be vaguely bored too.

They identify 6 problems and possible solutions (below) - this is a great conversation IMHO but it also sticks in the throat a little when you remember some of the criticism aimed those asking these questions 20 years ago... but, hey!

Problem – Predictable, Consumerist
Possible solution – Indigenous Creativity

Problem – Narrow Aims
Possible solution – Rediscover different ‘Movements’ of Worship

Problem – Lost connection with humanity
Possible solution – Multi-sensory

Problem – Inward Looking
Possible solution – Outward Looking

Mark Brewer's comment is encouraging...

As a musician I am more worried about the state of the church than I am about the state of christian music. Unfortunately God is asking his people to wake up and smell the coffee rather than sleepwalking through our maintainance schedules as we currently seem to be doing. Music springs from our culture. Same old springs from same old.Vibrant new expressions of musical worship will spring from vibrant new expressions of church. Relevant songs spring from relevant incarnation. A church that only invites people to join what they are doing rather than going into all the world is a poor image of Christ.

Technorati Tags: alt.worship: Christianity: Church: Culture: Worship

Isle of Wight Didge Heaven!?

We are in the wonderful Isle of Wight this summer - visiting one of our supporting Churches (Holy Trinity - Bembridge) who have kindly arranged for us to have a week in a bungalow belonging to a Church Member - how nice is that!  There's so much to see and do on the Island - including the DidgHeadRadio Didgeridoo Music Festival

Welcome to the first DidgHeadRadio International Music Festival to be held on the Isle of Wight
The week-end will showcase performers who represent the best of contemporary didgeridoo playing from the UK, Australia, Hungary, Ukraine, Czech Republic, Portugal, Italy, France, Germany and Croatia... As well as the didgeridoo there will be many other instruments heard at the festival including the jaw harp, drums of various kinds, flutes and throat singing.

£15 for a day ticket!  It's a no-brainer! :-D

Technorati Tags: Church: Culture: Music

Songs of Water

Thanks so much to lovefiercely for this music recommendation (on the sank•tuary forum)... songs of water experimental/folk/dance from deep in the North Carolina woods... kind of "hip-hillbilly"
 

North Carolina-based group Songs of Water has emerged from the South East with a sound both ancient and modern in an inventive fusion. This six piece sextet, composed primarily of instrumental music, harbors a wide variety of cultural and stylistic influences. The uncommon use of the Appalachian folk instrument, the hammered dulcimer, melodically leads many of the group’s pieces, followed by the resonance of various acoustic instruments and a brooding foundation of heavy percussion.

I have to say I love... it has resonances of the Afro-Celt-Sound System and Sigur Ros but completely different at the same time... swirling, piercing, deep, entrancing, awesome.  You have to go have a listen!

Technorati Tags: Music

Creative resources

Jonny just e-mailed me to say that Neil Haydock from www.prayerscapes.com had been in touch to say that they had produced a Dance Video based on the Francis Drake Prayer we use inour ST Brendan Meditation... You Tube Video below

Turns out they have some great video resources in high quality for next to no money... well worth a visit!

Technorati Tags: alt.worship: Art: Celtic: Christianity: Culture: Emerging Church: Music: Poetry: Prayer: Spirituality: St Brendan: Video: Worship

Festive tunes

We’re getting all christmasy tonight at sank•tuary... so the music is all coming from “The Reindeer Room” series… with mixes by the likes of Jon Kennedy, dj Trax, Tetsumi Nagaka and Billy Paul Williams... some quality Christmas chill-out! (Check out Zigo's "Sleigh Ride" on Vol 1 and Cortex Cure's "I wonder as I wander" on Vol 2)

The Reindeer Room (Vol 1) (follow the links for the subsequent volumes)

Technorati Tags: Music: Sanktuary

Sank•tuary update

The first night went well... we certainly enjoyed ourselves and the response we got was good, though of course there are many things we need to work on to get "right".

The set up and staff briefing went well and we where ready to open in plenty of time. It wasn’t heaving but we made a good start. All of those who came in asked when we would be open again and told us that they wanted to come back, all said they valued the facility and wanted to see it continue. Special mention for the Kitchen team (Tam, Bev and Kate) who produced superb Smoothies, Flap-jacks and Brownies amongst other things!

The Police, Environmental Health and the Safer Communities partnership came through for us… providing us, amongst other things, with a Radio which meant we could speak directly with the mobile Police unit and the Officers posted outside both Pussycats and the Station. We where even visited by a Council members including one high ranking cabinet member and of course our regular Radio 4 producer/journalist!

A number of Team members also spent some time outside the gates of Pussycats talking to clubbers, Police and Door staff - something we want to develop - Anne and I where invited into Pussycats by the head of the Door Staff to visit the VIP lounge and to have a chat with the Club Owner, which we did… unfortunately, though invited we didn’t feel we could stay and join the party! The opening night closed at 3.30am when the Police came to tell us it had all gone quite and to collect the Radio

Many lessons learned and much work to do!  To keep abreast of the sank•tuary project visit the blog/website including regular chill-out/ambient music recommendations & links.

Technorati Tags: Culture: Emerging Church: Entrepreneurship: Mission: Missional

Love is Concrete

Todd Fadel has launched 'Love is Concrete' - a kind of art, activism, creative network on Ning... worth checking out... and to tempt you further they have a free download of the Welcome Wagons album (produced and featuring Sufjan Stevens)...

The debut album by The Welcome Wagon unveils a ramshackle sing-a-long enterprise of a Presbyterian pastor (the Rev. Vito Aiuto) and his wife (Monique) wrestling out the influences of folk music, religion, popular culture, and church tradition in a collection of songs that is as soulful as it is good-humored. This gorgeous brew is reflected in the group's repertoire, which unflinchingly consolidates a vast history of "sacred" song traditions: from Old Testament psalms, to Presbyterian Psalters of the 17th century, to iconoclastic pop innovators of the 1960s (The Velvet Underground), to charismatic Catholics of the 1970s (Lenny Smith), and into the melancholy lovelorn pop of the 1980s (The Smiths). There are even a few originals. Armed with a particleboard parlor guitar and a plastic glockenspiel, pastor and wife stumble their way through an arresting catalog of hymns-hallowed and unholy-with the simple desire to know their Maker-and to know each other-more intimately. The result-due, in part, to producer/arranger Sufjan Stevens-is an awe-inspiring collection of hymns, pop covers, and originals that render soulful stunts from quiet skirmishes of home recordings.

The CD Times review...

Digging deep into the vast and rich ore of American Gospel and Spirituals, the Welcome Wagon have produced a unique nugget of musical brilliance, mixing blues riffs, horn blasts, and lush orchestral arrangements into an album full of surprises. The two members of the Welcome Wagon are married couple Vito and Monique Aiuto who with America's musical wunderkind, Sufjan Stevens, have been recording songs together over near a decade and are only now releasing them as an album.

The material itself is unashamedly spiritual material, in a similar vein to Sufjan's own Seven Swans, but that should not put anyone off buying the album. Quite far from being pious but boring renditions of traditional hymns, each arrangement appears to be a heartfelt exploration of the lyrics. A few covers also appear such as Lou Reed's Jesus and the Smiths, Half a person as well as Danielson's Sold... (mp3 here). Surprisingly, these renditions work admirably well with a Tori Amos like knack to make the covers their own. Sincerity can only take you so far but the Aiutos' sense of decorum crossed with a large dose of self-deprecation avoids the pitfalls that beckons any project of this kind.

Songs like "But For You Who Fear My Name" or "Unless the Lord the house shall build" conjure up the majesty of sacred music with the Mammas and Pappas flair for pop harmony. Although Sufjanesque is not (yet) an adjective, it most certainly applies to this release. His fingerprints are all over the production from his trademark soft voices to the choral harmonies and intricate arrangements. Despite this, his presence does not drown out the unique personality of the Aiutos. Their musical style may be unlikely to find a mainstream audience, but this remains a deft record that manages to remain honest, genuine and appealing without submerging itself in schmaltz. A complete nightmare to market I would imagine but a delight to listen to.

Technorati Tags: America: Art: Culture: Music: Christianity: Web 2.0

O come O come Emmanuel (9)

Our first Table in Advent... we're going to use Proost's superb "9" over the next three weeks... 9 readings and "carols" (for only £9!) from some of the most creative voices in the Alt.Worship world including Jonny Baker, Doug Gaye, Jon Birch, Juli Allen, Harronell (Laurence and Beth Keith), Cheryl Lawrie, Mike Emmett, Andi Mac and some tall thin bloke who lives way up north on some treeless isle! unfortunately one of the tracks (No. 3) "O come O come Emmanuel" by Pádraig Twomey is not available till tomorrow so Sufjan Stevens has had to come off the bench with his version of "O come O come Emmanuel" from his Songs for Christmas Album... not a bad substitute though - what a brilliant and beautiful track!

Technorati Tags: Advent: alt.worship: Anglican Church: Bible: Proost: Spirituality: Worship