Wednesday, September 2, 2015

Solo gig What Was That?



What Was That?

I've been trying to recall the first sound I ever heard. It was probably before I was born. It may have been my mother's voice. In fact, for all of us, it may have been the sound of our mother's pulse. Prenatal words and music.

Anika’s heartbeat, in utero

This could explain why mankind seems to have an innate predilection for "the beat". The bloodstream speeds up and slows down, but in reasonable health it generally keeps good time.



This brings up the question of why other animals don't seem to have this predilection. For example, though it is common among humans, you don't find a lot of geese honking with a downbeat. Marsupials in waltz time; forget it.

Sound images generated by Born of Sounds
 Dave Williams



SOLO GIG


01.- CALL IT ANYTHING YOU WANT 

02.- CONCERNING ACCIDENTS 
10.- WHEN IT'S OUT OF OUR HANDS
11.- GLAD WE DIDN'T ORDER THE SPECIAL
12.- WORKING JUNG'S RIFF
13.- KNOW THE ENEMY
14.- THE MUTABLE FORM 

15.- CONCERNING INMORTALITY
16.- MACH NUMBERS
17.- CONDITIONALITIES OF QUIETUDE
18.- THEN AND NOW
19.- WHY NOT SNEEZE
20.- WE PASSED JUPITER and THEN HEADED NORTH
21.- PRODUCT PLACEMENT 
22.- COMING UNDER FIRE
23.- LONGEVITY OF THE UNPREDICTABLE
24.- Signal Intelligence

Based in a noted musician's decades of personal experiences, his book Solo Gig: Essential Curiosities in Musical Free Improvisation (CreateSpace  Independent Publishing Platform, 2011) examines some crucial and  far-reaching aspects of musical free  improvisation, with particular  regard to live performances.  In this  illustrated collection of  narrative essays, the author looks both into  and from inside this  uniquely paradoxical, challenging and rewarding way  of making music,  within the context of an inherently eccentric milieu. 

Available here. (U.S.A.) (Europe)