Concurrents
CONCURRENTS
Concurrents is a derivative of the Current 4 recordings recorded in Feb 2018 and is presented here as a standalone piece due to its original nature.
The instruments are …the Indian Tamboura drone and the Suntar.
The Suntar is an original instrument which came to me through a series of realizations over a few decades.
Suntar means “Strings of the Sun”!
The Suntar resembles a guitar as it has six strings but it is fretless in that way it resembles the Indian Sarod but with the addition of the Sitar buzz bridge which makes the Suntar a true hybrid.
The various sitar or sarod timbres and other varying sounds it produces arise and fall away according to the way and the velocity it is plucked and where in the range one plays.
Concurrents is a version of the Currents compositions which is “concurring” and occurring with and within the subtle Currents of the presence we share. Wither a phrase is stated, unstated or even if it is a reversal of the original intention, still this is how a conversation of interplay becomes interestingly approachable and acts as a magnet for more interaction…
This interaction includes the listener whose act of listening– it is believed effects the outcome of each recording even though the material is set in time. The shared presence of listener and performance can be outside time therefore creating anew each time it comes into being!
This music is not intended to be related to any ancient tradition yet it may remind us of different ones upon each listening.
This is all original music spontaneously composed in a state of joy of being a vehicle…
There are no synthesizers or keyboards on this recording.
AntoninShow MoreConcurrents
CONCURRENTS Concurrents is a derivative of the Current 4 recordings …
CONCURRENTS
Concurrents is a derivative of the Current 4 recordings recorded in Feb 2018 and is presented here as a standalone piece due to its original nature.
The instruments are …the Indian Tamboura drone and the Suntar.
The Suntar is an original instrument which came to me through a series of realizations over a few decades.
Suntar means “Strings of the Sun”!
The Suntar resembles a guitar as it has six strings but it is fretless in that way it resembles the Indian Sarod but with the addition of the Sitar buzz bridge which makes the Suntar a true hybrid.
The various sitar or sarod timbres and other varying sounds it produces arise and fall away according to the way and the velocity it is plucked and where in the range one plays.
Concurrents is a version of the Currents compositions which is “concurring” and occurring with and within the subtle Currents of the presence we share. Wither a phrase is stated, unstated or even if it is a reversal of the original intention, still this is how a conversation of interplay becomes interestingly approachable and acts as a magnet for more interaction…
This interaction includes the listener whose act of listening– it is believed effects the outcome of each recording even though the material is set in time. The shared presence of listener and performance can be outside time therefore creating anew each time it comes into being!
This music is not intended to be related to any ancient tradition yet it may remind us of different ones upon each listening.
This is all original music spontaneously composed in a state of joy of being a vehicle…
There are no synthesizers or keyboards on this recording.
AntoninShow More The Golden Door
The Golden Door This is one large scale multi layered composition made …
The Golden Door
This is one large scale multi layered composition made up of synthesis and vocal textures. It is celebrating the awakening of Consciousness.
The Original bed of sound is …a rounded revolving sequence of harmonic and overtone variations not played but set in motion through programming analog to digital synthesis.
The colors include Waldorf, Akai, Vox, Arp and stream algorithmic programming and a good deal of Cicadas, Wine Glasses with treatments and filtering.
In addition to the layers of beds and textures there is a choir in the A and C sections with harmonic chanting in the B section.
The pitch variations have been altered to induce a calming state as have the drones to create a feeling of grounded-ness. I call this “Calipeeing (Circumambulation) or Whirling” as in Dervishes.
This music is tempered to be a tuning the listener to Gaia. The chanting is made up of Overtone vocalizations which i find to release a heartfelt pulsation.
This is the first melodic keyboard piece i have composed without a keyboard performance…
Antonin: Water Cascades, Cicadas, Wine Glasses, Composition, Synthesis, Programming, multiple Akai, Waldorf and Vox bedding, modulation, Calipeeing, Choir, Overtone Chant, treatments, arrangement and tonal reorganization.
Recorded & Engineered by Dean Rickard at Ruby Reed studios July 2020
Produced and composed by Antonin June 2020Show More The Sanctum
THE SANCTUM The Sanctum is a solo Organ piece recorded in 2001 by …
THE SANCTUM
The Sanctum is a solo Organ piece recorded in 2001 by Thomas Tedesco at his studio.
Dean Rickard post production and mastering July 24 2020.
Antonin reveals the story of it’s …inception…
I was in the middle of doing a series of solo piano works which are an addition to the “Sleeping Giant” recording. We set up to record that winter evening and after only a few minutes of some aggressive playing my finger broke a blood vessel and bleed on Tom’s 90,000 dollar Steinway!
Needless to say this did not go over well!
When i attempted to return to commence the recording the man was not having it!
So with the desire to create at hand I was left speechless as it were for a moment…
I had not brought any instruments along and was at a loss…
So he offered to postpone but I began to walk around the studio perusing his gear.
There I decided to dig into this Organ piece.
Having no real interest in this instrument having my heart set on the acoustic piano I delved deep and came up with a reaction to this massive
The following is the uncut version.
Antonin
The Sanctum
The sanctum conjures up a feeling of some stable ground with the winds of change moving across it as we find in Antonin’s ability to create atmospheres with textural elements moving across the core elements as he does in the 12 Currents CDs.
This idea is taken from Eastern thought and that musical heritage.
Here we may have to say is Antonin’s first “Minimalist” piece.
Minimalism is a style of music pioneered by Terry Riley in 1960 with his seminal recording of “In C” where he broke from the commonly use of the form of bar lines in compositional form.
Replacing the old notion of time with what we now call the “Steady State” Riley influenced a whole generation of composers, among the best of them are Steve Reich, Philip Glass.
Antonin employs odd time signatures as well as the pulsing heart rhythm what he calls the “Flowing State” as opposed to the Steady State as his ebb and flow is freer and less congested with a predictable regularity.
One will also note Riley’s later work delved with quarter tonal elements which we can also hear on Antonin’s recent minimal composition for Prophet 5 synthesizer “Pulsations.”
The Inner Sanctum dealing with more spiritual subjects is the antecedent to this piece which was recorded on July 11 2020 along with “Pulsations.”
Interestingly enough Antonin is not a Minimalist however he often finds himself expressing new ideas in another worldly idiom which remains undefined or rather only defined by his constant change toward an original aesthetic.
Cy RimbaudShow More The Inner Sanctum
THE INNER SANCTUM The Inner Sanctum is a single solo Analog/Digital …
THE INNER SANCTUM
The Inner Sanctum is a single solo Analog/Digital Synthesizer hybrid composition.
It is the antecedent of the solo Organ piece “Sanctum” from almost 20 years prior.
The Inner Sanctum was …realized July 11 2020 on a naked summer night.
This was recorded at Spirit Mountain Studios and mastered by Dean Rickard at Ruby Reed Studios.
The composition is a soft and delicate atmosphere for “Indiana Heart” a close friend.
All the brooding qualities and tension of the original are gone.
They have fallen away to the nuanced heart of bathing in the sound of a would be cosmic rain shedding the drives of the past and replacing them with the desire of the present.
The tonality is enrichening with the mesmerism of multilayered textures of bell like chiming, semi-singing bowls, wind, water, echoes and other worldly effects.
It is a simplicity of heart we can share & to return to…
This is where these atmospheres bring us if we let them.
The Images are mostly all original forms of manipulated photography interspersed with paintings and objects.
Antonin 7 30 2020Show More Pulsations
Pulsations Pulsations is a composition for the Prophet 5 Rev 2 …
Pulsations
Pulsations is a composition for the Prophet 5 Rev 2 synthesizer.
It was recorded on July 11 2020.
This is another of Antonin’s undefinable pieces which we later can categorize as …Minimalism. Although not deliberately so, this stands as a point of departure from which we can come into a new understanding of the fluidity of the workings of Spontaneity.
The multifarious sounds we hear are really one complex sound Antonin programmed on that naked summer night and then pursued to the climax of that intentional purpose.
There are no overdubs nor any preconceived notations. It is all intuited to emerge by responding to the newly born sounds programmed. Being as much a surprise to composer as to anyone, as it was extemporaneously manifested.
The imagery is again all his own as is on the “Inner Sanctum” of the same evening.
Pulsations however is a bit more of a complex set of particles scattering and re-converging together as the sound fractals act like a rotisserie fling off and returning to rub against and even love each other. The syntax is variable according to the choice of pitches chosen to play at any given time.
The piece enters a few stages before concluding with a semi return to the themes.
In fact the piece never leaves a formal felt continuity yet it does toward the center begin to move into the world of micro-tonality.
This is where we find the sound particles to magnetize each other and flow together in a completely different manner. The new form soothes the ear accustomed to the closeness of numeric values in pitched tonality.
This is an eastern study on origin however modern in application to moving harmonies.
One of the riskier approaches one may take to composition especially spontaneous composition…
The congruency of “Pulsations” is a flawless example of this composer’s willingness to move as the sound moves him. He obscures what is apparent and manages to transparentize the remnants left remaining uncovered into a movement forward into each composition he obfuscates.Show More Montage
Montage Montage is Antonin’s return to what he once called “Arte Rock” …
Montage
Montage is Antonin’s return to what he once called “Arte Rock” in the 80s.
It is the result on a reformation & refurbishing of electronics on Spirit Mountain. Recently …the studio has been rebuilt and the process continues.
Montage is a 7 piece recording from a few hour jam session.
It is a document of all synth music in real time without midi or overdubs.
The result is these terse refined elements with spoken word added later.
0:00 Incandescent
6:11 Shibboleth
10:21 With All Due Respect
16:19 1989
23:25 Outside the Box
35:07 Specticle 2020
49:05 Landing
Although “Montage” maybe labeled a funk/acid/hip hop record, its wide range is comprised of various genres such as Rock, World Music, meditative, funk, improvisational, Fusion, Ambient, dub, Synth Source with Spoken Word instead of rap.
Incandescent opens with a mellow feel from the drone and Indian tabla.
It is the mark of poetry -however contorted or unusually reworked along with the soloing which sets the spark of imagery apart here.
As we move through Shibboleth we understand the fusion of more expanding elements emerge— as we continue to dance our own part as listeners—-
The irreverent as we might suspect “With All Due Respect” is a real eye opener when we come to find out this is actually what lawyers are taught in Law School!
It was in “1989” Antonin took up residence as electronic composer {Le Mystic Corridor} and put his efforts in that direction more openly than in the early 80s.
“Outside the Box” renews that sense of urgency -Miles set yet another trend in reforming funk with a Bebop feel later known as Swunk; found here in another sketchy backdrop of shadows.
The beats are more generic and what he has accomplished here is to make us aware of the presence of the groove as textural wallpaper -something far less important {in this case} than the redefining of it with melodic invention.
Something far different than any of his other recent work…
Isn’t this what the great soloists taught us? Never stop moving forward!
The poetry of invention stands the test of time & this is as it is now and as it seems it has always been— one of Antonin’s enduring messages.
I cannot say, but i believe some of the choices of the forms were chance operations he just went with—off into the unknown—–
Making a simple form all your own spontaneously is as powerful as any!
In fact, we could say that the “In the Pocket” feel is nothing more than a vehicle for the madly explosive energy of the {heart/soul} soloist!
We need go no further than to check out the untamed wild exuberance of raging energy of “Specticle 2020”!
It really says it all. I listened to this track many times before I could get a handle on how amazing the blaze of fire in this {what was called black rock} brought the house down!
{This title is a reference to an early CD by that name, from 30 years ago and also predominantly made up of keyboards.}
In closing, we come to find ourselves back at a mellow eastern piece “Landing” to smooth out the flames of that combustible edge.
All in all we have an unexpected, yet a fantastic new journey from Antonin among the most visual of musicians speaking to us—-as if of some non-narrative narration—as if a musical painting of the invisible imagination could be visualized?
If so, he has done it!!!
Cy Rimbaud
Antonin all instruments, Analog & Digital Synthesis & programing, Percussion.
{Information on the instruments and keyboards is available upon request.}
Recorded 91020 at Spirit Mountain Studios.
Editing, Post Production and Mastering by Dean Rickard 10-20.
Special thanks to Syl for her stunning imagery, to Mr. e.e. for the redefining of meaning, to Professor Duane of Criminology and an officer Jackson for their candid observations.Show More My Life In The Bush of Hosts
“My Life in the Bush of Hosts” Recorded in the fall of 2020, final …
“My Life in the Bush of Hosts”
Recorded in the fall of 2020, final mastering Jan 6 21
This is the bookend of the recent return to keyboards on “Montage” -Spoken Word …Jan 4 2021. {Extra Special appreciation to Justin, J, K., A. Sex, E.E , F. L. W.}
“The Assassination of Poetry” features Dean Rickard on drums & Antonin on electric Bass- recorded 12-16-2020 at Ruby Reed studios. All other recordings at Spirit Mountain Studios on 9 2020}
To Be Yourself
When i hear musicians who never stop from challenging themselves i can only think of a select few. These are the pioneers of truth in our lives…
This constant challenging of oneself under all conditions and the altering of those conditions constitutes what i would call nothing less than “Courageousness!” The conviction of someone who takes on such a path of discovery is a determination not for everyone.
In a world of followers of the commercial derived motives the original voice is not for everyone—However, as time passes this voice becomes a part of the climate and atmosphere of the times as so many others are touched by these achievements.
It takes great “Courage” to be oneself! In any field but especially the arts, there is always a great pressure to follow the trends, to be in line with compliance to the tried and true methods of style which brings financial gain and usually are pigeonholes to creativity.
Once the conviction of Courage is building momentum it is capable of somehow making the impossible possible! And this is something that lasts through the centuries as originality, and uncompromising individuality. The art is merely a remnant of this thrust of heart!
As we reap the fruits of such harvests we are all richer for it!
-Herbie Hancock
In an Insane World it’s the Sane that appear Insane!
-Antonin
Track List:
0:00 The Assassination of Poetry
12:44 Don’t Believe Your Thoughts
19:01 Destroy the Box
21:07 Sing Spring
24:52 The Now Beat
30:34 Bachtoven & The Pop Mockers
40:56 The World in a Grain of Sand
1:02:25 Blue BlazeShow More
Melodica Electra is analog, digital and FM program synthesis composed and performed live in the moment. This channel covers from 2001 to the present. Each audio recording is shared with a slide show of original and found images that reveal how imagery can be both audible or visual.
