solipse by Anarchestra
solipse (40:29)
Recorded 2015 at the vine in Tucson
Played by alex ferris
Instruments
0 Regur Dovertu Klogg Venus DiReed Adrums Monte
1 Gurnigan SqFlute Regur Ena
2 Twobe Adrums Klogg Klem Bastid Turd Hendecq Pharo
3 Bastid Klem HmReed Gurdiad Thud Pharo
4 Twobe Adrums LilD Plato Pharo Digger Seegar Serpico
5 Tuffram Ex-why?
6 Bastid DiReed LilD Klogg Venus
7 Twobe Octoreed LilD Venus Plato Klogg
8 Kalbenkool Horzba Gurdiad Bootz Soren KyzylKum Turd
9 BabyK Adrums Klam Klem Klyd Stigo
10 Klogg Turd Gurdiad Thump Bastid KyzylKum Serpico Octoreed DP Hexflute Forky
11 Twobe Adrums Stigo Klyd Dovertu Gurdiad steel D-reed copper D-reed
12 Klamm Klogg Gurdiad Dovertue Pharo Baby K D-Reed D-Reed
This album is the product of a year long meditation on dying. Having turned sixty and started losing friends from my generation for reasons other than suicide, car accidents, substance abuse, HIV, etc., I experienced, for the first time, a constant awareness of my mortality.
I never thought too hard on dying before
I never sucked on the dying
I never licked the side of dying before
And now I'm feeling the dying
“Give me the Cure” Fugazi
My instinctual response to all life experiences is essentially to embrace them and approach them with curiosity. Dying is no different. I don’t fear it. Having made a point of doing what I wanted to do with my time on earth, I don’t have any sense of regret around it. If I drop dead this instant, I won’t ‘feel like I’ve been cheated’.
That said, I’m not planning on dying or looking forward it any more than anything else that may happen in the future. I have no idea when it will come. But it’s present in my life now and I’m not inclined to ignore or resist it.
Over the last decade, I have tended to associate the music I make deliberately (as opposed to playing spontaneously with other people) with narratives (usually danced). In an earlier century, I might have thought of them as scores for ballets (Stravinsky is my favorite composer and his ballets are my favorite music of his). My choices of tempos and signatures (other aspects as well) are strongly impacted by such considerations. When I record, I always have some story at least vaguely in mind throughout the process.
In this case, owing to my meditation on dying, the scenes I had in mind were from “Top of the World” by the swiss author Hans Ruesch. It is an anthropological novel about Inuit family life that made a lasting impression on me thirty years ago (when I read it during a heatwave). Specifically, a scene in which the grandmother (who having lost her teeth is no longer able to contribute to the family’s survival) sits in the snow patiently awaiting her death by exposure, provided the central scene to the narrative (which consists of her memories, reflections, and hypothermic hallucinations as she freezes).
Tracklist
| 1. | solipse 0 | 5:21 |
| 2. | solipse 1 | 1:44 |
| 3. | solipse 2 | 2:45 |
| 4. | solipse 3 | 2:14 |
| 5. | solipse 4 | 2:16 |
| 6. | solipse 5 | 0:56 |
| 7. | solipse 6 | 2:07 |
| 8. | solipse 7 | 2:13 |
| 9. | solipse 8 | 3:09 |
| 10. | solipse 9 | 2:13 |
| 11. | solipse 10 | 6:49 |
| 12. | solipse 11 | 4:57 |
| 13. | solipse 12 | 3:47 |
