Nature-Symphony 5
— Wide-eyed young monk's contemplation of Ama Dablam

Opus 37 (2023) — Timing: 53'

derived from a Wind Chimes in the Wild field recording

Nature-symphonies — a transformational discovery (background notes)…

It was in 2012 that I tentatively started recording natural soundscapes, and within a few months got the idea of purchasing some high-grade precision-tuned wind chimes to record out in the wilds, hung up on tree branches. …

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… I quickly found that not only was the sound of each set of chimes individually beautiful and to some extent inspiring in quality when recorded out in the wild like that (mostly high-up in the Teign Gorge, Devon, UK), but also, almost all of the combinations of different chimes worked out beautifully musically, though naturally some combinations made a more 'challenging' listen than others.

Much more recently I tried making a half-speed version of part of each of the most appealing or otherwise 'promising' chimes ensemble recordings. They were each a revelation — immensely beautiful, with quite dramatic transformation of the original sound. That is, not just a matter of being slower and an octave lower, but the whole musical and emotional effect changed.

But then, in late August 2023 I got this little urge to do something really stupid (all the world's 'sheep' know I'm stupid anyway, so I thought I might as well do it anyway!), and try putting a particularly evocative chimes ensemble recording in a virtual cathedral, of all things, just to see how crazy it might sound.

I tried that with a particularly usable and effective reverb VST plugin called Orilriver, and was bowled over by the results. Shivers up spine, and plenty of goose-bumps for good measure! I then did listening spot tests using Orilriver in preview mode on a wide selection of my half-speed chimes recordings, and every one was incredibly, amazingly, transformed.

It was clear that I'd sort-of unwittingly stumbled into producing powerfully beautiful stochastic / probability-driven music works that have a lot in common with the ethos and methods of Iannis Xenakis, but with a big practical difference. Whereas typically he worked out probabilistic structures and processes to shape many of his works, this lunatic composer instead left that task to 'Mother Nature', then transforming those sounds in a way that Xenakis did in most of his electroacoustic works, to enhance their ability to excite the listener's own inner creativity and to generate profound and powerful experiences in the process.

It can be no surprise, then, that in these new works of mine there would be passing (albeit partial) resemblances to certain Xenakis works — Bohor comes particularly to mind, and even, in a funny way, some aspects of Terretektorh.

It was then a real no-brainer to recognise each such piece of mine as one of my numbered public music compositions. For the purpose of a liberating simplicity I chose to classify ALL of this type of work that I produce as what I'm calling nature-symphonies. That hyphen is important, because they are not just symphonies about nature, but are a very specific type of composition — nature-generated symphonies.

The term 'symphony', although closely guarded with a very restricted meaning by small-minded traditionalists, actually just means 'sounding together', which apparently was its original meaning. For me to want to use that term, there need to be at least two contrasting elements that are in some way combined or worked together in some way that is much more effective and deeply inspiring than the sum of those elements.

Although, in terms of my own nature-symphonies, that would mean ensembles rather than solo chimes sets, I've found that certain of my recordings using just one chimes set still produce effective and powerful nature-symphonies because of some element of the natural soundscape within which the chimes were sounding. A weir or waterfall, for example, or the wind itself, or a liberal amount of bird sound (much of which latter sounds remarkably musical at half-speed).

As for title for each work, they won't all necessarily have a title beyond Nature-Symphony [nn]. I'll add an imaginative title only where the finished piece suggests one to me. — Well, er, except that I do have one title earnestly looking for a work for it to be applied to, but currently I don't see how it could fit any extant or future transformed wind chimes works of mine! Not telling why!

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Basic details

Location of original recording — Location of original field recording; a different recording session on 30 January 2013.

**Ama Dablam** *(photo courtesy Simon (mountaineer) via Pixabay)*

Instrumentation — Wind chimes as follows:

Woodstock Gregorian Chimes (Tenor)

Original recording location / date — In western edge of Drewston Wood, just below the Hunter's Path, high up on north side of Teign Gorge, Devon, UK, 6 February 2013
Processing — (a) 50% speed reduction, which means sounding an octave lower; (b) a rather shorter copy of part of the original given a 75% speed reduction, so it sounds two octaves lower, and then mixed in with the other; (c) application of a cathedral acoustic with 'back of cathedral' perspective to the mix of those two copies. (d) taming of the very strong low bass frequencies.
Primary distinguishing features — A really big-sounding soundworld! The Gregorian chant scale these chimes are tuned to sounds differently at this octave-lower pitch, giving an imposing, emotionally ambiguous character, with a sense of an unrequited longing.

A sense of heightened unease and conflict is brought in by the lower-pitched layer, because here we hear rather startling tuning differences, giving microtonal sounds and at times outright clashing dissonances. From my perspective as the composer, these are great and make a dramatic impact in their contrast with the less low-pitched layer, which seems relatively secure in its tuning and harmony.

Additionally, the wind brings in a lot of very low frequencies, adding to the sense of hugeness of this soundworld. This effect is augmented by the mixed-in two-octaves-reduced version. I reduced the level of those frequencies to what I consider is the most effective level. That's an intentional part of the sound.

However, many speaker systems without correction for room and speaker resonances would make this and other Nature-Symphonies of mine sound nasty. High-grade headphones are the best answer.

The image this work conjured up for me was of a supposedly wayward young monk who is no-soul and thus has the mental clarity and flexibility to turn his back on his monastery and its limiting tradition and beliefs, and look up at the imposing Ama Dablam mountain, resonate with its splendour and its dangers, and increasingly to think along the lines of One day I'm going to climb you, and escape from this valley hemmed in by traditions and beliefs, and get a real life out there, where surely my real friends are!.

Nature-Symphony 5— Wide-eyed young monk's contemplation of Ama Dablam

Basic details

Nature-Symphony 5
— Wide-eyed young monk's contemplation of Ama Dablam