If music can be autumnal, then I’d like to think of today’s work-in-progress, Magpie, in that way. We’ve been enjoying some wonderful fall weather here and it’s hard to picture a natural image more defining of Ladakh in fall than a magpie hopping around by a yellow-leaved poplar.
There’s something of a mysterious feeling that comes with fall when the wind starts blowing, and maybe there's something of that contained in this piece of music. I have no doubt that you could take just about any instrument and capture an autumnal feeling but something about the cold thinness of an acoustic piano compliments the dry and cooler air of the fall as compared with, for example, the “wetter” sound of the Rhodes electric piano heard in the sample below. In this case I imagine a rainier, more humid fall day:
People say that the particular Rhodes heard above has a wet sound. It’s funny how our brains make those associations but this one really makes sense to me. The acoustic piano I used for the main recording today conjures for me a decidedly dry fall day as compared with the sample above. See what you think.
I’m just thinking aloud. For some reason I find it necessary to say again that I don’t sit down contemplatively and say to myself “Hmm, I think I’ll try to capture the sound of a crisp, fall day today” and then tweak my sound accordingly (although maybe this would be a fun experiment). But I do imagine that something of the feeling outside while I was playing slipped into my subconscious and made what I was playing feel “right” at the time. Hope it feels right to you too.
See you soon.
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