David HYKES & The HARMONIC CHOIR

"Current Circulation"

(LP. Celestial Harmonies. 1984) [US]

David Hykes, "Ascending and Descending"

Gnostic Chant Reinvented: David Hykes & The Harmonic Choir - Harmonic Meetings

World-Renowned Percussionist Randy Gloss Releases his Second Solo album, "...The Ayes Have It, Vol. II: Self-Portraits in Percussion" on Orenda Records

For decades, percussionist Randy Gloss has been recognized as one of the world’s leading hand percussion virtuosi, with an astounding breadth of knowledge and cultural understanding. An expert in musical traditions from across the globe, he brings a deep and expansive approach to rhythm and percussive sounds as he once again dives into personal exploration. As Gloss’s new solo album’s title suggests, “…The Ayes Have It” Vol. II: Self-Portraits in Percussion is, on one hand, a seamless continuation and companion to Vol. I (released on Orenda Records in 2015), while on the other, a stand-alone narrative, showcasing new directions, different facets, instruments, and ideas not explored on the first. On both, Randy Gloss explores an extensive palette of sonic possibilities through a deeply reflective and personal approach, with the world of percussion and rhythm as brush and canvas, utilizing the double LP vinyl record format as it’s frame.

A protégé of renowned percussion vanguard John Bergamo and longtime student of tabla maestro Pandit Swapan Chaudhuri, Randy Gloss is a percussionist whose background performing several modalities of hand drums, contemporary percussion, and drum set has led to his involvement in many innovative ensembles that fuse world music with new music and jazz.  Most notable for his work with Hands On’Semble, a percussion group devoted to the art of hand drumming created by John Bergamo in 1997 (with Randy Gloss, Andrew Grueschow, and Austin Wrinkle) and multiple recipient of Drum! Magazine Reader’s Poll Award for Best Percussion Ensemble and Best Percussion Album, Gloss has performed and lectured throughout North and South America, Europe, and Asia at many of the world’s premier percussion and world music festivals, music schools and conservatories. Randy has also worked with an extensive array of world renowned artists including: reggae superstar Ziggy Marley, violin icon L. Shankar, pianist Larry Karush, The Lian Ensemble; percussionist Adam Rudolph’s “Go: Organic Orchestra” and world percussion group Vashti; slide veena virtuoso Chitravina Ravikiran, Balkan/Indian maestros Aashish Khan, Swapan Chaudhuri, Miroslav Tadic, Vlatko Stefanovski; Romanian pan flute virtuoso Damian Draghici; overtone singer David Hykes; Turkish musician Latif Bolat; Vinny Golia’s Large Ensemble; pianist Ardeshir Rohani; flautist Nicole Mitchell, pianist Dan Siegel, and South Indian percussionist Poovalur Sriji to name only some.  He has also contributed percussion for film soundtracks by composers Danny Elfman, Harry Gregson-Williams, and Gary Chang, and is on faculty at California Institute of the Arts, where he has taught since the late 90’s

On “…The Ayes Have It” Vol. II: Self-Portraits in Percussion Randy Gloss brings all his experience to bear in an incredible set of solo compositions featuring a dizzying array of percussive instruments, including aFrame (electrorganic frame drum); tabla; frame drums; metal restaurant pot; mason jar; water; double row mark tree; bamboo mark tree; vibraslap; gongs; tuned gongs; cymbals; bells; antique cymbal with jingles; dafs; dhavul/ tappan; handsonic; riq; drumset; pandeiro; cuica; congas; gankogui; dholak; vibraphone; cheng-cheng; reco-reco; bull roars; and wind wands. This gorgeous double LP, mixed by John Baffa and mastered by Stephen Marsh, is presented as a limited-edition double gatefold two LP vinyl album with accompanying booklet and digital download card, original artwork by Eron Rauch, and extensive liner notes by Randy Gloss.

Alexina Louie's "Take the Dog Sled", A Musical Iditarod for Inuit Throat Singers and Ensemble

Alexina Louie’s “Take the Dog Sled”, A Musical Iditarod for Inuit Throat Singers and Ensemble

Centrediscs CDCCD 28320 Ah, those sneaky Canadians. This disc was surreptitiously slipped in with another mailing of a disc sent for review. The sender, aware of my interest and admiration for Canadian art music sent me this little gem of a recording. It is a fine example of cultural incorporation (as opposed to the pejorative, “cultural appropriation”). It is about the celebration of “first…

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David Hykes and the Harmonic Choir

Arc descent

Hermetic Journals - Ocora Records Special Music

My first encounter with "Hermetic Journals" is a beauty. This 1 hour "Ocora" session is an excellent guided trip through a small part of the immense and wonderful Ocora label. And what a nice surprise, almost at the end i hear "Gagaku • Ono Gagaku Kaï", one of my all time Ocora favs.

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This episode of Hermetic Journals is dedicated to the brief exploration of the amazing French ethnomusicological label Ocora. Their catalogue is vast; so many more hours are required to make a comprehensive introduction. Therefore I resort to selection of my personal favourites. Structure-wise I dedicate roughly similar sections to the music of African continent, Western + South Asia with the final 20 minutes or so spent in East / Southeast Asia. It felt appropriate to bookend this ‘journey’ with a beautiful and timeless sounding overtone singing – an almost universal singing practice that coincidentally exists in traditional music of many cultures, eras and ethnic groups - by David Hykes and his Harmonic Choir.

Artwork by Andrew William Elvish

episode 56: music for wading, diving, and surfacing again (01.19.22)

set 1:

Los Blops – Tarde – Blops (Peña De Los Parra, 1971)

Kusudo & Worth – Something from Nowhere – Of Sun and Rain (Custom Fidelity, 1969)

Ivor Cutler – The Meadows Go – Velvet Donkey (Virgin, 1975)

Congregacion – El Dulce Espiritu de la Soledad y Ama la Muerte Hermano – Congregacion Viene… (IRT, 1972)

Mary O’Hara – An Raibh Tu Ag A' gCarraig (Were You at the Rock) – Songs of Ireland (Tradition, 1958)

John Jacob Niles – Bowie, Bowerie - Niles No.7B (The Twa Sisters - Child No. 10) – The Ballads of John Jacob Niles (Tradition, 1960)

set 2:

Sean McAloon – The Bogs of Clones (The Butcher’s March) – Stór Píobaiteachta: Piping From the Archives (Na Píobairí Uilleann, 2004)

Technical Space Composer’s Crew/Holger Czukay & Rolf Dammers – Mellow Out – Canaxis 5/Canaxis (Music Factory/Spoon, 1969/1998))

The Books – Excess Straussess – Thought for Food (tom20, 2002)

Mkwaju Ensemble – Ki-Motion – Mkwaju (Better Days, 1981)

Akira Rabelais – 1440 Promp. Parv. 518/2 Wawyn, Or Waueryn, Yn a Myry Totyr, Oscillo. – Spellewauerynsherde (Samadhisound, 2004)

set 3:

David Hykes & the Harmonic Choir – Two Poles; Ascent – Healing Solar Winds = À L’Ecoute Des Vents Solaires (Ocora, 1983)

Björk featuring Robert Wyatt – Submarine – Medúlla (One Little Indian, 2004)

Felt – Red Indians – The Splendour of Fear (Cherry Red, 1984)

Art Bears – The Hermit – Winter Songs (Rē Records, 1979)

Broadcast & the Focus Group – I See, So I See So – Investigate Witch Cults of the Radio Age (Warp, 2009)

Jim O’Rourke – Please Patronize Our Sponsors – Eureka (Drag City, 1999)

The Red Krayola – We Feel Fine – Hazel (Drag City, 1996)

V/A

"Tellus #14 : Just Intonation"

(cassette. Tellus. 1986) [US]

David Hykes, "Ascending and Descending" #NowPlaying

@kecharitomene​, ask, and you shall receive! 

The Island of Minos (Spotify) (8tracks)

01. spitzberg - atlantis: the lost tales 02. sea borne - dead can dance 03. the shores of megaris - assassin’s creed: odyssey 04. minoan palace - derek and brandon fiechter 05. kiko - dead can dance 06. rhea - atlantis: the lost tales 07. sumeria (ancient) - geoff knorr 08. message horn’s enchanting echo - daemonia nymphe 09. feasts and culture - etostone 10. battle drums - joe hisaishi 11. dance of the bacchantes - dead can dance 12. dream of the dolphin - atlantis: the lost tales 13. forgotten isle - assassin’s creed: odyssey 14. rainbow voice - david hykes & the harmonic choir 15. ancient winds - atlantis: the lost tales 16. paititi (city of the serpent) - brian d’oliviera 17. awakening - atlantis: the lost tales

RECORD YOU SHOULD BUY IF YOU HAVE TO BUY A RECORD THIS WEEK BUT FOR SOME REASON DON’T WANT TO BUY A BLUE TAPES/X-RAY RECORDS RECORD #81

DAVID HYKES & THE HARMONIC PRESENCE FOUNDATION - Hearing Solar Winds (Ocora; 1983)

from The Guardian:

'"Accept that music is not sealed to passion, nor to piety, nor to feelings, accept that it can blossom in spaces so wide your image cannot project yourself within them …" Now, that is precisely the sort of sleeve note (written by sound sculptor Louis Dandrel) we like, and this is a stunning, beautifully strange record. David Hykes was an established experimental film-maker with a long-held interest in traditional and sacred music when he formed the Harmonic Choir in 1975. A keen traveller, Hykes was particularly drawn to Mongolian Khöömii, or "throat singing", practised within tantric Tibetan Buddhism; this LP was the first of his own variations on that ancient art form. There are no words, no instruments, no chants and no "message" other than Slow Down. Each of the eight pieces (in fact, one long unbroken whole) is built on throat-singing foundations; so a single low bass note is, by way of bafflingly precise muscle control, joined by another, higher note, known as the overtone – a single voice can produce many sounds at once. Each singer then adds and then removes, then adds again his own, changing harmony and the piece grows, with glacial stillness, into utterly entrancing fullness. The Harmonic Choir were artists-in-residence at New York's Cathedral of St John the Divine for 10 years and this was recorded live there. The church's rich reverb makes the choir's incredible music sound like a Gregorian chant, albeit one performed by an alien race. Frankly, Hearing Solar Winds will blow your mind. And you'll like it.'

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