Five Thoughts on Everything - Itunes Booklet

1

IVE

T

ON

E

VERYTHING

TINNEMANS

HOUGHTS

JOBINA

F

1 2 3

T H E

4

MI DT O N E

I N

G

D JuPAL O N S DO T T I R

&

FT.

IC E LA N D

KAMME RKOR

SH A P E

SUOURLA ND S

O F

(SOUTH

T HI N GS

HEL L N AR S S O N CHA M BER

)

CHO I R )

AQU AT IC

MICR O BI O I S M

5VARESOTTO,HINTERLAND

O F

VAR E S E

The Shape Of Things Aquatic features location recordings from Pwll Deri in Pembrokeshire and Gullfoss in Iceland. The human-like sounds are by Atlantic grey seal pups calling for their mothers, while choughs echo their calls in the steep Pwll Deri cliffs.

The birds vocalising alongside Kammerkór Suðurlands in Djúpalónsdótttir & Hellnarsson are kittiwakes.

2

Š 2020 Jobina Tinnemans | All rights reserved Unauthorized replication & distribution prohibited BSTC-0134 | brightshiny.ninja | jobinatinnemans.com

3

five

thoughts

musical

on

everything

landscape fiction,

science

instruments Tinnemans you

where minimalism,

and

little sound

up

a

you

door

in

ecology,

couture

virtual

- as

discover

speakers go

a

coexist.

alchemy

will

system.

experience

weird

the

a

acoustic

orchestration

cooks

listen

establishes

of

a your

through new

and

universe.

With thanks to Kammerkór Suðurlands and their director Hilmar Örn Agnarsson, for interpreting my directions so wonderfully and for traveling to Djúpalónsssandur and Hellnar to record in the Arctic summer night. Thanks to PRS for Music and Arts Council England for supporting the realisation of this album.

Produced by Jobina Tinnemans Engineered, Edited, Mixed & Mastered by Jobina Tinnemans Cover Art & Album Package Design by Marian C. Holmes | Photographer: Matt Peberdy Tracks 1,3-5 recorded live at Clarendon House Track 2 recorded on location at Djúpalónssandur and Hellnar, Snaefellsness peninsula, Iceland © 2020 Bright Shiny Things | All rights on reserved TrackLLC 3 recorded location at Pwll Deri, Pembrokeshire, UK; Gullfoss waterfall, Iceland Unauthorized replication & distribution prohibited BSTC-0134 | brightshiny.ninja | jobinatinnemans.com

jobinatinnemans.com

4

Anything that makes a sound captures the attention of Dutch- born composer Jobina Tinnemans. on Five Thoughts on Everything each composition is sculpted using different techniques defining the sonic journey the composer has taken since the mid- nineties when she moved from composing works for solo piano to working with electronics and sound processing. The composer later developed what she calls an “ analog obsession” and began experimenting with early synthesizers in heritage studios, while still keeping up with the latest digital innovations.

After moving to an isolated peninsula in Wales in 2007 Tinnemans became overwhelmed by the beauty of natural soundscapes and soon electronic sounds made way for the rustling of leaves, wildlife calls, and other outdoor sounds. Featuring natural sounds in her work became the impetus for a movement into the virtual world. She realised that a field recording was like a photo, a document of the past. She writes, “The beauty of a natural soundscape is that it is so alive. but a field recording isn’ t; in the recording the blackbird will always sing at 1’ 56”, not a moment sooner or later .”

Tinnemans’ s field instruments are programmed in such a way that they function like natural sounds, they are not a static ‘ phrase’ or ‘‘ tape loop’. “The tree will keep rustling, the same yet always slightly different. The blackbird will keep singing, or not, as they do. The wind will keep its mercurial texture,” she writes.

5

1 Midtone in G ( ... From outer space... )

Heritage synthesizers that nostalgically bring us back to 1950s SciFi cult classics are being contrasted by acoustic piano. As they warm up, analog synthesizers typically change pitch over time, which gives their music a drunk feeling, like an inebriated brass band weightlessly gate-crashing a party in outer space. The earth-bound piano stays fixed in our right ear as other sounds orbit in zero gravity.

2 DjUpaLOnsdOttir & Hellnarsson ( ...getting closer, on wild coastlines...)

Recordings of the South Iceland Chamber Choir singing on location in Djúpalónssandur and Hellnar are sculpted into virtual field instruments. They sing in our most instinctual tongue, calling out like birds or animals, and the work is named after the places where they were recorded. The singers become the sons and daughters of those places.

Behind them a grid-like pulse of chords - the passing of time, the heartbeat of life. In Hellnar kittiwakes joined in, copying the singers’ vocalisations.

3

The Shape Of Things Aquatic ( ...into the riparian zone, above and underwater...)

A plant on the riverside, in the riparian zone, has leaves above and under water: one life-form, two lives. Location recordings are treated like melodies and create sounds like Atlantic grey seals from Pwll Deri in Wales and Gulfoss in Iceland. Gradually the music transforms into an underwater piano piece. The sounds sweep from left to right as we look around to discover where the music is coming from and, as we go deeper, we reach a profound stillness.

4 Microbioism ( ...to life in the deepest submarine levels...) )

Programmed beats often sound industrial rather than organic, but set in a new time and place they burst into microscopic life – they become heartbeats and pulses. The airy beats become the noise of starlings getting ready to roost, the panning of the pulses are schools of fish, and the virtual instruments return, this time as the calls of whales.

5 VarEsotto, Hinterland of VarEse (( ...we zoom in to Planet Earth...) )

Edgard Varèse created Poème Électronique, the world’s first mixed-media installation, for the Philips Pavilion at the Brussels World Fair in 1958. In 2018 Jobina Tinnemans was commissioned to compose a piece commemorating its 60th anniversary. She made virtual instruments from her sound library, each with its own pitch algorithms, and used them to populate a wide orchestral landscape with tiny, detailed sounds that gradually come into focus.

6