The Night Land was performed live on stillstream.com March 17, 2013. Done using midi controller, Linux and public domain field recordings. Music fashioned using the buddhalizer --a virtual extension of the imagination.
Several variations were re-imagined over the following months. This is the original performance.
Looking back on it now I can see this was a key performance in the evolution of Grove of Whispers. Everything seems to turn inside out. What sounded like synthesizers could be field recordings, while that which sounds like field recordings (the wind for example) is completely synthesized.
Everything here is fashioned algorithmically or from field recordings (including a washer machine), some of which was processed via spectral manipulation into drones.
I had started along this path with the idea of using my own field recordings: manipulating, processing, abstracting them from their sources. Along the way I found that using other people's field recordings was (at least for grove) an essential part of this process of abstraction. Somehow when the recordings are mine I'm just too close to hear them in the way I need to.
When I heard this played back I thought "well that's nice, but I could do it better", what I learned from trying was to respect what happens in that moment of performance. This is one of those moments. I hope you enjoy it.
Cover adapted from a photograph taken by Ricardo Lago.
![[BOF-064] Grove of Whispers - The Night Land](/img/work/nomencl/m_8278.jpg "[BOF-064] Grove of Whispers - The Night Land")
