In alchemical philosophy there is a stage of progress called Putrefaction. It is a stage of fermentation, and decomposition, a phase they call the black dragon or nigredo or just the blackness. It is a time when the old forms break down and through decomposition are transformed into a raw material from which a spiritually elevated form of life can arise.

A similar idea is described by the tarot card called the Tower. In the Tower card the lightning bolt, symbolizes a flash of spiritual insight that destroys the fixed shape of the tower which symbolizes the fixed opinions and dogmas we have built up in our lives over time. It represents a time of upheaval and disruption. Similarly the time of putrefaction is activated by ones own inner fire.

Change can only take place if the old is allowed to die. Renewal cannot take place unless destruction of the old takes place. On the mythological level, nigredo signifies the difficulties man has to overcome on his journey through the underworld. We all go through these sorts of changing phases – those disruptive phases of our lives we call transitions. Life’s transitions can be challenging because they are unpredictable, difficult, confusing and disorientating. It is a time when life forces us away from the familiar and so we feel vulnerable.

Here i am attempting to capture the feeling of a life transition musically.

If you take a handful of the greatest songs ever written and pick the one thing out that they have in common what do you think that would be? To me it would be a sense of yearning or a quality of longing. It seems to me that ‘longing’ possesses an actual sound quality, like the bending of a blues note. John Lennon brings this to the fore when he sings “i give her all my love”. Though he is confirming that it is a love song lyrically, his tone of voice and the melodic structure lean towards a sound of yearning. He was a master at this and could bring it to perfection in one word. For example listen to how he starts the song with the word ‘mother’. From the moment you hear him say it you are gripped by the deep yearning! The same with the sound of the voice and melody in two of the greatest love songs ever written in my opinion – Bridge over Troubled Water and The first time ever i saw your face, both these songs posses this quality in the extreme sense. It’s this yearning quality that lifts them up beyond their fantastic lyrics into a place of spiritual longing. There is a sound of longing in Neil Youngs voice when he sings “Jesus I saw you…walking on the river….” , when Bono wails “Sunday bloody sunday”. There is deep longing in the guitar solos of David Gilmour. Robert Plant is soaked in this quality and often times goes straight for this feeling by simply crying out “ooh”. Most often if a song, a piece of music or a guitar solo, doesn’t posses this quality of longing it is short lived in my personal picks list. Much of pop music these days lacks this noble quality . Here is a demo of the tail end of a song we are working on called Hello.

In this song I am aiming at this feeling of longing. The story is this: the viking boy, curious about dreams and feelings he is having about a girl he has never met in real life, goes to the High Priestess of the island and has a ‘session’ with her. She reads the crystal ball and reads his palm, and tells him about a “soul mate” who is also longing to be re-united with him. The opening line of the lyrics describes the boy looking at his palm and speaking to the girl.

hello, to the line upon my hand,
to the line that shows a friend,
to the friend who forms the line.

There is a greater alchemical mystery embedded in this album for those who know, but for now – we will stick to the story.

Lila is being initiated into the pearls of ancient wisdom by the High Priestess of her clan. “Like in a song” captures the content of her lesson on the nature of life. The content of this song can best be described, using an excerpt from the book I have written and am preparing to publish. Here it is:

“The fourth Hermetic Principle called; the Principle of Vibration – tells us that “nothing rests, everything moves, everything vibrates.” Thoughts, mental images and emotions are nothing more than a series of vibrations in the field of consciousness. Even matter is understood to be a collection of vibrations, seemingly coagulated like condensed sunlight. It is the nature of vibration that obliges the quantum physicist to poetically acclaim that we live in a musical universe. Vibration gives us life, energy, sound, color, temperature, harmony and, most importantly to our own understanding of quantum healing, the law of attraction. The law of attraction is based on the physics of harmony. The greater the degree of harmony existing between two bodies the greater the force of attraction. In other words the law of attraction makes itself known through the phenomena called sympathetic vibration.”

So this lesson that Lila is getting will, if she thoroughly integrates it into her consciousness, prepare her for the subtle disintegration of physical form that would happen when she eventually passes through the wormhole between the parallel universes to make contact with her soul mate, the Viking Boy. At this stage of the story though, neither of them know that this event lies in their future. Here Kripa, Roland and myself are seen recording the seed idea for this song. (a part of it can also heard in video 1)

Hopefully it grows into something worthy of the wisdom words it is designed to carry.

shine on
robbi

So i picked up the guitar and imagined what sort of music would be played by a few guys sitting around playing lyres on a lazy evening.  Firstly i began with parts that use only two or three strings on the guitar, and played them in a picking style to imitate  what a lyre player would have to do. I decided on the Fender Stratocaster for the sound.  I played these parts for a few minutes and then recorded them, all the while waiting for a vocal melody to arise from the interlocking  lyre-like parts.  Unfortunately nothing came to me that i really liked – so this little ditty will stay like this for a while.

Then Sam Wilmore a local drummer and healer came over for a visit and, since that i was in record mode, we decided to let him at it with percussion and drums.  Almost instinctively Sam reached for the “Bone tambourine”  that was made especially for me by local artisan Doug McKearn (see pic). Lyres and bones …mmm …this is very viking!  I was happy with the simplicity with which Sam approached the percussion arrangements. Even though he made his way through the many drums i have lying around – Indian, Turkish, Celtic and African – he managed to keep it very simple and open so as to let the guitar parts breathe.  Sam is great with this – he has had much experience playing in time to my delays and  line 6 looper where i build layers of interlocking parts live – much like this little ditty.

Toward the end i am trying to reign the piece in, so as to give it more of a rock arrangement, by using a thick ascending line played on a nasty distorted guitar. Finally i begin a modal guitar solo and bring back in, under it, the harmony melodies from earlier in the arrangement. This creates a cacophony of lyres and rock guitars.  It’s really fun to listen to this tail end as if  listening right though it, and not  to any one part in particular. It gets a three dimensional quality and a spaciousness between all the parts as they revolve around each other.

In the background all through the ditty you can hear the desert wind howling and whistling though our windows…mmm a gift from Thor? …The next day it snowed in the desert!

Here is the story:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=IfYhDGoJN3Y

The first piece of music in this little documentary is an instrumental piece we just finished called ‘The Stirring’. The next music is a short excerpt of a song from Kripa’s second album, ‘Dancing Lotus’ -- the song is called Shakti.  The final piece of music, in which Kripa is drumming, playing keys and singing, is the first piece about the viking boy.  In this piece Kripa and i attempt to create the strange viking harmonies by singing a single note that remains constant even across the chord changes while the melody of the lead voice  follows the chords.

In the final black and white shot of Kripa and myself (a moment captured by Andre Wilms) Richard Stuverud is seen in the background -- his image and the image in the lyric are perfect together  “the seaweed lies like dripping hair, upon the rocky shore” -- nice coincidence.

On a final note -- i remind myself,  my friends and Saraswati, the goddess of music that it was the Ancient Mariner’s own actions, by his decision to shoot the albatross, that brought upon him and his shipmates  the “weary time” -- and so i do not blame anyone for those, my days of weariness in the doldrums that brought my ship to a painted ocean. In truth i am now even grateful, for out of it came the sweetest of all blessings and the dew of immortal grace!

Shine on!

robbi

Hear Richard Burton read the Rime of the Ancient mariner. This is my number one CD of all time.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=RGH4p4z4s5A

Incidentally it is this reading that inspired the song Ice Below

www.youtube.com/watch?v=DL5_u1cO5y4

A commentary on The Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner:

http://www.sparknotes.com/poetry/coleridge/section1.html

I would so love to call the girl Lalena after the Donovan song that Deep Purple covered.  But it seems no matter how you sing this beautiful name it has Donovan all over it.  So for now she is a nameless mystery.  But in my secret place she is called Lalena.

I think the album begins with a song about her and touches on elements of her world.  It is a full moon night – she is going through a Luna retreat alone on the sacred hills a little way from her village.  The villagers are of course partying with songs, exotic dancers, wines and sweet wines that foam! She alone, in the sacred hills, enters deeply into the mystery of the Moon Magik, under the guidance of the High Priestess of her Clan.

The song describes the mythical qualities that surround her life and how she feels about them.  In the video you see I have only a small guitar part to begin with as I start to write the lyrics.  By the end of it the song has developed really nicely with a solemn chant and an exhilarating penny whistle piece.  This penny whistle – is a first for me!

www.youtube.com/watch?v=dnlGHD-xlEo

Lyrics

Breathing of time is scented for her now / Floating on the blossoming sky / blowing through the days of flutes and anklets /fanning the poets lit fire / and the beggars bowl is filled with a spring dance/ laughingly scented for all / these are the days of melody and welcome / upon the leaves of a song

On these sacred hills alone she wanders / Moonlight entangled in her hair / The jewels on her brow sparkle like dancers /  Silk, soft and fair / These are the ways she must reach for her wisdom / Healing for all to bear /  The truest of treasures, the softest of pleasures / Before the dawns gold aire…

Since this album is written in mythological style and manner with regards to channeling the lyrics (dream-speak) rather than intellectually carving them, the words are naturally rich with symbols. For example the moon in ancient wisdom represents the subconscious mind, memories, and psychological patterns; it also pertains to the emotions.   The hair on a person’s head symbolizes what that person’s thoughts are radiating -- their “mental aura” so to speak…so we have a lovely image in the lyrics

‘moonlight entangled in her hair’.

This simple phrase captures the idea of the contemplative Luna magical workings she is entangled or absorbed in.  The prize of this sort of spiritual practice leads to “the truest of treasures, the softest of pleasures”; there is nothing more subtle, or more blissful than consciousness awakening into super consciousness.

Those of you who have some experience with Tarot and alchemical symbolism will immediately recognize the formula for the making of the “gold” which is imbedded in the story of this album.  The secret to making gold lies in the alchemical wedding. Only atheists and fools really believe the alchemist gold is a solid material. Those who know -- know, that there is no such thing in the entire universe as a ‘solid particle with fixed properties.   These are some of the ideas hidden within the concept of this album

Please share your insights.

Shine!

robbi

Venus in Moon: photo art by Kripa

Moon card lifted from: www.thaliatook.com

Art card lifted from: www.energyenhancement.org

This album will be my first  solo album.  Although I am the music director for  the band tribe after tribe the approach to this album is something altogether different. Firstly tribe after tribe is “african acid rock” based and considered to be one of the pioneers of world rock.  So in a sense when i write for tribe i keep these african rock parameters in mind so that there is some kind of continuity between albums. For this album the challenge will be to stay away from my africanisms.  As a musician i have always been interested in ethnic music of the world,  i have studied turkish music, Indian music, classical baroque , jazz and i play many different instruments from various cultures. My deepest relationship has been with the Saraswati Vina.  ( i am waiting to grow up so i can approach the Rudra Vina next)

Also I am blessed to have had some wonderful music teachers in  my life from Mike Dickman to Mrs Moss (trinity college in south africa) from Alan Kwela to Alan Weinberg and many more.

So now with the making of the Love album i am venturing into three realms of music that i have not used in a rock context before namely -- celtic music and music of the vikings ;  then applying baroque fugal techniques for  the arrangements.   Unfortunetly there isn’t much viking music to draw on -- we do know that they used flutes made of bone and they had hand drums.

Viking flutes

Modern commentators describe the melodies of the Vikings as “eerie,” because the harmony is one that is unfamiliar to modern ears. The strangeness of  the singing of the Vikings, has been compared to the howling of wolves or dogs. Though their melodies are beautiful,  the major third was regarded as a dissonant interval in the early Middle Ages in Europe because most European music at the time utilized Pythagorean tuning, which gives pure fifths, but very nasty thirds.

Here is a pic and score of one of the earliest Scandinavian pieces of music discovered.

The text reads:

“i dreamt a dream last night
of silk and fur.”

It is the oldest preserved piece of music known in Denmark.

Here is pic and score of an earlier piece of music that scholars believe sheds light on the music of the vikings.

The hymn is written for a two-voices  in the Lydian mode and harmonized in parallel thirds. This is known as a parallel organum in thirds, one of the earliest polyphonic forms. In the northern parts of of Britain,  the people who inhabit these parts use a similar kind of singing in harmony  but with  only two distinct melodies and parts, one murmuring below, the other charming the ear above. Since the English do not generally use this manner of singing,  it is believed that the vikings, who often occupied these parts of the island brought this special manner of singing to the northerners.  So on this album you will hear this stylistic idea being used especially on the first song about the Boy who is from a Viking Ship.

One source of viking musical evidence comes from  a book written by Jean-Baptise de la Borde, Essai sur la Musique Ancienne et Moderne. In his book, Borde included five tunes to Old Norse texts, which he said were “as they today are sung in Iceland.” Iceland being so remote maintained the language of the Vikings almost unchanged up to the present day, The melodies seem  to be similar to the hymn. The strange thing about these melodies is that they  circle around the major third and the tune only goes one note above and one below, so that the entire range is within a fifth.  Again this motive will appear often throughout this album

The music of the Girl and her clan is based more or less on Celtic ideas where i hope to get some intense Bodhran drumming in.

The Story of Love

The Love story is about two soul mates who have incarnated on parallel universes. He is from a Viking clan and she from a Gaul clan. The vikings have arrived at her island which causes much grief to the islanders. Meantime our lovers longing for each other will create a worm hole of sorts through which they will meet up for a few minutes.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=-_dWGxFEZzE

The entire writing and recording of this album will be documented on video. Many times you will see me begin a song from scratch having no words or chords. Other times you will see me using my “dream-speak”  technique which involves me singing from a sub-conscious place and then writing down what i have sung afterwards. These are things i usually do in solitude and in the privacy of my studio  -- so now you have it.  I hope you enjoy witnessing this process.

Join tribe after tribe page on face book or  tribeaftertribemusic channel on youtube to get the latest releases of the video documentary and more.

shine on.
robbi