The New Speculative Music, Part 3

Leading on from parts one and two…

Hasler intends to open his exploration of existing ‘repertoires’ of speculative music with alchemy, before progressing to astrology and then cabala. Whether unconsciously intended or not, this scheme recalls Agrippa’s division of both the universe and his magnum opus into three realms: natural, celestial/mathematical and divine/intellectual.

However, Hasler quickly runs into a problem with considering alchemy as a single discipline: it cannot be divorced from the symbolism and practice of astrology. Alchemy is, as John Dee called it, astronomia inferior, of which “celestial astronomy is the source and guide.” Or to put it in terms of a well-worn Hermetic rubric: “As above, so below.”

An engraving of “The Emerald Tablet of Hermes Trismegistus”, cornerstone of alchemical and Hermetic philosophy.

The New Speculative Music, Part 2

Following on from part one…

By his own admission, in his acknowledgements (p.iv), Hasler has not conducted any new research with historical or archival material in the course of producing his thesis. At first I was rather disappointed by this, and felt myself becoming frustrated by the lack of depth – historical and theoretical – as I began to read the first half of the thesis, which treats the symbolic relationships established between astrology, alchemy, cabala and music. However, these frustrations were unfounded: to treat the various subjects here at a depth that would please the speculative-music-obsessive such as myself would be beyond the scope of what is essentially a composition PhD and thus geared toward the practical end of producing a portfolio of compositions, which are commented on at length in the latter half of the thesis. 

The New Speculative Music, Part 1

Over the last fortnight I’ve been reading Johann Friedrich Wolfgang Hasler’s PhD thesis with much interest. Entitled Towards Hermeticist Grammars of Music: A Proposal for Systems of Composition Based on the Principles of the Hermetic Tradition, with Musical Demonstrations, the thesis was completed at the University of Newcastle Upon Tyne in 2011.

Obviously, considering my musical, philosophical, historical and aesthetic interests I couldn’t ignore a title like that! I’ve read some brilliant doctoral work on magic, mysticism and music, not least Angela Voss’ thesis on Ficino’s astrological music. These works have, however, tended to be historical, theoretical or sociological discussions, rather than the sort of practical demonstrations that a composition PhD, such as that completed by Hasler, entails. Having finished reading his work, studying his scores, and even playing a couple, I have a lot of thoughts: far too many for a single, easily readable blog. Therefore, as time allows over the next month or so, I will be posting a series of shorter blogs about this interesting piece of work. 

Roaming in the LOAMing

So, with the holiday over, work on LOAM can resume. Or rather, be slotted in around marking, preparing for the next semester, writing documentation for a new-and-terribly-exciting-piece-of-composition-software (more on this later, non-disclosure agreements permitting!) and all the usual stuff that goes on here.

Two public prototypes using small areas of the LOAM function set are currently available. These are geolocative audio applications for Android mobiles:

Almias – An experimental soundscape situated on Almscliffe Crag, North Yorkshire.

Holbeck Audio Walk – A locative rendition of Simon Bradley’s MA on the oral history of Holbeck, Leeds.

Almias (Credit: Layla Legard)

There are some final bits of functionality to be implemented before I can think about encapsulating everything for a public launch of the complete LOAM platform. One of these is the ‘dislocator’, which will enable experiences to be ‘retopologised’ from one place to another. A prototype ‘dislocative media’ application will be released in February, although I’m hesitant to say exactly what it will involve – I hope it is a surprise!

If anyone in the area wishes to take Almias or Holbeck Audio Walk for a wander, then I would love to have feedback about your experience and the functionality/stability of the prototype works. Email: phil (at) larkfall (dot) co (dot) uk.

Happy trails!

A Dérive in the Pyrognomic Library

I am pleased to announce that I added The Pyrognomic Glass to the Xenis Emputae Travelling Band Bandcamp page yesterday. This was originally recorded in 2005 for a CD on Phil Todd‘s Memoirs of an Aesthete label. Phil kindly re-released as a vinyl LP with my accompanying chapbook, Abital, in 2009. I am happy to say that the downloadable version includes the booklet as a PDF, along with the original CD and LP art. You can also browse and download Abital on its own, by heading over to Issuu.

Vinyl edition of The Pyrognomic Glass.

If the above image whets your appetite, I’m pleased to say that there are still some copies available for the bargain price of £7 + P&P from the Memoirs of an Aesthete web shop, or alternatively from Cold Spring Records.

I have an incredible number of fond memories of working on The Pyrognomic Glass and Abital – of exploring Wharfedale with a bag-full of instruments and a  head-full of thoughts about dew, alchemy and genii locorum. This also marked the beginnings of thinking about not only psychogeography, but also ‘psychometeorology’: how does weather and time influence my imaginative and creative response?

Bandcamping

I’m pleased to announce that I am dragging myself into the 2010s with a long-overdue Bandcamp page. The first three to go up are A Prism for Annwn, Gamaaea and The Crooked Pool. All albums are ‘pay what you want’ – even free if you fancy.

This means that you’ll be eventually able to get the XETB, Pneumatic Consort and maybe even Neon Death Slittes and innumerable side-projects in high quality MP3s or FLACs from the original recordings, rather than the 192kbps MP3s which the collection at Archive.org is based on.

That’s the difference between this:

Water Invocation, MP3

… and this:

Water Invocation, lossless