12 Moons Solo Saxophone Project Day 133
Date: 05/13/2013
Instrument: Tenor saxophone
Location: Above a ravine at the base of Mt. Shasta. Mt. Shasta, California
Notes:
Now on the final day of our tour, Chris and I woke up in Mt. Shasta, an hour or so South of the Oregon border. We drove up an access road about 5 miles to get a better view of the mountain, and found ourselves at a vista point near the base of the. After doing some recording together on a trail, I headed farther up the service road by foot. I climbed up a hillside to get a birds-eye view of a deep ravine that had an open meadow beyond it. I was inspired by the reverberant space beyond me, and I responded to the acoustics by working with the naturally occurring delay.
The forest was alive with bird songs, ants scattering their energy on the ground and the ever-present wind. During moments of inaction from my instrument, I tried to listen equally to the delay, as well as the environment I was interrupting. In this improvisation I decided to use a single fingering, played with embouchure adjustments in order to pull out two main pitches and various overblown sound clusters. The two fundamental pitches were Concert Db, and Eb (quarter tone sharp). The fingering was as follows: (Left Hand) Fork F, A-G keys // F-E-D keys, Low C, Side Bb.
-Neil
The image accompanying today’s it Mount Shasta.