How is the music relevant to your goals for this project?

-- Finding Time (ftime@somewhere.org), February 27, 1999

Answers

Among the earliest decisions for what this piece was going to be, back in discussions between Jesse Gilbert and myself beginning in the summer of 1997, was the drone element. Aside from it being a simple, concrete form, it is one of the most widely used, or common, elements in musics around the world. It is found in some form in most music, wherever you go. It seems to have a fundamental appeal, even as it's function varies tremendously from place to place. The choice of the drone is not an attempt to homogenize a world sound, but to take advantage of an element of language that may be more readily understood and thus easier to come together on, than some others. We are not trying to create "World Music," as I mentioned above. I do not know where that term came from, or what exactly it means. It is often associated with anything that 1) has a set pulse, and 2) is not Western. For better and for worse, the music we will be performing is decidedly Western in its origin and identity. However, it will have the auspicious quality of being created by musicians from around the world, while being stretched physically across the world, and broadcast (hopefully) all over the world. So semantically, we will be creating world music by default. Music of, on, and in the world.

The blending of improvisation with composition is a conscious choice as well in that we wish to incorporate the individual voices of the drone music into an active role in the creation of the overall sound. A drone with interruption, deviation, expression, identity, personality. The human drone that rises and falls with the both the unique song of the body and the constant hum of life. It is imperative that the players feel connected to the work and the music in a personal way in order to bring a life to the constant flow of sound, or stream. It can only be through this process of sounding themselves that the drone will become significant in and of itself.

-- Scott Rosenberg (scottrosenberg@hotmail.com), February 28, 1999.