Enter Earth  
duration: 9' 02
voices, piano, keyboards, wind chimes, Indian bells, collection of stones from Scotland, East Anglian coast, Cornish coast, St. Gilgen am Wolfgangsee (Austria) & electronics: Ian Harris

(see CD releases for details)

www.orrery-music.co.uk

I began to compose ‘Incantation’ for piano at the same time as reading a book by Philip Lieberman on human language and evolution: ‘Eve Spoke’. In parallel I was also listening to ‘Meta Incognita’ an electro-acoustic work by Philippe Le Goff, constructed primarily of Inuit conversations, mouth noises and quotidian environmental sounds. Out of these activities came the idea that there might exist forgotten words/sound-worlds which are an alternative to ‘our reality’. These worlds would appear as constructions of desire for a spiritual dimension. To reveal the unseen in nature (‘the interior of time’ ) we would need to hear these ‘forgotten’ words. The piano music ‘Incantation’ became the starting point for ‘Enter Earth’, and the whole work became the focus for the exploration of these ideas.

Text was recorded then later fragmented to produce individual component parts of speech. These  fragments of the following text represent the sounds of ‘forgotten’ words. The vocal sounds heard on the recording are an incantation to evoke the spiritual: ‘the interior of time’.

"The Sun which is always in the land, inside this earth, in likeness has risen to become the Dome. The voyage is certain from this place, this Holy City.

Now is the moment of the inner landscape. When the wheel turns, the forgotten words will reveal the interior of time. These signs are touched desire. Thunder speaks to the traveller, the storm of memories. Enter Earth."

Structure

The structure of the piece represents the tjurunga stone itself. (The sacred stones of the Aborigines of central Australia). On the surface of these stones are distinct areas of images/symbols/patterns, usually dividing the surface of the stone into three. Within ‘Enter Earth’ also there are three patterns ( areas of denser musical Material ), overlaying a more discreet background. The piece moves through and over these areas of difference until the last element of the piece ( fracturing stone ) is integrated within the structure.

The electro-acoustic piece ‘Meta Incognita’ by Philippe Le Goff premiered in 1991 during the Prix International Noroit-Léonce Petitot, was the result of a long journey which took him to the Arctic to listen to nature, language and music. A journey to find out who, of bird, man or wind, first began to sing and speak. There are two elements from ‘Meta Incognita’ which particularly inform ‘Enter Earth’. Firstly the atmosphere of a remote place with a strong spiritual dimension, and secondly the Inuit language revealing itself as an extremely economical form of communication. ‘Enter Earth’ explores the idea of the remote place through changes in surface texture/image as already mentioned. The fragmented text is integrated into the whole, as if another language of great economy. The rhythms, textures and colours of the sound-world in which this language is placed is more ‘musical’ than purely ‘environmental’ as it is in ‘Meta-Incognita’. The ‘nature mysticism’ subject of the text achieves its purpose by representing the ‘forgotten words’ within an ‘inner landscape’ made audible.

electro-acoustic catalogue



© Ian Harris 2003