Happy Friday all. Today I have released onto the world my latest musical work, Autumn Suite I-IV. It’s an 18-minute suite consisting of 4 parts that I’ve sewn together to make one long movement, if you will.
It didn’t start out that way, though.
It began back in September as me wanting to make an EP worth of tracks for the Halloween season. You know, something to throw on while staring out at the falling leaves, handing out candy to the trick-or-treaters, or just getting yourself in the mood for ghosts, monsters, and things that go bump in the night.
As with most things I do it evolved into something else. Thinking about getting older, seeing my kids turning to adults and moving on in their lives, and our once crowded house feeling immensely larger and lonelier, I felt a huge wave of both nostalgia for simpler times and sadness for what I can only describe it as an existential loss. A sadness, not depression, for feeling I let a lifetime slip away without even a second glance.
Instead of sitting in that melancholy I decided to work with those feelings and make art out of it. So these songs I had been working on had become the skeleton of a concept EP about fall, the passing of time, changes, and our eventual ending. It went from something sad to something euphoric and hopeful and beautiful.
It begins with “The Shade Of Fading”, which is buoyant and playful. Like kids jumping in a pile of burnt-orange leaves. It’s the first signs of the season. A reprieve from the oppressive heat of the summer. “Long Nights, Short Days” is somber and eerie. October coming to an end and bringing darker mornings and overcast evenings. “Let Us Walk The Path” is quiet and sweet, like an early November walk on cleared paths through naked forests as leave crumble under the feet of lovers. It’s the last of days where these walks aren’t oppressive under bitter cold and messy snow-wet ground. “The Dying Light(Midwest Winter)” brings us to the end, a 7-minute drone-heavy piece that starts in distortion and ends in a dizzying flurry of optimistic synth arpeggios. A blinding light from sunshine on crisp white snow. It’s resolution and resignation to an inevitable fate.
Don’t let the heaviness dissuade you. I really feel this is a fun and flowing work from yours truly. I’m very happy with how it came out, from the music to the flow to the artwork made by yours truly.
Hope you enjoy.
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