australia trip - to bundeena....

australia trip - exploring around the blue mountains

australia trip - blue mountains

the first photo was taken at Wired Lab before setting off for the blue mountains

its rather nice here....next two pictures are where i'm staying in blackheath

australia trip - the weekend workshop

workshops are made by the interaction between those leading & the participants. A nice group of folks gathered at The Wired Lab this weekend & a good time was, I think, had by all. The performance event on the saturday (photos to come) was a success apart from a rather odd glitch with my laptop which meant the carefully prepared projection of photographic images stopped & instead the audience were treated to a few snaps of me in a tent eating an apple ! No doubt some thought this was the oddest 'art' they'd seen for some time !

i'm now in the blue mountains for 4 days & the thunder is ringing across the landscape....

australia trip - day three  |  day four

rain, talk to locals, beef pie from the bakery, woolworths ! (no pick n' mix though), maltesers that tasted slightly different, good steak, listening....

day four so far: up at 5am for the dawn chorus, tennis court fence, house floor vibrations & cat snoring....

australia trip - day two

morning walk in canberra

then, arrival at Wired Lab - nice folks, nice food, good wires of course, loud frogs & anticipation....

after 3 days in Norfolk tutoring on another nice Wildeye course alongside Chris Watson, followed by 3 flights over 26 hours, I've now arrived in Australia for my residency at The Wired Lab.

(qantas win a prize for playing stereolab as boarding music in Melbourne !)

flying in over mountains covered in early mists, cloud like cobwebs holding on & sliding down valleys, (listening to elizabeth fraser's new work) & contemplating the time i'll spend in australia.  Its a privilege indeed to have been invited here by Sarah & Dave at Wired Lab. I am constantly aware of how lucky I am & how much my work begins with the understanding of that.

I'm staying a night in Canberra - surely the quietest capital city in the world. I went for a short walk near my hotel & saw one person on the streets. I arrived early in the morning & intended to set out for a walk & to take some photos of some of the art deco architecture, however a quick nap somehow turned into a deeper sleep & I awoke after sunset. Perhaps tomorrow morning....

in the meantime here's some archival photos of canberra....

small creatures from sweden

back from Sweden - Stockholm then Ängskärsgården to be precise.

Spent some time at EMS in Stockholm, looking around their studios & then giving a talk - well attended by an interesting bunch of folks, some of whom then joined me, Chris Watson & Piers Warren for the Wildeye Sound Recording course at the nature reserve on the east coast, 2 hours or so from the capital.

dawn choruses (in the rain & the sun), evening choruses, exploring abandoned buildings, fence wires & telephone cables, sexton beetles, grass, unidentified insects, hydrophone discoveries, empty rooms & much more....

good folks, good food, amazing scenery, some rain & much more....

new release on Gruenrekorder

Jez riley French - 'Estonian strings'

The unpredictable music of found strings, here captured using JrF contact microphones, offers up an experience both subtle and powerful – it keeps me fascinated, as does the challenge of presenting the results in a clear, emotive and simple way – allowing the moment of discovery to remain, tempered by the slow reveal of living with this music over time.

Please note: some of the frequencies of these structures mean that listening via computer speakers is not recommended, as you simply won’t be able to hear much of the sound. Therefore, please listen via conventional audio speakers or with headphones. thanks.

The reccordings featured in this composition were made during my first trip to Estonia for a residency at Moks. For those who haven’t visited Estonia before its vast openness and freedom from sound pollution make it a fascinating country to explore. The molasses hued mirrored lakes offered up some fascinating hydrophone recordings (some of which feature on my cd ‘the bright work’). whilst the sound of trees cracking together and grain barns rattling themselves from sleep in the occasionally strong winds provided some richly charged moments of deep listening.

I found transmitter cables, long chimney support cables, disused piano wires stretched across old farm utensils, rust covered fences – each one a surprise, a discovery and a joy to listen to. Also, standing in a simple, plain field bordering a seemingly endless, straight rail track and listening to the singing of the telephone lines that ran alongside the rails gave one a sense of unintended harmony between the modern world and the nature it all too often attempts to impose itself on. I made small cut-out pictures, placed them alongside the train tracks and in the long grass and photographed them – a picture story to send to my daughter – all the time with the sound of these long harp strings in my ears - JrF

Field Recording Series by Gruenrekorder
Gruenrekorder / Germany / 2012 / GrDl 106 / LC 09488

review by Cheryl Tipp:

Estonian Strings -- Jez riley French
(Gruenrekorder)

Jez riley French is well known for his work exploring sounds that are 
normally hidden from the general listener. His recordings bring forth 
new life into environments that are not actively forthcoming when it 
comes to sharing their acoustic qualities, thereby opening up new sound 
environments to explore.

"Estonian Strings" is the latest offering from French and takes the form 
of a 42 minute composition based on recordings made during his first 
trip to Estonia in the spring of 2009. With his constant desire to 
investigate new sonic sources, French applied his contact microphones to 
a variety of "found strings".

"I found transmitter cables, long chimney support cables, disused piano 
wires stretched across old farm utensils, rust covered fences -- each 
one a surprise, a discovery and a joy to listen to."

The result of this foray into the unknown is a select series of field 
recordings that have been patiently worked together to create a 
pulsating, otherworldly piece that quietly beckons to the listener. 
Headphones are a definite must if you want to fully appreciate the 
multilayered intricacies of this work. With headphones, 'Estonian 
Strings' takes on an almost mesmeric quality; the piece is unhurried and 
minimal, yet it seems almost impossible to remove oneself from this 
strange world. The changing tone of the work is unquestionably subtle, 
but there is enough happening to retain more than a passing interest in 
the content.

With his ear for the unusual and an unflinching curiosity, French once 
again opens up a portal to reveal a wealth of usually concealed sounds. 
Just the right balance has been struck between content and composition 
here, making 'Estonian Strings' an intriguing and enjoyable listening 
experience. ct