WDBX’s Music from Beyond the Lakes replayed a show from last year with Sensitive Chaos “Starry Night” in the program:
Music from Beyond the Lakes
Produced by Jerry Nelms and Namdar Mogharreban
Sundays, 8-10 pm Central Time, USA
WDBX, 91.1 FM, Carbondale, Illinois (www.wdbx.org)
Streamed LIVE at wdbx.scientistsuperstar.com
Listen by going to www.wdbx.org and click on “Listen”
This past Sunday’s program featured music by Liquid Mind; Crystalline Dream; Roger Eno; Mingo; Rudy Adrian; Oophoi & Louisa John-Krol; Vidna Obmana; King Never; Igneous Flame; Chad Hoefler; Jacob Young; and Sensitive Chaos.
February 10, 2008 (originally aired February 4, 2007)
“Cold Nights, Warm Hearts” (produced by Jerry Nelms)
There’s a cold beauty to snow in the woods: the gray sky blending with the
gray hills beyond, black trees set against white earth, and flakes and lines
of white moving up and down the landscape. And in the cold, icy twilight, a
new snow begins to fall. It’s easy to see the poetry of a snowfall from my
study window. It would be harder from my frozen deck.
We felt our first real blast of winter over the past week or so here in the
lower Midwest. It’s felt especially cold after so much mild weather this
winter, but if it remains, we’ll get used to it, of course.
There’s a Buddhist meditation I once read somewhere—I forget the source. It
goes something like this, I think: In winter, the cold wind blows through
the trees, but after the shivering, I come to heed it no more until the cold
wind ceases to blow. Then, my soul starts, conscious of something missed.
So often, we wish for constancy in this life, a world of constant
moderation, but the reality is most of us prefer the change of seasons. Too
long in one position, we have to move and stretch. And it seems best for us
that things change, lest we stiffen into complacency.
There’s a Buddhist legend that tells of a disciple approaching his master to
complain about the summer’s heat and winter’s cold. “How can I avoid them?” he asks. “Why not go to a place where there is no heat or cold?” the Master answers. “Where is that place without heat or cold?” the disciple asks. And the Master replies, “Death.”
It’s easy to end up like the legendary Buddhist “cold-suffering bird.” The
bird is said to live in the Snow Mountains, so the story goes, tormented
every night by the cold. And so, every night, he promises himself that the
next morning, he will build a nest to keep himself warm. But comes the
daybreak and the warm sunlight, he forgets about the nest, spending the day
sleeping in the warmth. When night falls again, he suffers again, making
the same promise that he will never keep night after night.
Avoidance behavior is a natural response to suffering, of course, because to
think about it is only to relive it. Our images of hell may well have their
origins in this natural tendency to avoid pain and suffering. We project
uncomfortable thoughts of suffering onto the generic wicked. We can think
of nothing worse for them than an eternity of pain and suffering.
Popular images of hell are fiery, but many hells have been conceived of as
cold, gloomy places. A true hell for many of us might be one that
alternates between unbearable swelter and unbearable cold, never allowing
the sufferer to become acclimated to either.
Ironically, perhaps, acclimation and its corollary complacency might well be
what lead many into an afterlife of hell, if such a place or condition
exists. Despite the discomfort, a little shock of cold affliction to wake
us into an awareness of others’ plight might not be such a bad thing.
Another Buddhist meditation goes something like this: For those of us clad
in vestments warm and rich, the winter will not touch us, but if we but
think about that, our thoughts will turn to the shivering poor, freezing in
their thin rags.
It’s easy to avoid thinking about those less fortunate, those who suffer the
cold while we warm ourselves by the fireplace. But while a hearth fire can
warm the skin, it cannot warm the heart. That requires a kind of love, a
feeling of kinship and fellowship with others, a sympathy and empathy, an
imagining how the cold feels, that leads us, perhaps, to try to ameliorate,
as best we can, their plight.
The snow continues to fall in the dark, softly blanketing the earth and
trees once more with a natural beauty that takes my thoughts to worlds of
poetry beyond this one of suffering. But I consciously step out onto my
frozen deck and feel the icy sting of the cold deep winter night. I may no
longer appreciate the beauty there in the woods beyond the window light, but
there is a truth out there that I can no longer ignore. I’ll stand here a
while and let the frozen air penetrate my pours until my heart warms enough
to stand going back inside again.
This evening, let’s contemplate the actual, the real, consequences for many
of a cold, and, yes, also beautiful, snowfall. I’ll provide the background
music for us with a program entitled “Cold Nights, Warm Hearts.” We begin
with these calming, orchestral chimes and drones by Los Angeles keyboardist
Chuck Wild (a.k.a. Liquid Mind) from his first ambient album from 1994,
Ambience Minimus. Later, we’ll hear atmospheric, icy ambience by
flutist/sound artist Richard Ross, going under the name Crystalline Dream; a
shimmering nightscape by English pianist/ keyboardist Roger Eno; and more
ethereal atmospherics by Crystalline Dream again. In our second half-hour,
we’ll hear darkly electric music by Colorado sound artist Mingo; windswept,
otherworldly ambience by New Zealand keyboardist Rudy Adrian; further
haunting atmospherics from sound artist Oöphoi, in collaboration with
vocalist Louisa John-Krol; and finally, a delicate, wintry soundscape by
Belgian composer/ keyboardist Dirk Serries, better known as Vidna Obmana.
We’re contemplating our tendency to avoid thinking about the pain and
suffering of others, yet our realization that our own well-being cannot be
separated from an engagement with the world, “Cold Nights, Warm Hearts,”
suffering and benevolence, connections between the cold winter out there and the warmth and security inside, all leading us once again Beyond the Lakes.
8:00-8:30pm
Liquid Mind – Ambience Minimus – Real Music – 1994
“Whisperchill”
Crystalline Dream – Threshold – Solovey Music – 2006
“Ethereal Gauze”
Roger Eno – The Night Garden – La Cooka Racha Records – 1999
“Lengthening Shadows”
Crystalline Dream – Threshold – Solovey Music – 2006
“Crystalline Dream 2”
8:30-9:00pm
Mingo – This Side of the Night – sonarweb communications – 2006
“and colors are more beautiful there”
Rudy Adrian – Moonwater – Lotuspike – 2006
“Three Views of a Japanese Garden, part 2 (live)”
Oophoi and Louisa John-Krol – I Hear the Water Dreaming – Prikosnovenie –
2005
“Let the Night Sky Envelope Us”
Vidna Obmana – Memories Compiled 2 – Projekt – 1999
“In Winter Calm”
On those cold, mid-winter nights, it always feels good to put another log on
the fire, wrap yourself in a nice warm blanket, and forget the world’s
troubles. But the world’s troubles don’t go away. We humans have this
drive to avoid suffering and pain—and even thinking about pain and
suffering. No doubt, at one time in the history of our species, this drive
was a good thing, but now, perhaps not so good. The cliché “ignorance is
bliss” comes to mind. But that bliss comes at a heavy price, for to
complacently ignore the suffering of others means the suffering continues
unabated. It won’t lessen unless we do things to lessen it, and that
requires our acknowledgement of it, uncomfortable to us as it is. Yet, some
of us would ask, “Why? Why worry about others? Why not simply live for
ourselves?”
Former tennis star Andrea Yeager provides an answer. Yeager became a pro in 1979 at age 14. Two years later, she was ranked second in the world. But she was forced by a shoulder injury to retire from tennis at age 19 in 1984.
That, however, did not stop Yeager. She used her winnings in 1990 to start the Silver Lining Foundation and Silver Lining Ranch for children with cancer. Four months ago, Yeager became a Dominican nun in the Episcopal
Church. “When you touch a person’s life once, in a pure way, genuine way,” Yeager has said, “it’s so powerful it can last forever.”
It may be that there is no god. It may be that this life has no meaning
beyond whatever we put into it. And so, it may also be true, then, that
caring about the sufferings of others is meaningless. I imagine, however,
that that way of thinking would disturb most of us. Once made aware of
human suffering, how can we, then, turn our backs? Do we risk our own souls
in the process?
And so, this evening, we’re contemplating our need to confront human
suffering, to take steps to look out onto a beautiful snow-covered winter
landscape and remind ourselves of those who might be left out in that cold,
to close to it to appreciate its beauty. We begin our second hour with this
coolly electric guitar ambience by Matt McCabe, who goes by the name King
Never. We’ll devote the remainder of this third half-hour to four darkly
luminous soundscapes by guitarist Pete Kelly, calling himself Igneous Flame.
In our final half-hour, we’ll hear simultaneously playful and poignant
electronics by Ohio sound artist Chad Hoefler; gentle, twilit environmental
jazz by Norwegian guitarist Jacob Young and his ensemble; glistening newage/jazz crossover music by keyboardist Jim Combs (a.k.a. Sensitive Chaos), assisted by Brian Good on sax; and finally, a haunting composition by Roger Eno again, this time from his 1992 recording Between Tides.
“Cold Nights, Warm Hearts,” tonight on Music from Beyond the Lakes.
9:00-9:30pm
King Never – Lullabies & Sleepless Nights – Matt McCabe – 2007
“The Quiet Hour”
Igneous Flame – Astra – Chillfactor 10 Records – 2006
“Pluto-cracy”
“Lumina”
“Geo”
“Nimbus”
9:30-10:00pm
Chad Hoefler – Quiet Glow – Lotuspike – 2005
“Luminary”
Jacob Young – Evening Falls – ECM – 2004
“Evening Air”
Sensitive Chaos – Leak – Subsequent Records – 2006
“Starry Night” (excerpt)
Roger Eno – Compounds + Elements [compilation] – All Saints Records – 2006;
originally released on Between Tides – All Saints Records – 1992
“Winter Music”