Andi Chapple's music and art projects - electronics, DJing, site-specifics, installations, collaborations - Cumbria, England

Andi Chapple and Musicians

starting with Sounds in a Wood in mid-2008, I have devised a series of site-specific performances for a medium-sized group of perfomers which have mostly taken place around Sedbergh. I have tried to use the musicians' skills and repertoires - in part, so I had less music to write! - and have added my own electronics, some improvisational game-based stuff, some listening exercises for the audience, and some more straightforward songs and arrangements of others' work. I've had fantastic support and commitment from the musicians involved and I would like to thank all of them here.

Andi Chapple and Musicians in Preston, 22 May 2011

I was invited by the Music Practice department at UCLAN, Preston to make an 'And Musicians' performance with students from the department and musicians who live in the Preston area. the concert was on Sunday 22 May as part of the Department's 'Production Line' festival (more details available here), and ended up involving two kit drummers, five samba drummers, bass, four guitars, keyboards, sax, four barbershop singers from the Red Rose Chorus and two bagpipers and a drummer from the City of Preston Pipes and Drums, not to mention audience members playing cup fulls of peanuts. it was loud, and a lot of fun - I think both participants and audience enjoyed it.

I made a rather dodgy recording of the ensemble part of the performance on the night. here are two higher-resolution excerpts:

AC&M UCLAN 22May11 excerpt 1 320Kbps CBR.mp3 - drums and percussion, piano, guitars, semi-improvised (5 min, 12 MB, 320 Kbps)

AC&M UCLAN 22May11 excerpt 2 320Kbps CBR.mp3 - the full band (including bagpipes) take the reel 'Itchy Fingers' (3 min, 7 MB, 320 Kbps)

here is the whole of that part of the performance - it's at 128Kbps but given the recording device there's not a lot of loss of quality:

AC&M UCLAN 22May11 128Kbps CBR.mp3 (42 min, 39 MB, 128 Kbps)

Sedbergh Music Festival 2010

Left to right: Hall, Phil Bull, Blakey, Aveyard, Young, Han Bull, Chapple, Clayton, Geuer (screen grab from video by Jonathan Coleclough)

I was asked to put together a performance for the 2010 Festival and we did it on Saturday 12 June in the churchyard of St. Andrew's Church in the sunshine. there was a lot more percussion in this one than previously as Colin Blakey has been running a percussion group in Kendal; a lot of the members of that came along, and we also had a guest appearance from the great Robin Young. I also persuaded some members of the St. Andrew's bell-ringing team to take part on handbells, doing some of the bell-ringing they are used to as well as some stuff I dreamt up for them. the fiddlers were working with a deconstruction I did of pieces by Carolyn Francis.

Left to right: Wilson, Sharrocks, Denton, Griffiths, Hobson, Chapple (composite from photos by Helen Colledge)

I got a reasonable stereo recording of the performance, and have edited the hour's music down to a quarter-hour version of what went on - it's worth a listen!

ACandM12Jun10edit_192KbpsCBR.mp3 (16 min, 22 MB, 192 Kbps)

the band, in full: John Aveyard, percussion, gong; Colin Blakey, percussion; Han Bull, percussion; Phil Bull, violin, vocal, gong; Jo Clayton, percussion; Margaret Denton, handbells; Nela Geuer, percussion, vocal, gong; Elspeth Griffiths, handbells; Pip Hall, violin, vocal, gong; Sean Hobson, handbells; Susan Sharrocks, handbells; Angela Wilson, handbells; Robin Young, percussion.

Three Spring Performances

I am very lucky to have received funding from the National Lottery through Arts Council England and Sedbergh Parish Council, and support from Absolute Digital Print, We Make Media, the Churches Conservation Trust and Sedbergh Chamber of Trade, which enabled me to develop the fusion of my listening and soundwalk practice, my electronic music, and the vocal/instrumental ensemble work that I have been beginning to make over the last year or so into Three Spring Performances, which happened in May and June 2009 in south-east Cumbria.

Arts Council England ask those they fund to make a link available to their site so that other artists and musicians can access their funding - so if that's you, follow this link ...

Nature's Silver Seed

this performance, which was completely acoustic and ranged from strings-and-percussion arrangements of Neil Young songs through vocal improvisation to deep listening exercises for the audience, took place on Saturday 9 May at Sprint Mill, north of Kendal. Sprint Mill is the home of Edward and Romola Acland, and the centre of their organic smallholding, wood products workshop, and more - you can see a montage of photos of Sprint Mill by clicking here. Edward is also a very interesting visual artist. the performance was professionally filmed by Jo and Phil from WeMakeMedia in Ulverston; the film is hosted on Vimeo - to make it easy, it's embedded below, just click on the 'play' buttons.

Nature's Silver Seed - Part 1 filmed and edited by WeMakeMedia, hosted on Vimeo.

Nature's Silver Seed - Part 2 filmed and edited by WeMakeMedia, hosted on Vimeo.

here are two sound excerpts from the performance:

Listening to Sounds by Types of Material (2', 3MB, 192 Kbps) - an example of the kind of listening exercise I led as part of these performances; here we all are outside, by the River Sprint, and I'm asking people to pick sounds out of everything they can hear based on the type of material that is making the sound. listen out for the surprise at the end!

Ooby Dooby 1 (5', 7MB, 192 Kbps) - the singers working on a bar of interlocking, syncopated grooves, joined after a while by the musicians on some truly funky percussion. there was a lot of this sort of thing in 'Witnessed From The Slope' as well.

Witnessed From The Slope

this was an open-air performance at Queen's Gardens, Station Road, Sedbergh - a lovely small park with very big trees - at on Sunday 7 June. there was some listening to natural sound, some swingin' vocal work, a surround-sound electronic installation and instrumental interjections from the members of the Macaroon Ceilidh Band. I used the dedication ceremony (in 1902) of the cross in the park as a framework for the performance. it went well, I think, the audience was appreciative (well, most of them, of most of it) and most importantly the weather was kind. after a dodgy couple of days the sun came out, although it was still a bit cold.

Chinese Whispers/Clapping and Stamping (6 1/2', 9MB, 192 Kbps) - a couple of examples of music games that you don't need much training or practice to be able to enjoy, although we practised them first (of course!). Chinese Whispers is basically the old party game of repeating a phrase from ear to ear until it gets back to the start hopelessly confused, although we do it out loud, trying to copy the previous singer rather than an idea of what the phrase should be; Clapping and Stamping is ... well, just that. you can also hear the treated field recordings and some high-frequency electronics quite well.

These Grounds/Final Tone (4', 5MB, 192 Kbps) - 'These Grounds' is the faster and funkier of the two settings I wrote of the words on the memorial cross in Queen's Gardens, followed by the final example of an electronic tone cluster that had been repeated from time to time during the performance.

Suspense - Does Not Conclude -

the third performance took place on Wednesday 17 June. it was based on setting Emily Dickinson's poetry to hymn tunes likely to have been popular in the Sedbergh area in the late 19th century. as well as singing and live and electronic music, there was also be a live digital processing set-up transforming the sounds of passing traffic and making them part of the piece. the performance was at St. Gregory's Vale of Lune, Marthwaite, Sedbergh, a lovely retired (but not deconsecrated) church in the care of the Churches Conservation Trust. thanks to the Woofs for organising the parking and Alan Steadman for the electricity and toilets.

'There is a pain so utter' (3', 4MB, 192 Kbps) - percussion, piano and four-part harmonies.

'I stepped from Plank to Plank' (2', 3MB, 192 Kbps) - double bass and piano drone, electronics and four-part harmonies.

'The Wind begun to knead the Grass' (5', 7MB, 192 Kbps) - violin, piano, percussion and unison singing.

we performed the piece again on 19 September 2009 as part of the 2009 Sedbergh Festival of Books and Drama. it was well attended; opinions were polarised, but most people at least thought it was okay. there were a lot of Emily Dickinson fans there and I think they thought I'd not messed around with her work too much. once again, I didn't get a recording - I set the recorder up and everything, but I must have forgotten to switch it on.

The musicians

the squad for Three Spring Performances was: Helen Beare, cello and percussion; Colin Blakey, guitar, piano, whirly tube and percussion; Andy Boothman, percussion, double bass and whirly tube; Mark Browne, vocals and whirly tube; Han Bull, guitar, whirly tube and percussion; Phil Bull, fiddle, accordion, whirly tube and percussion; Nela Geuer, vocals, percussion and whirly tube; Jan Harrison, vocals and whirly tube; David Ramsbottom, vocals and whirly tube; Matt Robson, percussion; and Emma Watton, vocals and whirly tube. not everyone was at every performance. for the performance in September, David Ramsbottom couldn't be there but George Handley and Carole Nelson joined on vocals and whirly tube. my heartfelt thanks to them all for working extremely hard to master my crazed ideas in a very short time.

In The Sparkly Dark, December 2008

this was a sort of alternative Christmas show, aiming to capture the nice year's end feeling of stillness and recollection. there was electronic music - slow, peaceful and very sparkly; lighting by Andrew Allan and Steve Longlands which used pure colours to change the mood; a text from Helen Leslie Bromley which took a sideways look at the story of the Three Wise Men; Mark Browne, Nela Geuer, Jan Harrison and Emma Watton singing; and Colin Blakey and Phil Bull providing some real music. the show was at the People's Hall in Sedbergh. despite the atrocious weather about 40 people turned out, and the feedback I've had makes me think they liked it. for sound samples, click here to go to the 'Sounds and Recordings' page

Sounds in a Wood

this was a performance for voices and acoustic instruments which took place as part of the Sedbergh Music Festival on Sunday 15 June 2008. It was in Rawthey Wood, a small wood on the banks of the River Rawthey near Sedbergh opposite the confluence with the River Dee.

the performance related to the sound walks I have been doing in that I spoke directly to the audience during the performance, encouraging them to listen in various ways at various points in the performance, and used the music to potentiate the experiences I hope they were having.

it went well; as you can see in the photos below, about 25 people came to see the performance and they said they liked it - although the consensus was that it would have been good if there had been more music and less of me talking!

thanks go to Mr & Mrs Handley of Catholes Farm for allowing us to use the wood, and to the musicians for giving their all and being prepared to be a bit silly when it was necessary: Colin Blakey (gong/Galician bagpipes), Andy Boothman (percussion), Mark Browne (voice), Phil Bull (violin/accordian), Carolyn Francis (violin), Pip Hall (violin), Jan Harrison (voice), Yarona Mandevu (voice), David Ramsbottom (voice), Matthew Robson (percussion) and Emma Watton (voice).