An artistic practice in percussion allows for endless possibility.
Any object can be an instrument; any action can be a musical gesture. With so much possibility and no constant, percussion may be the ultimate blank page.
So, where do I begin?
I am frozen by the blank page. Instead, I start with pages that have pre-made scribbles, some crinkle marks, some folds. These incidental findings form my initial inspiration and become the start of a project.
In most cases, these findings find me.
What is my initial inspiration when creating a composition?
Interestingly it’s not a melody, a rhythm or even a sound.
It starts with a feeling; the process is like trying to recall a memory or a distant sensation that I can never quite grasp.
I commence my development process by asking:
What does this feeling look like?
Is it shiny? Clear? Messy? Dark or bright? Cold? Furry?
How does it make me feel? How could it make the listener feel?
How does my body want to translate and perform this feeling?
Aesthetics start to form…
The answers lead me to imagine material objects; the instruments.
How does my body want to connect with these objects?
How does this connection form a sound?
From here, the rest will unfold.
***
Tidelines
Performing Tidelines felt so familiar; stepping into the work was like stepping into a dream or a memory. As I reflect more deeply on how Tidelines came to be, I begin to question where it really came from. There was never a moment when I intentionally decided to make a work about the moon and the sun, the ocean and ritual. However, these themes naturally and inexplicitly formed the underlying essence of the work. They are intrinsically linked to my practice and, until now, I have never questioned or attempted to articulate how or why.
Obsessions with the moon and with the night, with the feeling of being drenched in moonlight. The perpetual cycle between moonlight and the warm rays of the sun, the overlapping space between them as time passes. In the final stages of Tidelines’ development, a familiar memory kept replaying in my mind. It is a memory I’ve had for as long as I can remember, although I don’t think of it often.
It's the middle of the night.
I am quite young, maybe three years old. I am sitting in the back seat of the car; my parents have taken me out for a night drive to help me fall asleep.
My father comments on the moonlight. I look up through the car window at the bright night sky.
They pull over by the post box at the top of a small hill, just a short distance from our home. The hill overlooks a paddock and bushland, beautifully bathed in moonlight.
My mother and I stay in the car while my father walks into the paddock and comes back with the moon—it had fallen from the sky. Luckily, the stars were bright that night and kept the sky alight in the moon’s absence.
He passes it to me: a shiny silver crescent on the end of a stick, similar to a fairy’s wand.
We bring the moon back home with us.
Our friend and neighbour is over, and we are all sitting on the couch in the living room, with the moon placed on the coffee table. I play with it while the adults talk.
My father tells me that it’s time for bed.
The next morning, I wake and come downstairs.
“Where’s the moon?” I ask.
“We put it back in the sky” my father replies.
Sometime later—maybe months or years—I recall asking my mother, “Remember that time the moon fell from the sky, and we brought it home with us?”
She replied by asking, “What are you talking about?”
In that moment, I remember thinking to myself: I know it didn’t really happen… but how did it happen?
I wonder whether this is one of my first memories—albeit a three-year-old’s blur of reality and fantasy—or if it is in fact a memory at all.
Perhaps a dream I had when I was older…
Did I really ask my mother? Or is that a dream too?
What I do know, is that Tidelines feels like this story—how my body felt in the space, the sounds, the lighting.
That familiar feeling has led me to wonder:
