Featured
artist this week on The Jazz Network Worldwide: Colin Whitby - creator of
culturally diverse ‘hybrid’ music, releases his new CD “Synchronicity”
The title of
the album Synchronicity is an indirect, playful reference to the ‘unexpected’
meeting of diverse genres and instrumentation encountered in each of the seven
tracks, and specifically to their potential use for sync in film projects and
more.
Colin Whitby
has worked in various capacities in the creative industries including film
production and has been working with audio production and music creation
software for close to eighteen years, culminating in the creation of his
distinct ‘hybrid’ compositions. Apart from pure listening pleasure, these seven
tracks were created with “music sync” in mind with a wide variety of musical
influences, from Classical to Jazz, Funk, Dub, Industrial, traditional Ethnic,
Ambient and Experimental/Systems music. Psychology also plays a part and
creatively, the work of Swiss analytical psychologist Carl Jung is an important
inspiration to Whitby, who is also a visual artist. Whitby does not restrict
his musical choices by following a strict concept; rather he finds himself
naturally inclined to a non-hierarchic eclectic field of musical directions.
His nuanced ‘hybrid’ compositions are informed by a musicological interest as
well as passion and flair for music composition.
But while he
is creatively multivalent, music has been a mainstay, with the trumpet being
his traditional instrument. There were influential periods of experimenting
with recording incidental sounds of the city, and in nature, that had earlier
fed ideas of music concrete, now discernible in such tracks as Off the Rails.
Percussion has been the natural medium, using a full drum kit, between periods
of painting and object-making, in his East London studio.
The hybrid
genres of the seven tracks are like distillations or ‘time capsules’ of “world”
music. And, is it coincidence or not that Whitby hails from the historical port
city of Liverpool, England? Centuries ago, English seafarers would have reached
the ancient ports of the Nusantara, now modern day Southeast Asia, where Whitby
currently resides. All seems to be rather in “sync”, in that meaning has come
about via unforeseen connections!
“The seven
tracks were created with “music sync” in mind. The title of the album
Synchronicity is a play on the word “sync” as in potential synchronization with
film projects and other media. It also kind of refers to the ‘unexpected’
meeting or surprising co-existence, if you like, of disparate and diverse
genres and instrumentation in a ‘shared space’. I wanted to create nuances,
shifting grounds, unexpected juxtapositions that keep the listener guessing.
Each track came about naturally from personal experiences and choices made from
a wide field of musical interests I had developed over the years. The end result, the album as a whole, I think
is a landscape of diverse sounds, a kind of confluence of styles and genres.
Each track is a small ‘window’ onto a ‘soundscape’ coming out of a disparate
range of instruments. They variously refer to the timeless classical past and
contemporary eras of the West, to tribal/ethnic chants, to tonal shapes and
structures that point to the more ‘futuristic’ allusions of minimalist Systems
Music. Each track holds subliminal ‘cinematic memories’ or ‘themes’ inspired by
film moments, perhaps continuing in the tradition of “Music for Films” (Eno)
and “Pictures in an Exhibition” (Mussorgsky).” ~ Colin Whitby
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