Walking the Old Track is an EP, comprising four tracks, that were all created in 2023. Similar to the last album, it was published at Imbolc in 2024. It was originally going to be a longer album, but for various reasons I decided that these tracks needed to be released together as a group, as that the next set of tracks were likely to be somewhat

Walking the Old Track is an EP, comprising four tracks, that were all created in 2023. Similar to the last album, it was published at Imbolc in 2024. It was originally going to be a longer album, but for various reasons I decided that these tracks needed to be released together as a group, as that the next set of tracks were likely to be somewhat different. So, an EP it is.

The tracks are in theory constrained, as I chose to use only one synthesizer - Omnisphere - in creating them. Of course, this isn't a constraint at all, but rather a spur to creativity. They still all conform to my general style of "vaguely ambient" music.

Published on Imbolc, 2023 (Feb 1st) my second album, Layers of Abstraction, is a child of 2022. It was started on the spring Equinox, after my first album was published. Mastering was finished just after the New Year. It's a little more traditionally ambient - if there even is such a thing - and a little less experimental. The sound sources on it

Published on Imbolc, 2023 (Feb 1st) my second album, Layers of Abstraction, is a child of 2022. It was started on the spring Equinox, after my first album was published. Mastering was finished just after the New Year. It's a little more traditionally ambient - if there even is such a thing - and a little less experimental. The sound sources on it can largely be categorized into two groupings: modern synthetic/sampled sounds with heavy emphasis on sound design, and vintage analog synthesizers. For the former, I don't know why, but I am really drawn to the Nordic influenced Luftrum and Triple Spiral. For the latter, there are a few excellent software emulations - especially the ones by Arturia - which for various reasons, I prefer over fiddling with hardware synths. On this album, the synthesizers are predominantly the Minimoog model D and the Yamaha CS-80. I am extremely fond of both of these synthesizers, which were foundational to my interests in the sensual aspects of sound.

A few notes on names:

Layers of Abstraction is a term much beloved by software developers when designing large scale software systems. It turns out that it's also a useful paradigm for thinking about and organizing many concepts, which is why it spoke to me.

The Love of my Life has two meanings on this album. First, I have always been drawn to the sound of closely heard resonances from grand pianos. It's certainly one love of my life. I rather doubt that I am done exploring this yet. Second, and much more to the point, it is dedicated to the real love of my life, my wife of 32 years, Kelly.

Ringed by the High Mountains is a term that will make sense to anyone who has ever visited Taos New Mexico, where we spend a good part of our time. To the east, there is the wall of the Sangre de Cristo mountains. To the west, slashed by the deep Rio Grande gorge, is the horizontal plane of the mesa. And then, in the distance to the South, West and North are yet more high mountains - El Pedernal (much beloved by Georgia O'Keefe), and extinct volcanoes such as San Antonio and Ute Mountain - that are visible for dozens and dozens and dozens of miles.

A smell of Turpentine pervades the Whole has its roots in an apocryphal story that my mother was fond of telling. But when the family researched it, we found - greatly to our surprise - that it was true and the back story was riveting. This explains it better than I ever could: https://quoteinvestigator.com/2012/03/31/turpentine-prevails/

In 2021, while transitioning out of my old life as a cybersecurity executive, I stared working on my first large collection of ambient music pieces. This album, Finally Coming Home, was something of a journeyman experience for me, as I had a solid theoretical understanding of what I wanted to create, but didn’t then have the “muscle memory” that I

In 2021, while transitioning out of my old life as a cybersecurity executive, I stared working on my first large collection of ambient music pieces. This album, Finally Coming Home, was something of a journeyman experience for me, as I had a solid theoretical understanding of what I wanted to create, but didn’t then have the “muscle memory” that I needed to pull it together. Music software turns out to be quite persnickety, and hard to master!

While all of these pieces can generally be described as ambient music, several of them are also reminiscent of classical tone poems. (You can more or less work out which tracks based on their titles.) Something about the sounds I was using seemed to want to tell a story, and I followed my intuition wherever it led. It seems to be a consistent one about humanity’s impact on the world. This is the story that we’re all living now, and it’s our destiny to understand what we’re doing collectively – and hopefully adjust our behavior. I personally find that that one word that describes these feelings is wistful.

James Lovelock, originator of the Gaia hypothesis said in 2021: “But my fellow humans must learn to live in partnership with the Earth, otherwise the rest of creation will, as part of Gaia, unconsciously move the Earth to a new state in which humans may no longer be welcome. The virus, Covid-19, may well have been one negative feedback. Gaia will try harder next time with something even nastier.”

My wife told me recently that she had seen a great quote from Paul Hawken, and perhaps it lets us end on a high note: “Healing the wounds of the earth and its people does not require saintliness or a political party, only gumption and persistence. It is not a liberal or a conservative activity; it is a sacred act. It is a massive enterprise undertaken by ordinary citizens everywhere, not by self-appointed governments or oligarchies.”

The album was published on March 20th, 2022, the spring equinox.

In the summer of 2021, I was struggling with a major infestation of moles in our garden in California. Blue herons are voracious hunters of moles, but they did not visit often enough to make a significant dent in the problem. I had read somewhere that moles are sensitive to noise, and will flee from loud underground sounds. I also saw a funny

In the summer of 2021, I was struggling with a major infestation of moles in our garden in California. Blue herons are voracious hunters of moles, but they did not visit often enough to make a significant dent in the problem. I had read somewhere that moles are sensitive to noise, and will flee from loud underground sounds. I also saw a funny Youtube video of someone attempting exactly that feat with a buried loudspeaker playing Celine Dion’s Greatest Hits.

I therefore thought it would be interesting to make some pieces that had less dynamic range (meaning the volume could be turned up louder), but also had a broad range of active frequencies. Each piece also uses a very limited palette of software synthesizers. These are quite active pieces and are at the edges of what I think of as ambient music, if not beyond it.

The moles hate it all, by the way, and keep well outside of a 20 foot radius of the speaker, which is buried about 2 feet down…

This EP was released to major streaming platforms on February 2nd 2022 - which was the day after Imbolc, or Candlemas for more conventional folk. Please note that the tracks offered here are all 128kbit MP3; the quality of tracks on most streaming platforms will be CD quality (i.e. 16 bit), so don't expect them to sound quite the same - the streaming ones will generally be higher quality.