Artist : Penguin Cafe
Album : Handfuls Of Night
Year : 2019
Genre : Classical
Quality : 245kbps / 44.1KHz / Joint Stereo
Source : CD
Playtime : 0h 46m
Size : 86.26mb
Label : Erased Tapes Records
Catalognr : ERATP127CD
Tracklist:
01. Winter Sun 3:57
02. Chinstrap 5:49
03. Chapter 6:43
04. Adele 4:08
05. At The Top Of The Hill, They Stood... 5:40
06. Pythagoras On The Line Again 5:50
07. The Life Of An Emperor 4:56
08. Gentoo Origin 5:32
09. Midnight Sun 4:08
Releasenotes:
Handfuls of Night began life after Greenpeace commissioned Jeffes to write four
pieces of music corresponding to four breeds of penguins, to help raise
awareness for the endangered Antarctic seas. A fundraising evening at EartH in
Hackney followed, where Penguin Cafe premiered the four songs named after their
feathered counterparts to a sold out audience; the rousing contemporary folk
inflected 'Chinstrap', the mournful and minimalistic 'Adelie', stoic and
rhythmic 'The Life of an Emperor' and the wistful, string-laden 'Gentoo Origin'.
"This record started with a core of pieces I wrote specifically about penguins
in the Antarctic for a project with Greenpeace in autumn 2018. There are four
native Antarctic penguin species - each with their own individual
characteristics and natures. I carried on from there to envisage a whole
anthropomorphised world, where these penguins had narratives and adventures that
we soundtracked", says Jeffes. But both the album and Penguin Cafe as a project
have origins that reach further back:
"In 2005 I was asked to join an expedition re-creating Scott's last Antarctic
trip in 1911 for the BBC, using the same Edwardian equipment. I'm no explorer
but I was keen, especially as there's a family link - Scott was married to my
great grandmother before she married my great grandfather.
Antarctica by this stage being a protected environment, we swapped to the Arctic
circle where we spent 3 months on the Greenland ice sheet, first dog-sledding
and then man-hauling just short of 1000 km at 10,000 feet, across ice fields and
glaciers.
I had lots of time to ponder my life back home. It was then that I decided to
get my Master of Music degree and focus on composing music, and also then that I
realised that even in the most remote silent places, music can still be a huge
part of one's internal world and imagination. Whilst on the expedition. I spent
days playing things back in my head and also writing new things, which I would
then try and write down at the end of the day."
Handfuls of Night's tones, textures and melodies evoke otherworldly expanses,
which at different junctures are either foreboding, awe inspiring or peaceful.
There's subtly morphing rhythmic repetition throughout, somewhere between
minimalism, krautrock and the piano-cascades of label peer Lubomyr Melnyk.
Jeffes creates a kinetic, circling motion, which drives the album forward in the
form of a musical trip that mirrors the physical journey it was inspired by.
http://www.erasedtapes.com/release/eratp127-penguin-cafe-handfuls-of-night