Transformed wind chimes: Nature-Symphony 76

Nature-Symphony 76 (Beauty of Mother Nature's ever-running dynamo) — An exquisitely beautiful four-layer work, full of a resonating inspirational play of tone colours, using two metal chimes I'd omitted to consider putting together before — the Davis Blanchard The Blues and the Woodstock Gregorian chimes, also with bamboo chimes in the latter recording. Its sense of a driving purpose comes particularly from its subtle dynamo-like 'pedal' tone at (A2+G2) + (A3+G3), which I emphasized a little because of its musical importance here, and 'driving-forward' higher tone at E5+D5. Everything seems to revolve around those two tones, even when either isn't sounding. There's a haunting quality about it all, which seems deeply meaningful, and yet which defies explanation. One thing that gives the music such a sense of a 'proactive transcendence' is all the microtonal intervals and harmonies, a lot of which are a result of the Gregorian chimes being tuned to the standard A440 and the Blues chime being tuned to the brighter A448, though other microtonal effects are a result as usual of the reduced speed causing harmonics to be heard as though they were fundamental or at least 'singing' pitches.

Chimes used

(Layers 1+2)
Davis Blanchard The Blues chime — 8-tube galvanized steel chime, tuned to a Blues scale.

(Layers 3+4)
Woodstock Gregorian Chimes (tenor) — 6-tube, tuned to a bright and seemingly pretentiously upbeat-sounding Gregorian chant scale (which sounds quite different at such low pitches as here).
Indonesian bamboo chimes, large + small — undistinguished tone at the slowed speed here, but an excellent percussive element in the whole show.

I made the recordings by the Hunter's Path, high-up on the north side of the Teign Gorge, Drewsteignton, Devon, UK. The Gregorian and bamboo chimes were recorded together on 21 November 2012 at Sharp Tor, and the The Blues chime was recorded on 16 February 2017, on the rough slope just below Hunting Gate. Geolocation is for the Gregorian + bamboo chimes recording.

Advisory

To get the best out of this, with its mass of detail, listen with high-grade headphones.

This recording taking place; the small bamboo chime is hidden behind the Gregorian chime. Now try to spot the recorder, on its tiny tripod (with black furry windshield)…!

Techie stuff:

For the Layers 1+2 recording the recorder was a Sony PCM-M10, with Rycote Mini Windjammmer furry windshield, on a (tiny) Hama Mini tripod.

For the Layers 3+4 recording the recorder was a Sony PCM-D100, with two nested custom Windcut furry windshields, on a Zipshot Mini tripod.

Post-recording processing was to apply EQ in Audacity to correct for the muffling effect of the windshield, and, for PCM-M10 recording, widening the soundstage by 160%, which also greatly clarifies the stereo image.

For this work noise reduction was just strong reduction of mic wind noise using my 'extreme wind cut' preset (dynamic EQ) in TDR Nova GE for all layers individually.

Layer pitch shifts (semitones above / below original — all layers half-speed): -12, -31, -8, -15; cathedral acoustic: L1 moderate background, L2 mid foreground, L3 background, L4 mid foreground.

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