Each track is an original piece that tells a story; you'll find a dragon who
fell in love with the moon, elephants daydreaming about having wings, a mouse-skeleton dance
party, and much more. Scroll down for a list of tracks and the stories that
go with them!
Imagine that you are
walking in a forest just after sunset, and you stumble across a mythic party
in a faerie glen. The music is irresistible, the wine is flowing, and the
glade is full of faeries and satyrs and centaurs and dryads, all laughing
and dancing and having a wonderful time. A friendly satyr notices you, takes
your hand, and draws you into the dance. You are swept away by the music and
the swirling magic around you, and time passes… and then you find that you
can't leave. Fortunately, you don't mind… why ever would you want to leave??
I woke up one morning with the music for this still
playing in my head, along with a strong image: an evergreen forest after a
recent rainstorm. The sun is streaming at an angle through the dripping
branches, lighting the falling droplets into rainbow gems, and creating
brilliant splashes of puddled light on the forest floor. And the rain
has woken up the trees, and they are singing.
We don’t get much
snow here in the Seattle area - but this past February, we awoke one day to
find it snowing hard. It was a heavy, wet snow; rather than individual
snowflakes, huge soggy wads of snow the size of a quarter were falling from
the sky, and making "ploof, ploof… ploof" noises when they landed. We got
about 5" of dense, soggy snow in about an hour; the weight of it brought
down many branches and a few trees. Even so, it sure was pretty! (Like the
snowstorm that inspired it, this piece is dark-grey, wet, and yet still
graceful - and also, like the snowstorm, pretty brief.)
Elephants are self-aware and highly intelligent, and
are fully capable of wondering about things -- for example, what it might be
like to fly. This piece is a musical interpretation of what might float
through an elephant's mind while watching a bird take flight.
Technically, she
isn't my dog; she belongs to my daughter-in-law, Sabrina, which makes her my
granddogger. Lillith is a pit bull rescue who loves everyone (she would
probably fail as a guard dog, unless she were to knock the thief over while
trying to lick his face). One of her favorite activities is zooming
cheerfully around our yard at high speed, pausing occasionally to Inspect
Something Important On The Ground. This piece was written for Lillith, her
cheerful approach to life, and, of course, her "zoomies".
And maybe you can
tell from the music: Lillith really is just the best dog.
Cello & shaker egg: Betsy Tinney
Bodhrán: Brenda Sutton
Cajon programming: Jeff Bohnhoff
Sleepy Leopard Blues
This started out as
a solo improvisation -- just cello over a walking bassline. Then my friend
Mary sent me some delightful jazzy piano that transformed it into a slinky,
intimate little improv duet - and I thought the piece was complete. But then
Jeff, my sound engineer (also a brilliant guitarist) quietly slipped some
tasty electric guitar into the mix -- and suddenly this piece was clad in a
long, sophisticated evening gown (in a leopard print, of course), and was
ready for a night out on the town. And now I can’t imagine her any
other way…
Cello: Betsy Tinney
Piano: Dr. Mary Crowell
Electric guitar: Jeff Bohnhoff
The Dragon Who Fell in Love With the Moon
There once was a sea
dragon who fell in love with the Moon, and the Moon loved him back – but
they were separated by distance and impossibility.
On calm, clear nights, the
Moon would reach out to the dragon across the great expanse of the sea, her
silvery light paving a glittering path to her heart. The dragon would take
wing toward her, and as he flew, he and the Moon would sing to each other,
their voices weaving sweetly together above the rippling waves.
But they were separated by
distance and impossibility, so eventually the Dragon would sink back to rest
upon the surging sea, still gazing up at his love's shining face --
exhausted, but nonetheless filled with joy. For he was in love with the
Moon, and he knew the Moon loved him back.
Cello: Betsy Tinney
For Becky, who asked me to write “something dark and
epic, with dragons in.”
Wyverns in the Winery
Wyverns in the Winery is a whimsical improvisation
between yours truly (Betsy Tinney, cello) and the incomparable Geli Wuerzner
(five-string violin/viola), with guest appearances by a few friendly local
wyverns and some excellent local wine.
The delightful cover art for this album was
originally created for this song by my daughter Cade Tinney, who whipped it
up amazingly fast (especially considering that neither the wyverns nor the
wine were present to help with the task).
Cello: Betsy Tinney
Viola/violin: Geli Wuerzner
Sweet is the Sound
This is a duo improvisation between Betsy Tinney
(me, cello) and S.J. Tucker (guitar & vocals). This piece flowed out of us
spontaneously, without any preceding discussion or planning. (Even Sooj's
vocals/lyrics were improvised - she says the words just popped into her mind
while we were playing.)
Cello: Betsy Tinney
Guitar & vocals: S.J. Tucker
Lyrics by S.J. Tucker
Behind My Eyelids
This track is based on a recent experience I had
with emergency eye surgery. (I'm fine now.) One day, I noticed flashes in my
right peripheral vision: brilliant yellow-white sparkles that blinked on and
off when I moved my eye. I also suddenly developed floaters in my right eye:
several diaphanous smoky-grey ribbons that wafted gracefully about between
me and the outside world. All these vision changes were kind of pretty, if
one didn't think too hard about the clinical implications (flashes and
floaters can signal a retinal tear, which if untreated can quickly progress
to retinal detachment and blindness). My ophthalmologist, Dr Basset,
confirmed that there was indeed a tear in my retina, and that laser surgery
was immediately required. He routinely performs such surgeries in his
office, so I trustingly put my face into his laser cannon's face bracket,
and tried not to flinch while a series of 49 agonizingly-bright laser bursts
"riveted" down the edges of the tear.
Behind My Eyelids is a musical painting of this
experience. It begins with what I normally see behind closed eyelids: dark,
slowly swirling colors with occasional brighter spots. Then the flashes
appear on the far right: a glitter of tiny bronze bells. The floaters,
represented by two swirling cello melodies, and the 49 pizzicato laser
bursts (which really do sound like the laser bursts felt, though not nearly
as loud) follow soon after. When the surgery is complete, the floaters swirl
quietly on for a little while, and then disappear.
While I can't recommend eye surgery as an ideal
source of artistic inspiration, I'm grateful for inspiration wherever I find
it. (I am also grateful that my vision is still fine. Thanks, Dr Bassett!)
Cello & bells: Betsy Tinney
Cat and Moth (Molly on the Table)
I wrote this after watching our Maine Coon cat Mali
(pronounced "Molly") in hot pursuit of an (understandably panicked) moth,
which led her on a mad chase through the house, always staying just too high
for her to reach. Finally, she leapt onto the kitchen table (which she knows
is forbidden), swatted the moth out of the air with one great spatulate paw,
and then promptly ate it before it could recover. Chomp.
Cello, Bodhrán programming: Betsy Tinney
Shaker egg & zills: S.J. Tucker
The Tiny Skeleton Shuffle
It's said that at midnight on Hallowe'en, the
skeletons rise up and dance. But why should humans have all the fun - what
about the animals? Cats like to dance, of course; and so do dogs and
elephants and alligators and ...mice.
Mice.
At this point, it occurred to me (with a slight
shudder) that on Halloween, the interstices of our (huge, old) house almost
certainly become the venue for a colossal mouse-skeleton party.
So I wrote them some dance music.
Cello (including cello thumps & shuffles): Betsy
Tinney
Song of the Hart
Song of the Hart was commissioned by my friend
Wayne, who asked me to write him something dark, wild and beautiful. By way
of inspiration, he sent me several gorgeous images of a stag standing wild,
alert and magnificent, its antlered head held high; he also wrote of the
pounding heart of the stag, the rush of its breath, and its power and
courage.
In addition to being a musical stew inspired by the
above images and ideas, this piece incorporates two specific motifs based on
actual field recordings. First is the call of the hunting horn, which echoes
through the forest and throughout the piece. Later, hidden deep in the piece
(from 4:07 to 4:33) is the staccato roar of a red stag, as it might sound if
the stag had a voice like a cello.
Cello: Betsy Tinney
For Wayne, of course.
Dalliance with Darcy
…so, you ask, who is Darcy? Darcy is the talented &
mysterious drummer who plays kit on this song (and, technically, is a
feature of Logic, the software program I use to mix my music). I spent most
of an afternoon using Logic to explain what I wanted, drumwise, for the
various parts of this song -- and to my delight, Darcy cooperated willingly
(unlike the last e-drummer I tried). Darcy is still a virtual stranger, of
course; but after several happy hours of making music together, I confess
I’ve developed a tiny musical crush on them. (That is, if one can have a
crush on a software feature...)
Cello: Betsy Tinney
Electric Guitar: Jeff Bohnhoff
Drum programming: Betsy Tinney & Jeff Bohnhoff
Drum: The mysterious Darcy
OTHER LINER NOTES
All tracking by Betsy
Tinney at Wild Pine Studios, Redmond, WA; except guitar on track 3 and
harmony vocals on track 9 tracked by SJ Tucker at The Pixie House,
bodhrán on track 5 tracked by Bill Sutton at
Bedlam House Studios, piano on track 6 tracked by Dr. Mary Crowell, and
electric guitar on tracks 6 and 14 tracked by Jeff Bohnoff at Mystic Fig
Studios.
Mixed by Jeff Bohnhoff at
Mystic Fig Studios, San Jose, CA www.mysticfig.com
Mastered at Trakworx in
San Francisco, CA www.trakworx.com
Album artwork by Cade
Tinney
Album design by Kevin K Wiley
Replicated at Oasis Disc Manufacturing www.oasiscd.com
All rights reserved by
Betsy Tinney www.betsytinney.com
All songs and this
recording copyright © Betsy Tinney 2017 except Wyverns in the Winery © 2017
by Betsy Tinney & Geli Wuerzner and Sweet is the Sound © 2017 by Betsy
Tinney & S.J. Tucker. All rights reserved.
Acknowledgments
This album would not exist
without the support of my wonderful subscribers on Patreon and Bandcamp.
Thank you all so much for your continuing support and encouragement over the
past two years!
To S.J. Tucker, Jeff
Bohnhoff, Dr Mary Crowell, Brenda Sutton, and Geli Wuerzner: your musical
contributions have made this album so much richer!
To Jeff Bohnhoff: Thank
you so much for your skill, your patience and your continued good nature
throughout this project. I am delighted and amazed by how beautifully your
mixes transformed my music!
Last but not least, so
many thanks and so much love to my family - Dave, Jamie, Cade, and Sabrina -
for all your love and support.