This complication is created from the original tapes and LP. The tracks were cut from the original tapes and digitized at 196 Hz/24 bit for the production of this CD.
Rain Forest Music
Take recordings of rainfall and thunder from the East Texas forests, and
bird sounds from the Houston Zoo mixed with soothing, electronic music and it creates a peaceful, listening experience.
This is the original version of Rain Forest Music created in 1981 on a cassette titled, "Sound Paintings" and named "Rain Forest." I then give its own tape title, "Rain Forest Music" with "Ocean Music" as side two.
I have kept the title names as used on the original tapes.
Ocean Music
Inspired by many early morning and evening walks on many different beaches sets up this musical experience!
This originally was side two of the "Rain Forest Music" tape. It consist of four jazz/electronic pieces with synthesized ocean sounds in the background.
Visions of Life
A Musical Experience in Movement, Imagination and Inner Awareness -
Imagine meditating on your favorite beach with the sounds of the ocean and
gentle flowing music in the background.
"Visions of Life" was originally a tape with "Rain Forest Music" as side two. Then I presented it on the Rain Forest Music LP as "Visions During Movement."
I used a recording technique called, Continuous Tape Looping. It was used on albums by Terry Riley, Robert Fripp and Brian Eno, to name a few artist. I used two reel-to-reel tape decks placed about a foot apart, though you can set different distances to control the loop timing. This was all done in real time by starting the recording on deck 1, playing it back on deck 2 feeding the signal back to deck 1 carefully keeping the recording level stable, all the while adding new music and letting old music fade out. This image from the back cover of Brian Eno's Discreet vinyl album illustrates how this works. I used the Crumar Organ as the only instrument, adding different riffs and themes as it developed. Then I did the final master using a tape delay for the movement between tracks and a synthesizer for the ocean sounds.
Album cover was from an original water color created especially for the LP in 1982 by a local, Houston artist, Molly Khan. The sunrise photo was taken one morning in Virginia Beach, VA, during the 70s.
The instrumentation is a Crumar Traveler-1 organ and Yairi acoustic guitar processed with an EchoPlex EP-4, a DOD Phaser and a Ross Compressor recorded on a Teac A-3340S.
I originally designed this music to enhance relaxation and meditation, as a background for massage or for counseling to help a person relax and open up faster. Dr. Robert Pennington, PhD., a clinical
psychologist and friend, was very interested in the idea of using music in this way. So he
used the Rain Forest Music in his counseling sessions as background and noticed a marked difference in
the quality of the patient's sessions. He continues to use this and similar music as a
background for his counseling.
