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"Objects of Devotion" is a collection of 3 ambient suites (intended for acousmatic performance) composed by Ollie Turbitt over the winter of 2021 and summer of 2022. Consisting of long drones, field recordings, devotional organ meditations and tape experiments, the 3 suites were written and performed according to strict compositional and improvisational approaches:
The first and most recent suite, composed in August 2022, was inspired by contemporary church organ music (Áine O'Dwyer, Anna von Hausswolff, Vanessa Amara). Both pieces were semi-improvised in the dark, using modular organ plugins and a 4-track tape machine. The suite's titles reference two Orthodox saints: Baalbek being the birthplace of Saint Barbara (the Great Martyr), and Radonezh being the realm of Sergius.
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The second suite, Leaning from the Steep Slope, was recorded over a cold winter in Trento, Italy. It is, in effect, an exercise in copyright infringement: each piece takes one jazz recording as its sole sound source, which is then stretched, blasted, reverberated and transposed into something completely unrecognisable. The pieces used are:
I&II - Red Clay by Freddie Hubbard
III - Romain by Bill Evans & Jim Hall
IV - Galaxy Around Olodumare by Alice Coltraine // Caravan by Art Blakey
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The final suite, "Music for Pigs of the Sounder" was composed after a journey through the Dolomites in May 2022. This time, visual inputs provided inspiration: as well as drawing from the mountain landscapes, the first piece was inspired by a Baselitz painting, and the second a photographic series by Boetti.
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ollie turbitt is a scottish composer, writer, and multi-instrumentalist based in trento, italy. as well as providing guitar and bass duties for a handful of bands, he has pursued a fluctuating solo career in avant-garde exploration. under the pseudonyms oxhead, sforza gramsci, oj turbitt, hermetic gaze and others, his self-released cassettes, usbs and digital albums have aimed to express ideas of cultural memory, false consciousness and mysticism/esotericism through improvisation, sound collage, ambient textures, laptop experimentation and field recordings. ollie also runs dead hound records (which serves as a platform for both his own material and an increasing list of international experimental acts) & works in freelance audio mixing/mastering
released September 9, 2022
ollie turbitt - organs, synths, field recordings, tape machines, audio manipulation, max, effects pedals, meditations
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lovingly dedicated to our lady of the gate of dawn
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"Ah, by praying to St. Barbara I felt even simpler
Than I think I am...
I felt common and domestic,
As if I’d lived my whole life
Peacefully, like the garden wall,
Having ideas and feelings the same way
A flower has scent and color..."
- Fernando Pessoa
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"I touched nothing with my hand.
I had not seen the view before.
After three nights I recognised
The moon once more."
- Bertolt Brecht, "The Shipwrecked Man's Report"