TURNING THE WIND INTO SOUND
It was after hearing the effect of the wind upon the strings of an acoustic guitar that Roger Winfield began to experiment with wind music. After creating a variety of weird and wonderful devices using strings and soundboxes he found that his main problem lay in achieving a satisfactory level of volume.
Eventually he began using magnetic pick-ups to amplify the wind as it
played the strings. This led to the creation of an orchestra of eight
beautiful Aeolian harps created with the help of local luthiers Phil Davidson
and John Kinkade. These were to feature on his first album "WINDSONGS",
released in1991 on the Saydisc label.
The harps were made from a variety of materials, some from wood, others
from perspex, fibreglass and metal. Each material created a different
quality of sound which accounts for the rich variety of textures on the
album.
The harps were designed to take a particular gauge of metal string, the
larger instruments were strung with bass strings, the middle range ones
designed to take standard guitar strings,the smaller ones were fitted
with mandolin strings tocreate a soprano effect. The strings were all
carefully tuned to create the harmonics and overtones that make the sound
so distinctive.
THE RECORDINGS
WINDSONGS
The material for "WINDSONGS" was recorded in Southern Spain and edited in the UK. The first part of the album is a real "wind symphony" in four movements featuring (of course) the North, South, East and West winds. The second part Windsongs 1-4 features a variety of moods from different winds.
The bass-heavy
North Wind will blow your head off, the South Wind should chill you
out, the eerily frosty East Wind will take through a wintry landscape
and the West wind will gently sail you home again. It really is a
journey, you will transcend time and never be completely the same
again.
Lots of people must have agreed , because WINDSONGS eventually reached
No 1 in the New Age charts!
ON THE ROAD
Roger eventually took
his orchestra of harps out on the road, touring music and arts festivals
and other venues throughout the UK, the harps playing through a PA system.
The magical sound never failing to astonish audiences of all types and
ages.
In a Glastonbury festival revue a rock journalist from the NME wrote –
"If you can have your brain massaged by music, the Aeolian Harps
are the instruments to do it.".
After a couple of years touring with the harps Roger decided to make a
new album. The contents of this next batch of recordings were decided
by some of the many thousands of people who had heard the live shows,
some of whom already had copies of WINDSONGS. Over and over again he received
the same request "We‚d like a CD of the live unedited sound!"
THE SECOND ALBUM
VOICES OF THE WIND
This live sound was
indeed very different from WINDSONGS. For a start he was using a new
set
of windharps, carved from larchwood for him by sculptor/ guitar maker
Jon Kinkade of Bristol. These new harps also had more powerful pickups
on them and were capturing whole new levels of windsong that the previous
pick-ups couldn't find. The sound was also much simpler, just drones
with one or two simple harmonies added. Ideal, according to many people,
for meditation, healing etc.
Nothing else is really needed when things are happening live. The rising
and falling of the wind on the strings mirrored by the ever-present flags
and banners provide enough fascination.
Thus was born VOICES OF THE WIND, recorded spring/summer 1996 on a windy
hillside near Bath. Roger took a power source from a friend's house
and used his (sadly defunct) VW camper as a recording studio. The recording
of VOICES OF THE WIND was a painstaking task – at live performances part
of the experience lies in the silences between breezes as much as during
the moments when the harps are singing – on a recording however these
silences are not so effective. This meant waiting for breezes that were
constant enough to produce a continuity of sound. Quite a few beautiful
moments had to be scrubbed because the wind refused to co-operate!
VOICES OF THE WIND is especially effective as a kind of "aural incense" when played very quietly, almost subliminally as a background to massage, meditation or just chilling out. Unlike WINDSONGS there are no separate tracks, just one seamless flow of windmusic that takes the listener on a journey through different moods and textures. If you are unfamiliar with Roger Winfield's work it is advisable to buy WINDSONGS first.
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