I was very pleased to have the opportunity to present a ‘guest’ mix as part of Dave Michuda’s excellent Low Light Mixes program.

Here’s my write-up on the program, a bit on the track selections and the track list:

I was very pleased when Dave invited me to submit a guest mix to the Low Light Mixes. Dave’s mixes are as diverse as they are interesting and they’re always chill with good vibes. I spent quite a bit of time thinking about what I might contribute that could hang with so many great mixes. I have a certain thing I do with the Ambient Soundbath Podcast, but the Low Light Mixes are more all-encompassing. 

After a couple months of deliberation, I decided that I would feature the work of my favorite composer, Harold Budd and newcomer, Durango Budd. Harold Budd’s fantastic catalog of work very much informs the work of Durango Budd (https://durangobudd.bandcamp.com), and both of these artists have the piano at the center of most of their creative pursuits. Harold Budd has a well-publicized and longstanding love/hate relationship with the piano, yet he manages to coax such beautiful music out of a wood box filled with felt-tipped hammers and strings. Durango Budd, similarly, takes the same instrument and through experimentation and synthesis manages to coax out equally beautiful, distressed tones that evoke melancholic nostalgia (as Mike Carss, the artist known as Altus, put it – https://www.altusmusic.ca/).
Track list for program:
  1. 00:00 – 06:00 – The Child with a Lion – Harold Budd – The White Arcades
  2. 06:00 – 09:30 – Piano Drone 4 – Durango Budd – Drones for Prepared and Synthesized Piano
  3. 09:30 – 12:30 – A Child in a Sylvan Field – Harold Budd – By the Dawn’s Early Light
  4. 12:30 – 31:00 – Bismillahi’ Rrahman Rrahim – Harold Budd – The Pavilion of Dreams
  5. 31:00 – 33:00 – Piano Drone 5 – Durango Budd – Drones for Prepared and Synthesized Piano
  6. 33:00 – 39:00 – The Room of Ancillary Dreams – Harold Budd – The Room
  7. 39:00 – 46:30 – Piano Synthesis Drone 3 – Durango Budd – Drones for Prepared and Synthesized Piano
  8. 46:30 – 59:00 – Agua – Harold Budd – Agua
  9. 59:00 – 61:30 – Piano Drone 1 – Durango Budd – Drones for Prepared and Synthesized Piano