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LP
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SLT 006LP
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Saltern present the first-time vinyl edition of Yoshi Wada's The Appointed Cloud (1987), a work which Wada has often said is his favorite of his own. Staged at the Great Hall of the New York Hall of Science, The Appointed Cloud was Wada's first large-scale, interactive installation and featured a custom pipe organ, among other homemade instruments, controlled by a computer with a customized interface and software designed by engineer David Rayna, known for his work with La Monte Young. This recording captures the opening performance for which Wada brought together four musicians on bagpipes (Wada, Bob Dombrowski, and Wayne Hankin) and percussion (Michael Pugliese) to perform with the installation, operated by David Rayna. Remastered from the original master tape by Stephan Mathieu, and cut to vinyl via Direct Metal Mastering by Hans-Jörg Maucksch at Pauler Acoustics. Pressed at RTI and printed at Stoughton. Includes a digital download of the album. Edition of 600.
In Wada's own words: "This performance [of The Appointed Cloud] was one of most memorable performances I've done. The space itself -- the Great Hall of the New York Hall of Science -- was incredible. The building was designed for the 1964-65 World's Fair and had spaceships hanging from the ceiling so people felt like they were traveling in outer space. It was an amazing experience with the sound of the pipe organ, sheet metal, pipe gong, and bagpipes all together. 60 minutes may seem like a long duration, but it didn't feel like it."
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LP
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ETAT 013LP
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2021 restock. "Yoshi Wada's Lament For The Rise And Fall Of The Elephantine Crocodile, originally released in 1982 on India Navigation, remains one of the most remarkable flowers to grow in the rarefied air of American minimalism -- akin to Terry Riley's Reed Streams and Pauline Oliveros' Accordion & Voice, yet with a wild, liberated energy all of its own. After graduating from Kyoto University of Fine Arts with a degree in sculpture, Wada moved to New York City in 1967 and quickly fell in with the community of artists known as Fluxus. In the early '70s, he began building his own instruments and writing musical compositions, studying with La Monte Young and Hindustani singer Pandit Pran Nath. Recorded during an epic three-day session in an empty swimming pool in upstate New York, Wada's first album brings together two of the oldest drone instruments -- the human voice and bagpipes -- to simple and glorious effect. A visit to the Scottish Highlands spurred Wada's interest in bagpipes, which the composer integrated into these sparse, otherworldly sounds heard on Lament. 'That swimming pool was quite hallucinatory,' recalls Wada. 'It was another world. I felt it in terms of resonance. I slept in the pool, and whenever I moved, I woke up because of the reverberations... The piece itself is an experiment with reeds and improvisational singing within the modal structure.' This first-time vinyl reissue is limited to 750 numbered copies. Comes with poster."
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LP
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SLT 003LP
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Sold out, to be repressed eventually, no ETA. First vinyl reissue of composer and Fluxus artist Yoshi Wada's second album, Off The Wall, originally released in 1985 by famed free jazz label FMP. Recorded in Berlin on May 11 and 12, 1984, by a quartet featuring Yoshi Wada and Wayne Hankin on bagpipes, Marilyn Bogerd on adapted organ (hand-built by Wada), and Andreas Schmidt Neri on percussion. Edition of 750. Mastered by Rashad Becker and housed in old-style gatefold jackets printed by Stoughton. "Off The Wall belongs somewhere between the exuberant harmolodic ritual of Ornette Coleman's Dancing In Your Head, a damp, medieval dirge and the inner ear soundings of composer Maryanne Amacher" --David Keenan, The Wire. "It may be more accurate to think of Wada as a sculptor than as a composer, because his music seems to be a physical reality, like wood or stone, and also because of the way he treats this material. Most composers work with ideas. Their basic interest is in melodies, harmonies, thematic relationships, tone rows, tonal centers, emotional qualities, and other rather abstract things, all of which can then be conveyed in sound, but none of which really are sound. Wada, on the other hand, works directly with the sound itself. His music would sound silly arranged for church organ for example. And if he prefers to preserve some improvisatory freedom rather than to notate specific musical ideas, this is at least partly because he is not so interested in the kinds of musical ideas that can be written down on paper. He wants to maintain direct contact with the physical reality of the sound." --Tom Johnson
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3LP
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EM 1109LP
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Restock of the last copies on vinyl. Singing in Unison is the latest in a series of recordings from acclaimed sound artist, composer, and performer Yoshi Wada. Recorded live over two nights in 1978, on March 14th and 15th at New York City's legendary performance space The Kitchen, Singing in Unison is a dramatic yet meditative work: modal improvisations for three male voices, singing, with great gravitas, in purposeful unison. These previously-unreleased recordings, featuring vocalists Richard Hayman, Imani Smith, and Wada himself are extremely powerful, with a glacial majesty and a sense of timeless wonder. Wada's earliest musical memories are of hearing Zen Buddhist ritual chants in his native Japan, and those memories are reflected in the deep vocalizations here; also evident is Wada's period of intense study with Indian master singer Pandit Pran Nath. Thus there is a definite "eastern" feeling to Singing in Unison, with further elements added by Imani Smith's Sufi background and Wada's interest in eastern European vocal styles, but the music is also informed by Wada's experiences in the Fluxus movement and as a member of the New York avant-garde community. The edgy atmosphere of 1970s New York City pervades these recordings, adding a hint of menace. Despite the fact that this is purely vocal music, fans of the slow-moving heaviosity of Sunn 0))) will appreciate Singing in Unison.
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CD
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EM 1109CD
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Singing in Unison is the latest in a series of recordings from acclaimed sound artist, composer, and performer Yoshi Wada. Recorded live over two nights in 1978, on March 14th and 15th at New York City's legendary performance space The Kitchen, Singing in Unison is a dramatic yet meditative work: modal improvisations for three male voices, singing, with great gravitas, in purposeful unison. These previously-unreleased recordings, featuring vocalists Richard Hayman, Imani Smith, and Wada himself are extremely powerful, with a glacial majesty and a sense of timeless wonder. Wada's earliest musical memories are of hearing Zen Buddhist ritual chants in his native Japan, and those memories are reflected in the deep vocalizations here; also evident is Wada's period of intense study with Indian master singer Pandit Pran Nath. Thus there is a definite "eastern" feeling to Singing in Unison, with further elements added by Imani Smith's Sufi background and Wada's interest in eastern European vocal styles, but the music is also informed by Wada's experiences in the Fluxus movement and as a member of the New York avant-garde community. The edgy atmosphere of 1970s New York City pervades these recordings, adding a hint of menace. Despite the fact that this is purely vocal music, fans of the slow-moving heaviosity of Sunn 0))) will appreciate Singing in Unison. Yoshi Wada has four previous releases on EM Records: Lament for the Rise and Fall of Elephantine Crocodile (EM 1074CD); The Appointed Cloud (EM 1076D); Off the Wall (EM 1078CD); and Earth Horns with Electronic Drone (EM 1081CD). CD version features the March 15 performance. Singing in Unison is a massive, monumental, monolith of vocal sound. 96khz/24bit digitally remastered. Liner notes written by Yoshi Wada, with English/Japanese text. Cover art by Yoshi Wada.
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CD
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EM 1081CD
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Yoshi Wada and EM Records presents the first-ever, world-premiere release of Earth Horns With Electronic Drone, recorded live in 1974. Combining four of Wada's self-made "pipehorns" (made from plumbing materials, over three meters in length), with an electronic drone tuned to the electrical current of the performance space, this is a lost masterpiece of early minimalism, placing Wada rightfully in the pantheon with La Monte Young, Phill Niblock, Maryanne Amacher and Alvin Lucier. Recorded live in Syracuse, New York, this recording captures the room-filling complex overtones generated by the ever-shifting interplay of the breathing horns and the constant electronic drone. This is a music of ritual hypnotic power, its heavy low-end mass and sense of change within constancy engendering a meditative transcendency. Earth Horns With Electronic Drone is the fourth and ultimate release in Em Records' Yoshi Wada series, a must for all fans of minimalism, heavy drones, ritual, mystery and world-shaking transcendence. From an original performance of almost three hours, the CD features a 77-minute excerpt. The full performance is also available as a 3LP set (162 minutes). From Earth horns to beyond the firmament: prepare to be elevated! Pipehorns constructed by Yoshi Wada; electronic equipment designed by Liz Phillips and Yoshi Wada; Electronics: Liz Phillips; Pipehorn Players: Jim Burton, Garrett List, Barbara Stewart and Yoshi Wada. 96khz/24bit digitally remastered, including a booklet with text in Japanese & English, and a reproduction circa-1975 Fluxus poster by George Maciunas.
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CD
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EM 1078CD
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2014 repress. More Yoshi Wada from EM Records! The long-awaited reissue of Wada's 1985 LP Off The Wall, recorded in Berlin and originally released on the esteemed FMP-subsidiary SAJ label. A minimalist yet majestic monsterpiece ("massive," as Tom Johnson declares in his perceptive liner notes), Off The Wall features Wada and Wayne Hankin on bagpipes, Marilyn Bogerd on adapted organ, and percussionist Andreas Schmidt-Neri. The original album consisted of two side-long pieces recorded on successive days by Jost Geber, who captured the power and dynamics of the quartet without losing the meditative delicacy of the bagpipes and the intricacy of their interplay with the homemade organ (constructed by Wada), resulting in a slowly-evolving mosaic of combination tones and overtones. Simultaneously static yet changing, rooted and ethereal, homespun and alien, ancient and very modern, the music is created entirely with acoustic instruments but has "electronic" textures at times, yet is very warm and human, always pulsing, shifting and mutating. Em Records is pleased indeed to release Off The Wall for the first time ever on CD, with the bonus track "Die Konsonanten Pfeifen," a slightly earlier recording with Wada and Hankin on bagpipes and Kevin Newhoff on percussion, originally released as a cassette.
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CD
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EM 1076CD
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This is the first-ever release of the extraordinary 1987 performance of Yoshi Wada's interactive sound installation The Appointed Cloud, recorded in the Great Hall of the New York Hall of Science. This majestic recording captures 60 minutes of sound produced by a self-made 80-pipe organ, a pipe gong, sirens and a massive suspended metal sheet, all triggered by a computer program designed by David Rayna. The CD also features Wada, Bob Drombowski and Wayne Hankin on bagpipes, plus Michael Pugliese (percussion). Dramatically structured, shifting and intense, The Appointed Cloud features massive low frequencies and regal percussion vying with the ululations of bagpipes, all resounding in the huge, reverberant space of the Great Hall with its 24-meter ceiling. This CD, the second Yoshi Wada release as a joint production of EM Records and Omega Point (the first being the reissue of 1982's Lament For The Rise and Fall of the Elephantine Crocodile), is sure to delight all who enjoy drones, dynamics and drama. "His creation explores the effects of low, rumbling bass sounds and the higher, ringing tones of the organ as they reverberate off the curving walls of the space ... The work continues Wada's fascination with producing sub-sonic sounds -- sound frequencies so low that it seems the sounds are produced by the inner ear rather than an outside source." --from the liner notes
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CD
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EM 1074CD
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2014 repress! Finally, a CD reissue of Yoshi Wada's most important and most rare LP, Lament For The Rise And Fall Of The Elephantine Crocodile, originally released in 1982 on the India Navigation label. Yoshi Wada is a Japanese sound installation artist and musician -- he moved to New York in the late 1960s, and became well-known as a Fluxus artist with links to La Monte Young, and has been involved in many performances and sound installations. However, he has released only two recordings, which are both hard to find. This CD contains two pieces: track 1 features a solo overtone voice (he studied with legendary Indian vocalist Pandit Pran Nath) recorded at the performance space Dry Pool (literally a dry pool that Wada slept in before this recording), with a deep underground echoing feeling. Track 2 displays Wada's trademark dense psychedelic drones using his "pipe horn," a home-made, bagpipe-like instrument. These wondrous sounds will take you to another, better world. 96khz/24bit digitally remastered complete full-length version (original LP edition was edited). Liner notes in English & Japanese.
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