Although not a core member of Splinter Orchestra, I have learnt much from them about space, giving space and how something exquisitely minimal can be so profoundly heard. These qualities of practice have been intensified in my latest experience in Feb/Mar 2016 playing together with twenty of these sound artists in an intimate practice and recording environment in the midst of sand dunes and bush of Lake Mungo. What an honour to have the opportunity bring a sound practice to this landscape: the fragility, perhaps the grief it has suffered, its remembered lushness, along with its lineage of Lady Mungo which establishes the original people of this land a relationship to it dating at least 45,000 years ago.
The Splinter Orchestra has a sound improvisational language that they has been built over the years. With members coming and going over the years, it has shifted and negotiated dynamics. The reminder is to always step back, and listen...
In this project, we drove two van-loads of us to Lake Mungo as a way of meditating together through sound in relationship to the bush, sand dunes, the huge shearing shed and landing strip on location. We played at dawn, in the middle of the midday heat, at dusk, close to midnight. It was an experience to remember, playing with these twenty sound artists, musicians, vocalists, percussionists, drummers. It built a working intimacy that affected how we played for Tectonics in Adelaide Festival later.
