An Ode to Night

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

An Ode to Night

How’re you enjoying these long nights, especially for those of you in the Northern Hemisphere? Personally I love them, so full of intrigue and mystery as they tend to be, and rue the day when daylight incrementally begins its slow swing back into dominance.

Snow came early to Ontario’s Near North this winter, and here is an improv which seems perfectly suited to mark this Winter Solstice that I performed outdoors recently on my Native North American Flute, inspired in part by the dark and cold – listen for the crunch of snow underfoot on the deck towards the beginning of this recording as I step out into the solitude of the empty night.

More subtle still is the echo and quick report of the shorter notes bouncing off of the adjacent outbuildings in the crisp air, or perhaps the rumble of a lone plane passing far overhead* midway through. And then of course there’s the sound of the door at the end as I head back in to the warmth of the fire!

For me this truly represents a Canadian Winter Solstice, offered up as an Ode to Night on my traditional Native American Love Flute, hopefully sending forth as many answers as musical questions – a healing energy projected out over the frozen river and forlorn cornfields barely discernible with their shroud of inky darkness and under a fresh blanket of snow, the eery glow of a distant Toronto serving as backdrop slung low on southern horizon.

* Headphones, as always, highly recommended, and this time for the full, lonely effect…Happy Listening!?