UNDERGROUND
BY ANDREW MALE
Brian Harnetty ★★★★★
Words And Silences
WINESAP. CD/DL
The Columbus, Ohio-based artist finds solace in the words of an American Cistercian monk and theologian.
For the past 20 years, Brian Harnetty has moved between the worlds of music and archival research, turning his ethnographic studies of the Appalachian people of Kentucky and Ohio, and his exploration of the El Saturn archives of Sun Ra, into works of abstract folk beauty. For this album, Harnetty has studied the works of Thomas Merton, specifically recordings made in Kentucky in 1967 in which the philosopher discusses everything from Beckett and Foucault to ever-changing natural surroundings of his hermitage. Subtly referencing Merton’s own music tastes (Mary Lou Williams, John Coltrane etc), the subtle breathing patterns of meditation and the rhythmic sounds of nature captured on Merton’s tapes, Harnetty’s brass and wind ensemble craft a series of rising and falling musical conversations with the man. Reflective, vulnerable, melancholic and hypnotic, this is a record for times of solace, companionship and escape.