Album Notes

The creation of composer/guitarist/producer Royce Campbell’s “Ear Of The Beholder” CD is the result of many requests Campbell received from friends in the healing professions to do a New Age style project. Campbell is primarily known as a jazz guitarist (see www.roycecampbell.com), so it is a surprise that there are only a few tracks featuring guitar. “It was a nice change for me to do some tracks without guitar,” states Campbell. “Once I had decided to honor all of those requests to create “mood music,” I had to still do it with a sensibility that emerges from my love for and knowledge of jazz. That meant that I had to take a step back from actually playing a lot. I focused on the composing rather than the performance aspect.”

Although the CD makes perfect background music for massage or yoga sessions, or even for work sessions such as studying or reading, it is absolutely ideal for meditation sessions. Many of the tracks have a cinematic quality that, upon closer listening, can stimulate the imagination, generate positive energy, and definitely reduce stress.

The first track, the aptly titled “Isabella’s Journey,” does indeed take listeners on a journey across musical landscapes. While the song has the flowing quality typical of New Age music, it never gets repetitive. The passages of the journey Campbell has created here transition into each other seamlessly and always just at the right moment. Campbell joyously juggles with a multiplicity of influences without ever losing track of a bigger picture. “Breath of Nature, at 6:04 minutes the shortest tune on the CD, inspires listener to breathe deeply and attentively and to listen to the breath of nature just as deeply and attentively. The title track, “Ear of the Beholder,” continues that message; “listen and you shall hear,” it says. Campbell’s subtle—improvised—melody over an imaginative and evocative rhythm bed is mesmerizing and uplifting. “Inner Perception” and “Pastoral Peace,” the last two tracks on the CD, again highlight Campbell’s love for eccentric blending. He brings together western and eastern, modern and ancient, acoustic and electric instruments with daring, and yet, with method.

“Pastoral Peace” is the perfect final track. If you must get up and continue your day, you will feel refreshed and reenergized. If you want to continue your relaxation, just listen to the CD again, and you will hear it even more intensely the second, or third, or fourth time around.