Album Notes

The music on the debut recording of Redhooker was written in a vacated accident-injury law office 700 feet above ground in downtown Manhattan. The music was inspired by a year spent living in a quiet, isolated former port village called Red Hook. The stark contrast of these two environments yields a four piece program that is spacious but dark, dense yet fluid, cautious while extreme. A solo clarinet trails a lone violin creating long swaths of gossamer dissonance while a Rhodes quietly spins out its ostinato. An electric guitar enters the mix as the group embarks on a repetitive but contrapuntally rich dance. When the computer enters, it brings with it a monolithic drone – a composite of acoustic voices collected earlier, blended to reveal rich overtones that take on lives of their own. Gradually the acoustic instruments reenter, singing long lamenting lines vaguely reminiscent of 16th century choral polyphony, while the drone recedes to a role as foundation, and guides the players through the completion of their walk.