Album Notes

Rocco Di Pietro- composer,writer,habilitationist,sound-cinematographer,educator. I work in the area between written out scored music and improvisation with conceptual work that is often trapped between genres.My recent reseach into consciousness studies in trance ,possession and ritual in discovering sources of the self has resulted in several new works including the "Rhizome for Evelyn Glennie" the world famous percussionist ('Touch the Sound'). I am also currently writing the follow ups to the "The Third Position" which is in the medium of electro-acoustic radio drama -novella."The Fourth" and "Fifth Positions" continue the exploration into alternate modes of consciousness.In this way "The Third Position" is really only the opening work of a large cycle of eight works in progress.In "The Forth" and "Fifth Positions" the narrative jounal of a human subject with an "I" is written out of the story as the tenses turn from "I" to "He" to "It"."The Third Position" was written as confessional literature.What was the most transgressive thing I could think of to do in Post-Modernism? To talk about a self as Alfred de Musset might have in the 1830's, when the self was not under siege.I researched this question after the Julian Jaynes book on the Bicameral Mind and explored the notion of consciousness as a drop that must be caught by a body that is itself a trap to catch consciousness.I also have composed works for various fixed media and have completed a non-improvisation for Pauline Oliveros called "A Turning" and a " Possession Entrainment for a Body Trap" 2007.Basically I a ask the question of the possible existence of "A Doctrine of Affections" within Post-Modernism.Aspects of the High Renaissance and Early Baroque are important to me:John Dowland,Saint Colombe,Carravagio,Gesualdo are today perceived as "authentic"when in fact a self as we understand it was emerging from the medieval period.This 'self' then under siege in Post-Modernist 'Simulation' and 'Hyper-Reality' made me attempt many links to ask questions:Could Saint Colombe(see the film "All the Mornings of the World") exist today among the soundscape artists of electro-acoustic and acousmatic composition?All these things are on my mind in creating this radio drama,THE THIRD POSITION.