Turbulence Orchestra
Fluid Friction
Excerpt From Liner Notes by PEK
“… This set, Fluid Friction, is the largest Turbulence ensemble since we resumed this year, at 9 horn players doubling percussion. The set features a couple of relative Evil Clown newbies: Ellwood Epps (tp) makes his third appearance after playing on a recent Leap of Faith session (Meaning Arising) and a pre-virus Turbulence festival performance (Upheaval); Vance Provey (tp) makes his third appearance after playing on a recent Leap of Faith session (Revealing the Essence) and the last Turbulence session (Roughness of Surfaces), and David Welans (flutes) makes his third appearance after playing on the recent Expanse Meets the JDME Quartet session (Scope) and the last Turbulence session (Roughness of Surfaces). We also have two performers on their very first Evil Clown performance: Jared Holiday (woodwinds) and Dennis Livingston (flutes). The balance of the ensemble is made up from Evil Clown regulars…”
Fluid Friction:
Turbulence Orchestra
Evil Clown Headquarters, Waltham MA – 8 December 2021
1) Fluid Friction – 1:10:44
PEK – Clarinet, contralto & contrabass clarinets, soprano, alto, tenor & bass saxophones, bass flute, 5 hole wooden flute, alto & bass ocarinas, piccolo oboe, goat horn, bass tromboon, melodica, [d]ronin, electric chimes, chime rod boxes, spring boxes, gongs, crotales, glockenspiel, Tibetan bowls, castanets, seed pod rattle
Melanie Howell-Brooks – alto sax, bass clarinet, wooden irish flute, flute head joint, bowed crotales, glockenspiel, Temple & Tibetan bells, almglocken, cow bells, log drums, seed pod rattle, table, concertina, chime rod boxes, spring boxes, 17-string bass
Jared Holiday – tenor sax, bass clarinet, flute, beer bottle, 17-string bass, Englephone, wood blocks, log drums, brontosaurus bell
David Welans – flute, piccolo, flute head joint, head joint-dizi conversion, gong, glockenspiel, log drums, wood & temple blocks, balafon, bowed percussion
Dennis Livingston – flute, sopranino, soprano and alto recorders, ocarinas, assorted bottles
Vance Provey – trumpet, balafon, concertina, Tibetan bowls, chime rod boxes, spring boxes, gong
Ellwood Epps – trumpet, Tibetan bowl
Bob Moores – trumpet with various mutes, flugelhorn, small wooden whistles, slide whistle, mini cowbell, gong, plate gong, brontosaurus & tank bells, almglocken, crotales, glockenspiel, balafon,log drums, wood blocks, temple blocks, seed pod rattle, castanets, [d]ronin, electric chimes, chime rod boxes, spring boxes, gongs, crank siren
Duane Reed – baritone horn, bass trombone, trombone mute, slide whistle, balafon, glockenspiel, crotales, glockenspiel, gongs, bell tree, almglocken, Tibetan bowl, voice
Liner Notes by PEK
I formed Turbulence in 2015 as I started to assemble players for the Leap of Faith Orchestra. Turbulence, the extended horn section for the Orchestra (along with guests on other instruments), also records and performs as an independent unit. As if this writing in 2021, we have recorded over 30 albums on Evil Clown with greatly varied ensembles. All the smaller Evil Clown bands are really more about a general approach, rather than a specific set of musicians. A session gets credited to Turbulence when it is mostly horn players and the only musician on all of them is me. The sessions range from an early duet with Steve Norton and me (Vortex Generation Mechanisms) to a 5-horn band with bass and two percussionists (Encryption Schemes) to four albums by the side project Turbulence Doom Choir which feature myself, multiple tubas, percussion, electronics, and signal processing and many other configurations.
This set, Fluid Friction, is the largest Turbulence ensemble since we resumed this year, at 9 horn players doubling percussion. The set features a couple of relative Evil Clown newbies: Ellwood Epps (tp) makes his third appearance after playing on a recent Leap of Faith session (Meaning Arising) and a pre-virus Turbulence festival performance (Upheaval); Vance Provey (tp) makes his third appearance after playing on a recent Leap of Faith session (Revealing the Essence) and the last Turbulence session (Roughness of Surfaces), and David Welans (flutes) makes his third appearance after playing on the recent Expanse Meets the JDME Quartet session (Scope) and the last Turbulence session (Roughness of Surfaces). We also have two performers on their very first Evil Clown performance: Jared Holiday (woodwinds) and Dennis Livingston (flutes). The balance of the ensemble is made up from Evil Clown regulars…
I’m super happy with this session. The regulars and the newer arrivals really played extremely well together, listening intently and exercising admirable restraint. 9 players is a very large band for pure improvisation. Generally speaking, as ensemble size increases, so increases the difficulty of making music which is well-formed and tight. I’m very interested in the aesthetic problems of larger group pure improvisations. My Broad Palate concept is a solution to this problem which works by introducing many different possible sonorities. Over the duration of the work, the combination of instruments undergoes tremendous variation, leading to a sequence of very different movements. Most of the players on Fluid Friction play several horns, and also auxiliary percussion and the other instruments which are strewn all throughout the studio.
Anyway, I like this set and I bet you will too…
PEK – 12/9/2021
Video Screen Grabs
