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 2026, we have recorded over 65 albums on Evil Clown with greatly varied ensembles.  All the smaller Evil Clown Ensembles 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.  More recently, the Turbulence Orchestra and Sub-Units project has been performing twice a year in Brattleboro VT.

Adjacent Flow Rising was scheduled originally to be Turbulence Orchestra. I assign the “Orchestra Suffix” to the ensemble name when there are 8 or more performers in the unit – Enough players to ensure there are several different sections of instruments of like family/timbre. I used to reduce the schedule significantly in the winter months since we are located basically in Boston where the weather can inhibit travel and equipment mobilization. The last 5 or 6 years have been milder with fewer/smaller snow storms that tend to melt off afterwards, so I have changed my tactics and scheduled a regular pace right through the season. Mostly this works pretty well, but Bob Moores and Kelsey Gallagher both live north of Boston and the storm that came along was worse for them than for us. Anyway, they canceled and so did Duane Reed and David Welans. So, the original ensemble of 10 was reduced to 6.

Sextet is plenty of performers, so of course we charged ahead with the available players like I always do, but I dropped “Orchestra” from the band name. The remaining ensemble is an example of what I call balanced:  2 reeds, 2 brass and 2 rhythm section. All the horn players spent time on the auxiliary percussion, electronic, and electro acoustic instruments which are permanently installed in the studio. The result is a great example of the broad palette aesthetic executed by an experienced group of hard core Evil Clown regulars. The piece naturally transforms through a long series of distinct sonorites as the players all execute instrument changes over the duration.

PEK 1/18/2026