Squidco Blurb

A meditative and expansive improvisation from the Boston-based collective Turbulence, a precursor to Leap of Faith Orchestra led by Evil Clown leader David Peck, here performing on a variety of clarinets, saxophones, flutes, winds and percussive devices, in a quartet with Bob Moore on trumpets and percussion, Duane Reed on baritone horn and Melanie Howell-Brooks on contrabass clarinet.

Squidco Staff

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 May of 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.

I opened Evil Clown Headquarters in mid-May to players that have been fully vaccinated. Horn players can’t really wear a mask, so there was no way to do ECH studio sessions inside during the stupid CV. There has been some shifting in the roster with some players no longer available and some players returning after a period of absence. This set was originally scheduled around clarinetist Todd Brunel (who played on a couple Leap of Faith sets following the reboot in 2015) and Evil Clown newcomer Melanie Howell-Brooks (who plays flutes, clarinets and saxophones). As often happens with scheduling busy players, Todd had a schedule conflict arise after we arranged the session, so we went on with out him as a quartet with Melanie, Evil Clown regulars Bob Moores (trumpets) and Duane Reed (baritone horn), and me.

I met Melanie during the pandemic when she reached out to me regarding my contrabass clarinet, a fairly unusual horn at the bottom end of the clarinet family. I love low clarinets, and I had this metal, paperclip shaped, contra since the early 90s. In 2015 or 2016, I bought a nice contralto clarinet and I started to use the contrabass infrequently – it is a nice horn that plays well, but it has a tricky peg arrangement and is a bit awkward as a result. I tended to use the contralto as my main low clarinet, it’s in a great register, almost as low as the contrabass, and did not have any of the awkwardness of the giant paperclip. Anyhow, I bought a new contrabass at the beginning of 2020 which is a straight horn without the peg issues during instrument changes. In a wild coincidence, she inquired about this rare instrument and I happened to have two of them! Anyway, she bought my old horn from me to use for her immediate need and to extend her clarinet range to the bottom register.

I’m always looking for new qualified players to bring into Evil Clown, and during our discussion around her purchase of my old instrument, we decided that we would like to play together. This was her first set with Turbulence and she was great as I expected! Look for more of Melanie in Turbulence and Leap of Faith albums coming in the future from Evil Clown…

PEK – 7/17/2021