Numinosum
TRACK LIST
1 Epiphinated 3:58
2 Silver Spring 3:58
3 Lucid Dreaming 4:35
4 Valley Sunbeams 1:30
5 Valley Creek 3:20
6 Dave's Island Jam 3:31
7 Nomo FOMO 4:40
8 Look to the Sky 0:40
9 Supermang 4:04
10 Deep Origin 1:12
11 Deep End 3:01
12 Numinosum 4:45
13 No Two Ways 4:14
14 Take the Exit 4:37
15 Arcadian Falls 6:01
Live solo performances of original compositions featuring the following handpans:
RAV Vast (1, 3, 7, 8, 9, 14)
Pantheon Steel Halo (2, 4, 5, 15)
Saraz Handpan (2)
Dave’s Island Instruments (6, 12)
Sela Percussion (10, 11)
Aura Handpan (13)
This album is a Pure DSD 256 Stereo recording made using a pair of Audio Engineering Associates R44C microphones in the Blumlein stereo configuration. All tracks were performed live with no overdubs.
Produced and Engineered by Doug Fearn, George Hazelrigg, Geoff Hazelrigg
Production Assistant: Christopher Morgan
Original Artwork: AllisonPrettyman.com
Photos: Arun Paul Photography.
Also available in PureDSD format on NativeDSD.com
Video samples
Dave’s Island Jam
Supermang
Extended liner notes
I feel like I must be the musical equivalent of that proverbial cobbler. You know… The one whose own children go shoeless! For decades, I’ve been so preoccupied with helping other people produce their music - not a bad thing to do! - that I’ve neglected producing my own. It has taken the grace, vision, and trust of George and Geoff Hazelrigg, and Doug Fearn, to at long last bring some of my original compositions to life! For that, I am so grateful.
I was first introduced to a PanArt Hang drum around 2006. I immediately knew that handpans were meant for me! At that time, the handpan hadn’t yet ‘blown up’ as a phenomenon around the world. They were still rare and mysterious; as were the chances for getting one! Yet I discovered Pantheon Steel and their masterpieces, the Halo drum, and I was fortunate to be able to acquire a few of them over the next several years. Since then, my collection has grown significantly! But hey, I’m still not as crazy as a guitarist. I mean, come on!
The instruments I play on this album are from the following makers: Pantheon Steel (Kyle Cox), Dave’s Island Instruments (David Beery), Sela Percussion, Saraz, and Aura Handpan (Jon Antzoulis). These are what I guess you could call the ‘classical’ handpan style. The other type of drum featured on much of this album is technically a tongue drum: the RAV Vast. However, the makers of this special instrument took what is normally a rather simple-toned instrument, a tongue drum, and through their ingenuity and craftsmanship they created a harmonically rich instrument which is a classic in its own right, as I’m sure you can hear!
Two of the pieces on this album were written on those first Halo drums, some 10-12 years ago. Those are Valley Creek and Arcadian Falls. Silver Spring and Lucid Dreaming have been bouncing off the walls for several years or more. The remaining pieces are much more recent, and several of them were birthed in preparation for this very album: Dave’s Island Jam, Deep End, Numinosum, and all of the intros: Valley Sunbeams, Look to the Sky, Deep Origin.
For me, each instrument, each ‘pan’ has its own voice and its own story to tell. I feel that each instrument has as least one signature piece hidden within it, waiting to be revealed. I get excited when I get to discover it, when it is revealed to me. Surely, many times I feel that the music is indeed revealed to me. Epiphinated, for example, pretty much played itself to me one evening, in one sitting. I was about to head to bed, and I thought, “Let me just play a little bit first…”, and 15 minutes later, there it was. And now I get to share it with you!!
It is my hope that in this music, in the sounds themselves, you may find something that inspires you, calms you, energizes you, surprises you, activates you! I have been told more than a few times over the years that these instruments, my playing, my music, that it is somehow healing. I wish that for you, if that is what you need or want. At least, may it take you on a journey you were not expecting. I would consider that validation enough for the effort it took for us to cobble this together.