Ellen Fullman - Through Glass Panes

Ellen Fullmans's first proper full length for Important Records follows her collaborative work with Barn Owl (IMPREC277) and a split LP
with Eleh (IMPREC318). She was also featured on The Harmonic Series: A Collection Of Work In Just Intonation (IMPREC272).
In 1981 Ellen Fullman began developing the “Long String Instrument,” an installation of dozens of wires fifty feet or more in length, tuned  in Just Intonation and ‘bowed’ with rosin coated fingers. Fullman has developed a unique notation system to choreograph the performer’s movements, exploring sonic events that occur at specific nodal point locations along the string-length of the instrument. She has recorded extensively with this unusual instrument and has collaborated with such luminary figures as composer Pauline Oliveros, choreographer Deborah Hay, the Kronos Quartet, and Keiji Haino. She has been the recipient of numerous awards, commissions and residencies. Through Glass Panes In composing “Event Locations No. 2”, I set out to focus more strictly than I ever had on detail in the choreography of my notation. Through writing the piece I designed ways to add more specific information in the score. The tuning uses a set of pitches based in the key of A, in combination with Arnold Dreyblatt’s tuning system based on F. These two roots generate tones in common but also complex or “dissonant” tones. I wanted to find a way to incorporate more dissonance into my sound and intentionally worked with beating frequencies in this piece. “Never Gets Out of Me”, a duet with cellist Theresa Wong, and “Flowers”, a trio recorded with Travis Weller and Henna Cho, are adaptations from “Stratified Bands: Last Kind Words”, originally composed for the Kronos Quartet in the Other Minds Festival. The composition is based on Last Kind Words Blues, a haunting song by Geeshie Wiley recorded in 1930. An excerpt of the lyrics:If I get killed, if I get killed, please don’t bury my soul,I’d pro’bly just leave me out, let the buzzards eat me whole.The cello and violin writing for these pieces was influenced by my study of North Indian vocal music. My intention is that the sounds of all instruments mesh into an undulation like water flowing. Composed melodic phrases are based on fragments from the song lyrics in combination with impressions from the overtone melodies produced by the long string instrument. “Flowers” was recorded at Seaholm, a decommissioned electric power plant in Austin, Texas. A flock of sparrows that nest inside the cathedral-like cast-concrete space can be heard chirping on this recording. “Through Glass Panes” is constructed around a sequence of rhythmic patterns played using the “box bow”. Homage to the harmonica, the box bow is a hand held hollow wooden box with a curved lower surface used to play my instrument percussively. Techniques based on hand drumming inform the articulations of the tool used to strike groupings of strings tuned to chords. Two box bow performers stand facing each other at a double-sided resonator to play hocketed parts providing a stable framework from which to measure spectral changes in the sustained texture.

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