In continuing our theme of recordings that re-imagine personal setting or space, we present this limited edition release by Brooklyn based sound artist B. Moran. This recording was primarily made with use of Driscoll Modular Synthesizer panels and in some instances, the Bubblesound VCOb Eurorack Oscillator. The pieces were improvised in real time in Moran’s bedroom studio over the course of a day, ” quietly hovering around the instruments while breathing and whispering secrets.”

The Driscoll Mala may be seen as an artifact of meditation and ritual.  The interaction with the electronics is the basis for a document of Moran’s exploration of egolessness through practice. In this sense there is no distinction between the process and the resulting work. The rarified noise flows from the instruments, as a simple room mic bears witness to the flickering of switches, the passing of hands through prayer beads, the utterance of self-secret incantations–all integral to this private ceremonial.

In the Tibetan Buddhist tradition, it is thought that when the beads of mala are broken it is an auspicious moment in the practitioners path; a moment to honor the emptiness of capturing one’s work. This recording can never hope to re-create the artist’s experience, but leaves behind a trace of his process and practice. There is no fixed narrative in the work, only an open ended glimpse of the ritual that is shared with the listener. The listener is a sort of voyeur to the intimate events unfolding, as one might feel when listening to an ethnographic field recording. The events of a day and evening of work are edited and condensed to a single cassette by Love All Day’s EP Prezzano with an aim to move Moran’s process into more immediate focus. A series of fragments emerged from the extended recording sessions, but these are brought back together as a single piece, retying the mala beads to the string.