Sedayne Meets Sundog along the Byways of Vagabondia

Parts I to XII / 66.15

Recorded on-location in Tatterford, Pensthorpe & Salle (Norfolk) & Waterhouses (County Durham) throughout May 2006; text by Sedayne - images by Sabrina Eden, May 2006, Norfolk, Lincoln & Durham.



i) On one level this must operate as a document; a record of a particular process wherein certain things happen the way that only certain things can; and wherein, more importantly, process is the key to both creation and revelation.



Part I / 4.45 : We begin with an early evening stroll in the village of Tatterford, Norfolk, Saturday 6th May 2006; the old vicarage gate opens to a lane by the wooded churchyard: segue into preludium performed on Dan Moi (= brass Vietnamese idioglottal trump) in D / citera alpha drones / horse shoes / goat bells / ankle bells / low-D 3-hole harmonic pipe: segue into part one of the initial mix of 'Sundog in Vagabondia' derived entirely from literal field-recording early morning Friday 12th May in the corner of a flinty field near Tatterford, playing Dan Moi (= brass Vietnamese idioglottal trump in E) whilst filming a dozen or so hares at play...



ii) For such things that exist do so only to be revealed, glimpsed in an instant, before vanishing away before our very eyes leaving us doubtful as to what we have just witnessed - or, for that matter, uncertain as whether we have just witnessed anything at all.



Part II / 3.17 : Kubing (= bamboo Philippine idioglottal trump) / rabab / bodhran / assorted bells / cross-blown 2-hole bamboo flute: segue into the estuary aviary at Pensthorpe wildfowl park, nr. Fakenham, Norfolk.



iii) Thus do we listen in constant expectation, clutching at the familiar as the drowning man might clutch as razors or else shamanistic blood-hooks; and where the sun rises and the mad & glad hares o'er leap the ever expectant furrows.



Part III / 9.37 : Citera alpha / ankle & animal bells / extreme trump (= ultra lo-D Szilagyi Black-Fire Jew's Harp) / bodhran: segue into part two of 'Sundog in Vagabondia'.



iv) It is here we find Sundog, Sedayne's vagabondian-shamanic alter-ego, somehow acknowledging the inspiration of both Sun Ra and Moondog.



Part IV / 6.19 : Extreme trump (= ultra lo-D Szilagyi Black-Fire Jew's Harp) / ankle & animal bells / bodhran / cross-blown 6-hole bamboo flute: segue into part three of 'Sundog in Vagabondia', dan moi, flies & pheasants...



v) Sundog also relates to the actual atmospheric phenomenon also known as Parhelia (see http://www.sundog.clara.co.uk/halo/parhelia.htm etc.). It was witnessing such an event that connected Sun Ra with Moondog, something of a Myth-Science revelation in regard to our perception of Nature, for what we know to be true (i.e. what science has told us) and what we perceive to be true (i.e. the immediate evidence of our senses) are often two very different things.



Part V / 4.27 : Dan Moi in E / bird whistle / crwth / bodhran / bells / telephone: segue into part four of 'Sundog in Vagabondia' - the flies give evidence of a dead hare a few yards away, unnoticed at the time of recording, although here they seen more interested in the microphone.



vi) How often in witnessing a sunset do we perceive the rising of the horizon in relation to the comparatively stationary sun? Thus the scientific 'explanation' becomes as mythic as the Ancient Egyptian tales of Ra traversing the heavens in his solar boat.



Part VI / 4.42 : Bird whistles / Scacciapensieri (= antique European Jew's Harp in B, possibly Italian) / ankle & animal bells / tilliduduk (= Turkish whistle flute) / bodhran / voice; segue into improvisation on Citera recorded in the vicarage garden in the village of Tatterford, Norfolk on the morning on Wednesday May 10th 2006.



vii) Thus is Sundog bound by Nature, bound as much by its beauteous splendours as by its pragmatic corporeality, as knowing as unknowing, hence Vagabondia.



Part VII / 6.00 : Szilagyi Black-Fire Jew's Harp in D / low-D 3-hole harmonic pipe / bodhran / ankle & animal bells / bowed rabab: segue into part five of 'Sundog in Vagabondia' (ID on the birdsong anyone?)



viii) "It stretches from the open sea to the blue mountains and beyond; the world is Vagabondia to him who is a Vagabond." - Bliss Carman.



Part VIII / 6.05 : Dan Moi in E / crwth / bodhran / ankle bells: immediate segue into Part IX / 3.19 in which Sedayne plays upon the piano in the church of Saint Peter & Saint Paul, Salle, Norfolk, on the afternoon Wednesday May 10th 2006 together with Tatterford pheasant loop from the morning of Friday 12th.



ix) The Vagabond is also, of course, the Shaman; the happy wanderer, the wounded-healer, forever destined to be the outsider, the passer-by, his feet never touching the same place twice, the hub of his own perceptive wheel.



Part X / 3.33 : kubing in approximate F / rabab / bodhran / ankle & animal bells: segue into part six of 'Sundog in Vagabondia' - pheasants & flints.



x) 'I have been with my Lord in the manger of the ass: I strengthened Moses through the water of Jordan; I have been in the firmament with Mary Magdalene; I have obtained the muse from the cauldron of Caridwen; I have been bard of the harp to Lleon of Lochlin.

I have been on the White Hill, in the court of Cynvelyn, For a day and a year in stocks and fetters, I have suffered hunger for the Son of the Virgin, I have been fostered in the land of the Deity, I have been a teacher to all intelligences, I am able to instruct the whole universe.

I shall be until the day of doom on the face of the earth; And it is not known whether my body is flesh or fish.

Then I was for nine months in the womb of Caridwen; I was originally little Gwion, And at length I am Taliesin.'

(from Taliesin, The Mabinogion, Charlotte Guest, 1848)



Part XI / 9.26: citera / extreme trump (= ultra lo-D Szilagyi Black-Fire) / bird whistles / bells / bendhir (= North African frame drum): segue into second part of Pensthorpe estuary.



x) The instrumental parts of the 'studio' pieces were recorded in stereo, using two large diaphragm condenser microphones feeding into two channels the 6-track effectively becomes a 3-track, thus giving greater detail to each instrument.



Part XII / 4.40: citera / Dan Moi in D / extreme trump (= ultra lo-D Szilagyi Black-Fire): segue into second part of early evening stroll in the village of Tatterford, Norfolk, Saturday 6th May 2006; the old vicarage gate closes upon the lane by the wooded churchyard.



xi) Additional track: SUNDOG IN VAGABONDIA / 8.49 - field recording: Sundog (Dan Moi in E) in a field near Tatterford, Norfolk, 7.30 am, Friday 12th May 2006 / real time processing: Sedayne at the Small Palace, County Durham, Sunday 14th May 2006. Note: this is an entirely different treatment of this recording to that which features throughout Sedayne Meets Sundog along the Byways of Vagabondia...



xii) Film of the roof bosses in the Upper Room of the North Porch, Saint Peter & Saint Paul, Salle, Norfolk by Sabrina Eden. Music: Sedayne meets Sundog Part I, modified September 2006. Click to view full size at YouTube.



xiii) Film of cloisters, misericords & corbels in Chester Cathedral by Sabrina Eden. Music: Sedayne meets Sundog Part XI, modified October 2006. Click to view full size at YouTube.



xiv) Film of Norwich Cathedral cloister bosses by Sabrina Eden. Music: Sedayne meets Sundog Part VIII, modified April 2007. Click to view full size at YouTube.



xv) Sedayne meets Sundog along the Byways of Vagbondia is also available in a download edition from Woven Wheat Whispers. Click image above for review, samples & purchase details.



Ploughmyth International

contact: sundog@sedayne.co.uk