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WeeklyBeats.com / Music / george bowles's music / ISLAND - One Note of Zen

ISLAND - One Note of Zen

By george bowles on January 20, 2012 5:01 am

spry and I got to talking about zen, and I found this koan:

"After Kakua visited the emperor he disappeared and no one knew what became of him. He was the first Japanese to study Zen in China, but since he showed nothing of it, save one note, he is not remembered for having brought Zen into his country.

Kakua visited China and accepted the true teaching. He did not travel while he was there. Meditating constantly, he lived on a remote part of a mountain. Whenever people found him and asked him to preach he would say a few words and then move to another part of the mountain where he could be found less easily.

The emperor heard about Kakua when he returned to Japan and asked him to preach Zen for his edification and that of his subjects.

Kakua stood before the emperor in silence. He then produced a flute from the folds of his robe, and blew one short note. Bowing politely, he disappeared."

This track from my <a href="http://island1.bandcamp.com">band</a> is dedicated to this koan, which I selected at random. I explained to the band the idea and read them the koan, and then we proceeded with the piece. It turned out pretty unexpectedly.

January 23, 2012 12:14 am

fc

Cool concept, the koan reminds me of: "I have nothing to say / and I am saying it / and that is poetry / as I needed it" --John Cage

Nice sounding piece, too.  What instrumentation is your band?

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January 23, 2012 12:48 am

george bowles

fuzzed out bass (which is not very audible) through an ampeg, saxophone played through a lot of different pedals through a sovtek, guitar through a couple amps with some weird delays on it, and drums. thanks for listening! I also did some post fx because I didn't like the mix, used it as an experiment using audiomulch and an analog mixer, mixed a digitally mastered version in audacity.

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January 23, 2012 12:50 am

fc

Ooh, Audiomulch! Rad. Awesome instrument setup too.

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January 23, 2012 3:39 am

spry

this is really sweet.  that feedback is brutal.  its got sort of a stereolab meets a blender feel to it.

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January 24, 2012 3:58 am

cTrix

Woah.  Great combo of instruments. Thanks for writings too.

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January 24, 2012 4:04 am

george bowles

thanks yall. here is something from the collab thread I started:  I felt my piece (this is probably a bit of stretch) is a soundtrack for this story. The beginning is the one note of zen, the middle is the ambiance of the remote area and the meditation, isolation, etc. The end is the aftermath of the return and the disappearance.

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