more from
VDSQ
We’ve updated our Terms of Use to reflect our new entity name and address. You can review the changes here.
We’ve updated our Terms of Use. You can review the changes here.

The Cinder Grove

by Chuck Johnson

supported by
Felipe Rqn
Felipe Rqn thumbnail
Felipe Rqn I don't know how many times i will listen and listen again to this marvelous record. A masterpiece ! Thank you
Raymond Stewart
Raymond Stewart thumbnail
Raymond Stewart I actually bought this record thinking it would be great to play at night to drift off to sleep to, but it has such a cinematic quality to it that not only did it NOT put me to sleep, it inspired a rush of ideas and fantasies that wouldn’t let up. I played it twice that night and have been telling all the music lovers I know about it since. What a gorgeous record.
Charlie Moonbeam
Charlie Moonbeam thumbnail
Charlie Moonbeam Chuck Johnson's musical evolution is like a slow and endless drive through the diverse and magnificent landscapes of the Americas... always calming, always gorgeous.
Ian
Ian thumbnail
Ian 2nd best news of 2020
more...
/
  • Streaming + Download

    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    Purchasable with gift card

      $10 USD  or more

     

  • Record/Vinyl + Digital Album

    Deluxe LP housed in old style tip-on jacket with UV spot finishes.

    Includes unlimited streaming of The Cinder Grove via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    ships out within 5 days

      $20 USD or more 

     

1.
2.
Serotiny 07:17
3.
4.
5.
The Laurel 09:26

about

The follow-up to Johnson’s acclaimed Balsams LP, The Cinder Grove delves further into the compositional possibilities of the pedal steel guitar. This halcyon collection of tracks draws on a wider pallette of sounds, adding strings and piano, to dive deeper into the sound bath of Johnson’s meditative music.

The Cinder Grove is a profound, affecting statement on the nature of loss and irreplaceability as well as a major addition to the canon of Johnson’s work. It's a suite of requiems for lost places. Many of the spaces that once fostered affordable living and creative work now only exist in sonic memory, like the echoes of ghosts. Like much of the California landscape in recent years, some of these spaces having succumbed to fire. Others, to the equally inexorable forces of gentrification. While his 2017 LP Balsams was intended to provide the listener with a space for respite and calm—even healing—The Cinder Grove seeks to remember what has been lost while celebrating the resilience of the human spirit and the natural world.

In making The Cinder Grove, Johnson dug through archival recordings from Oakland DIY performance spaces to digitally extract their reverb and echo qualities. He then applied these effects—as well as the digitally modeled reverberation of a redwood forest—to the tracks on The Cinder Grove, allowing the pieces to bask in the lush virtual spaces, and in the process realized that these sonic re-constructions can only ever be approximations. We try to make spaces what we want them to be, whether in memory or in the material present.

credits

released February 5, 2021

All music composed by Chuck Johnson and published by Sruti Music (ASCAP)

Recorded and mixed by Chuck Johnson at Cirrus Oxide in Oakland, California
String ensemble conducted by Jason Hoopes and recorded by The Norman Conquest at Expression in Emeryville, California
Piano recorded by Sarah Davachi in Los Angeles, California
Mastered by Bo Kondren at Calyx Mastering in Berlin, Germany

Front cover “Geschenk der Seherin” by Johannes Schebler

Layout and design by Rob Carmichael, SEEN


Chuck Johnson | pedal steel guitar, synthesizers, Yamaha electronic organ, treatments
with:
Sarah Davachi | piano
Marielle V. Jakobsons | violin
Hilary Lewis | violin and viola
Crystal Pascucci | cello

license

all rights reserved

tags

about

Chuck Johnson Oakland, California

Composer, musician, and producer based in Oakland, CA. Recordings available from All Saints, Thrill Jockey, VDSQ, Longform Editions, Three Lobed, and Kompakt.

EU/UK bookings - info@folkwisdom.net

contact / help

Contact Chuck Johnson

Streaming and
Download help

Shipping and returns

Redeem code

Report this album or account

Chuck Johnson recommends:

If you like Chuck Johnson, you may also like: