Listen & tracks
1 of 12 tracks have a preview · 12 works · 52:17
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1 Northern Dreams Dean Frenkel 3:31
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2 Magic Sounds Dean Frenkel 5:06
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3 Moon Bear Mantra Dean Frenkel 5:38
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4 Australian Soundscapes Dean Frenkel 6:18
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5 Crystal Temple Dean Frenkel 5:06
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6 Short Song Dean Frenkel :30
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7 Night Lights and Whale Callers Dean Frenkel 5:24
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8 Space in Timelessness Dean Frenkel 3:40
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9 Rain Chant Dean Frenkel 4:38
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10 Watery World Dean Frenkel 4:32
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11 Sleeping Caves Dean Frenkel 4:10
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12 Southern Dreams Dean Frenkel 3:44
It is a journey of sacred sounds, uplifting soundscapes and original composition. The music is sourced from authentic human voices, not electronic synthesizers, and centres on vocal instrumentation – an approach to singing that long pre-dates songs. Vocal musicality is deeply embedded in the human genome, with evolutionary roots far older than spoken language.
The album features the natural voices of Dean Frenkel and Linda Laasi throughout. Arrayah adds crystal bowls on three tracks (Crystal Temple, Rain Chant and Watery World); didgeridoo appears on Australian Soundscapes and Magic Sounds, harmonium on Magic Sounds, and jaw harp on Rain Chant. A minimalist approach lets the harmonic tones usually hidden within music come alive in open space.
Vocal harmonics is among the world's oldest surviving forms of singing, with a history clearly exceeding 10,000 years. It is still practised by more than twenty mainly indigenous cultures, including Mongolians, Tibetans, Tuvans, Canadian Inuit, Siberian Eskimos, Sardinians, African and Taiwanese tribes, the Huli of Papua New Guinea, and people from Nagaland in India. The Ainu of northern Japan lost their last singer in 1976. In Mongolia, Tuva and other herding cultures, throat singing still calms and mesmerises animals. Shamans and monks apply vocal harmonics in spiritual practice; the Dalai Lama, Mahatma Gandhi, Nelson Mandela and Genghis Khan all share different techniques of harmonic throat singing in their regional heritages.
Northern Dreams evokes ancient harmonics near the top of the world, where Alaska and Siberia once met across a land-bridge before the Bering Strait formed. Magic Sounds recalls lyricism that emerged long before words. Moon Bear Mantra is an incantation of compassion for all living creatures. Australian Soundscapes draws on vast continental space and millennia of didgeridoo and chant. Crystal Temple is a place of cleansing where voice and crystal bowls can be hard to tell apart. Short Song explores Mongolian Kargyraa harmonics in what may be one of the shortest pieces on record. Night Lights and Whale Callers pairs Linda's night-lights with Dean's ocean and a brief harmonic interlude. Space in Timelessness links outer navigation with inner meditation. Rain Chant brings jaw harp droplets and crystal-bowl rain. Watery World follows the land's replenishment after rain. In Sleeping Caves the two voices begin apart and converge. Southern Dreams closes the circle, connecting dreamscapes of southern Australia with the opening Northern Dreams.
Reviews
Ancient ambient vocal stylings to calm ragged modern souls
Artists
Dean Frenkel
vocals, jaw harp
Dean Frenkel combines ancient Tibetan throat-singing technique with modern composition, creating a distinctive hybrid form. He used that technique to set a world record for the longest continuous vocal note.
Linda Laasi
vocals
Linda Laasi sings vocal harmonics into ambient dreamscapes, pure human voice treated as instrument. Overtone colour rises like night-lights over ocean and land, crystal bowls and throat-driven tones woven into calm, spacious sound.
Performers
- Dean Frenkel · vocals, jaw harp
- Linda Laasi · vocals
Details
- List price
- $25.00 AUD
- Total playing time
- 52 minutes 17 seconds
- Release date
- 25 Aug 2008
- Categories
- Australian, Cross-cultural, Vocal
- Sound recording copyright
- ℗ 2008 Dean Frenkel and Linda Laasi
- Catalogue
- MCD 373
- EAN
- 9314574037326
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