Bret H. Hart - "NC maverick outsider artist"

THE NEW DEATH LETTER BLUES [The Exquisite Corpse] Bret Harold Hart improvised with a resonator guitar on 1-1-12 through The Labyrinth into a Fender AcoustiSonic 2-channel amplifier. Recorded via HipWorks Mobile Tone-Magnet.

Real-time,No overdubs. One guitar channel out through 1.2s looper and MXR Distortion+ pedal. Second guitar channel out through E-H QTron and 20s FX/loop-station.

Real-time,No overdubs. One guitar channel out through 1.2s looper and MXR Distortion+ pedal. Second guitar channel out through E-H QTron and 20s FX/loop-station.

WHITEWASHED TOMBS AND PRETTY CUPS bhh 2/13/11

you can't steer a ship with its anchor
you've got to get up on the bow
what's been done is never as important as what you're doing now

to do right begins with standing up
get to work when the going gets tough
when something is broken, fix it up

[Be more than] WHITEWASHED TOMBS AND PRETTY CUPS

you can't steer a ship with its anchor
you've got to get up on the bow
what's been done is never as important as what you're doing now

to do right, we need to get on our feet
FLEX OUR SOULS and hit the street
when someone is broken, cheer them up
[Be more than] WHITEWASHED TOMBS AND PRETTY CUPS

to do right begins with standing up
get to work when the going gets tough
when something is broken, fix it up
[Be more than] WHITEWASHED TOMBS AND PRETTY CUPS

Peter Zolli: drumming..Eric Wallack: bass and Chapman Stick..Bret H. Hart: guitars and loops..Don Campau: texts/voices..Greg Segal: post-session EQ.
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I'm posting this extract from the 'Heal, Not Wound' CD on the heels of the recent passing of Captain Beefheart. The mix that left my studio - and this was last fall, before Don died - deliberately endeavored to be an homage of sorts to the 'Mirror Man' and more specifically 'Strictly Personal' LPs of 1967, with flanged drums and long single-key explorations, a la' John Lee Hooker through a prism.

This 5-track instant composition* is my first foray as an adult into the things a Stylophone can do. They're fun, simple to play, and offer a useful palette of basic sounds/timbres which, when routed out through add'l signal processing and amplification, can become Hammond organ-like.
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I remember a elementary school music teacher having one of these when we lived in Indiana, and I got to fool with it for a while back then. When I went to SUNY Potsdam in the late 70's, as I recall, the experimental band Flavor Crystals used one during their Miles Davis 'Nefertiti' set. Last week, a friend pointed out that Stylophone's are again being manufactured, have all the original features, and a few nice new ones, and cost only about twenty bucks (!).
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* A deliberate multi-track composition in which each individual track serves as the 'guide' for the next, permitting melodic and rhythmic entrainment.

Composed & engineered by bret h. hart on 1/10/11 at the HipWorks Mobile Tone-Magnet in Eden, NC
Gear: Yahama RX12L (Latin Percussion), Boss BR-8 recording platform

A couple of months ago, the ACU Steely Pan Steel Band, led by Dr. Scott Meister, performed a fund-raiser concert at Morehead High School's Duane Best Auditorium. It was fantastic, exciting, and the student percussionists introduced the community's sometimes stiff and Top 40-oriented ear to something new, sophisticated, and alien.
My family had a blast, and it was nice to see and hear an Eden-homeboy (Nick Galloway) on stage. LISTEN TO SOME OF THEIR RECORDINGS: http://www.steelband.appstate.edu/spsbmusic.html

“A Less Than Sober Night in Trinidad” was recorded on an unnecessary 'snow day' school closure, during which we never saw a flake until after kids would have already gotten off the buses.

“Have time, WILL RECORD!” is my motto; and this rather psychedelic tribute to what might be called 'heavy metal' in Trinidad is the result.

Boom Appetit!

"reflection on parenting"
bret harold hart: "bowed things" (processed acoustic guitars)
Tony Trischka: banjos

During the 10th Annual Charlie Poole Music Festival in Eden, North Carolina I had the pleasure of meeting and talking with banjo legend Tony Trischka (who's played with Béla Fleck, David Grisman, the Violent Femmes, REM, William S. Burroughs, Leftover Salmon), who was one of our headliners.
Turns out T.T. is from Syracuse, New York same as me, and knows where all the great pizza joints and record stores used to be in the 70's! Very cool.
On the freak chance that he might have time, I asked whether Tony could stop over at my studio the day after the festival and record something with me for an album I have been working on ("Finding Grace in America") for a few years.
Serendipity smiled.

I was able to capture Tony improvising against my song 'Daddy Only Did the Best He Knew How', TWICE!
Yup, a spontaneous banjo duet with himself.
During the recording of the 8-track arrangement of the song, I welded two tracks of "bowed things", a blanket term for a particular effects configuration I like that makes everything sound like a bowed instrument (very slow attack, no sustain, very slow decay) onto it. Here, it was a 1950's Kay acoustic through an electret condenser mic into a Boss BR8 digital platform.

the instrumental "reflection on parenting" is a later minimalistic mix of only my "bowed things" and Tony's banjo playing. listen carefully and you can hear a continuous deconstruction of John Newton's hymn 'Amazing Grace' occurring.

Recorded to stereo @ Tall Order Music, Reidsville, NC on December 29, 2010 by Phil Sparks

Players:
Phil - 7-string electric guitar/FX
Bret - 6-string electric guitar/FX/looping
John - drumming
Ron - electric bass guitar

1.DAWN [13'30”]

A studio composition using the ElectroFaustus EF101 Dual Oscillator ("a digital circuit in which one oscillator feeds into another in series"). I first recorded eight tracks digitally, exploring the sonic properties of the instrument (each subsequent track was improvised while listening to the preceding track in the other ear). This recording lasts 3m10s.
An additional compositional step took place during first mix-down & transfer to an adjacent 8-track unit, at which time I used these 8 tracks to construct a 'sonic pyramid' by panning the odd tracks 80% left channel and even tracks 80% right channel, and deliberately inserting them into the mix every (appx.) 22 seconds (3m10s divided by 8). After nailing a good L/R mix of the 8 tracks, I zeroed the first deck, changed the delay setting to a 50s doubling and the reverb from 'Hall' to 'Room' with a 2s increase in throw, and panned every track hard to the opposte side.
At the 3m point of the first recording, I inserted the new 8-track stereo mix in as it faded, supplanting it at equal volume, but with subtle changes in timbre. These 8 tracks were then subtracted from the mix at 22s intervals, beginning with the removal of the first track introduced in the piece. At the 6m4s endpoint, the piece concludes in a different EF191 'realm' than it began..

I have always loved the arid, openness of Ennio Morricone's soundtracks, particularly for Sergio Leone's "spaghetti westerns" in the 60's/70's. Here, I am going for that "Oh hell, there's a dead animal in the waterin' hole" feeling. All Telecaster. This is the final song of my first CD in the Pro Bono Oxytocin Series, free to download, burn to disc, and take on a long car drive to listen to.

The low bass-y root riffs borrow from Juju and Reggae, the jazzy banjo-like runs and rhythms celebrate field and mountain musics, and the repetitive Hip-hop drumming patterns endeavor to stay out of the way and be trance-y, like when I'm walking down a street to the beat of a song I'm remembering.

Mr. Axolotl

Pete Zolli: drums
Eric Wallack: bass
Bret Hart: guitars
Greg Segal: guitar

Ken Hyder (dungur shaman drums, voice) began his recording career thirty years ago with Talisker, a pioneering band which fused his home-boy traditional Scottish music with avant garde jazz. Gradually the specific jazz element decreased and his music expanded to take in other Celtic musics, South American and South African forms, and two spirit genres - Tibetan Buddhist, and shamanic musics. He played drums with the Bardo State Orchestra which recorded and toured Europe with Tibetan monks. He's also played with and studied shamanic music with shamans in Siberia - principally in Tuva. He has made over two dozen albums with a range of jazz, folk and avant-garde musicians. "Ken Hyder's drumming always appears connected to the world beyond narrow musical concerns. It comes with a context, picking up on place, the past, people met and local practices. At the same time he favours strong, well-defined musical statements, entirely free from ornamental excess and fuss." - Julian Cowley, The Wire He has worked with and recorded with many musicians, including Elton Dean, Chris Biscoe, Tim Hodgkinson, Paul Rogers, Maggie Nicols, Don Paterson and Frankie Armstrong.
=========================================== Ken Hyder and Bret Hart - Duets Volume 1
"...the Hyder/Hart team are at a zenith stage on this CD! Actually, if mem'ry serves me correctly, I don't think I've heard Bret improvising against a percussionist all that frequently... but this guy Ken is a killah...There are some reviewers who tend to write this kind of experimentation up as something that "anybody with a washboard & a guitar" coulld do... & while that may be true (in one sense), it is pure balderdash with music like this duo is playing...anyone with even a dollop of adventure in their blood will fall in love with this beautifully odd CD... I did... enough so that it gets our MOST HIGHLY RECOMMENDED rating!" - Rotcod Zzaj Improvijazzation Nation # 59

Ken Hyder + Bret Hart - "Duets Volume One"
Bret really scored with this duet with Scottish drummer and Tuvan throat singer Ken Hyder. I'd never heard of Hyder before Bret enthused about him, but cruising his web site it's clear he's had an interesting and varied career. In addition to performing and traveling all over the world, he has collaborated with such luminaries as Tim Hodgkinson (Henry Cow), Elton Dean (Soft Machine), Nick Evans, Phil Minton, and many others. Bret's free-improv works are often heavy on the percussives so having an actual drummer participating is a treat. One of my favorite tracks is the spacey tribal free-jazz "Paltry Origin", with its steady drumming, playful piano, spacey efx, and whining howls. And I'm guessing the efx'd chanting is Hyder doing the throat singing thing. More of this singing style (along with some traditional Celtic song) can be heard on the 14 minute "Eurasian Chassis", which is a symphony of drum and percussion workouts. Another highlight is "Sibi Drone", which is not quite like the drone in the title would suggest. Hyder lays down some free-wheelin drumming while Bret conjures up some cool string manipulated sounds, all against a drifting wall of atmospherics and sedate background drones. An interesting set. There's a wealth of information at Ken Hyder's web site at: http://www.hyder.demon.co.uk.
Be sure and read the account of his trip to Siberia with Tim Hodgkinson. [J.Kranitz/Aural-Innovations]

One piece from my upcoming record - "Token Yankee". This was recorded the week before Thanksgiving '08 using a Washburn acoustic into a Boss BR-8. Like it says in the liner notes: "Just a Blues. Just another Blues. BREATHE."

I recorded this stacked-improvisation on 9.1.08 at the HipWorks Mobile Tone-Magnet in Eden, NC using a Guild "Ashbory" fretless bass (with silicon rubber strings!) and a signal-processed acoustic guitar through a Boss BR-8 recording platform. All tracks were 1st-pass improvisations.

“Jaco” Pastorius' first album entitled Jaco Pastorius (1976), was a breakthrough album for the electric bass, and its influence may still be felt in Jazz, Rock, and Hip-Hop. Many believe this to be the finest bass album ever recorded. In 1976, he joined the fusion band Weather Report, and his bass-playing became an integral part of its sound, in concert and on albums such as Heavy Weather and Night Passage. As well as pulsating basslines, he played mad solos in the higher register, with a bright tone that contrasted to the tribalism of his ensemble playing. He used chords and harmonics which created a rich texture. He played both fretted and fretless bass guitars. His playing was noted for its precision and propulsive drive.

William "Bootsy" Collins Rising to prominence with James Brown in the late 1960s and with Parliament-Funkadelic in the '70s, Collins' driving bass guitar and humorous vocals established him as one of the leading names in funk. Bootsy's Rubber Band, a separate touring unit of Clinton's P-Funk collective, recorded four albums together, the first three of which are often considered to be among the quintessential P-Funk recordings. Bootsy collaborated with bluegrass legends Del McCoury, Doc Watson and Mac Wiseman to form the GrooveGrass Boyz, a fusion of bluegrass and funk. Bootsy is widely considered a pioneer in many aspects of not only funk, but also in the progression and evolution of bass playing techniques. His bass playing is driving, rhythmic and groovy, and has been very influential in the development of funk. His characteristic juicy sound, produced by envelope filters (for example the Mutron), is one of his distinguishing traits as a bass player.

Source: (adapted from)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaco_Pastorius
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bootsy_Collins

"reflection on parenting"
bret harold hart: "bowed things" (processed acoustic guitars)
Tony Trischka: banjos

During the 10th Annual Charlie Poole Music Festival in Eden, North Carolina I had the pleasure of meeting and talking with banjo legend Tony Trischka (who's played with Béla Fleck, David Grisman, the Violent Femmes, REM, William S. Burroughs, Leftover Salmon), who was one of our headliners.
Turns out T.T. is from Syracuse, New York same as me, and knows where all the great pizza joints and record stores used to be in the 70's! Very cool.
On the freak chance that he might have time, I asked whether Tony could stop over at my studio the day after the festival and record something with me for an album I have been working on ("Finding Grace in America") for a few years.
Serendipity smiled.

I was able to capture Tony improvising against my song 'Daddy Only Did the Best He Knew How', TWICE!
Yup, a spontaneous banjo duet with himself.
During the recording of the 8-track arrangement of the song, I welded two tracks of "bowed things", a blanket term for a particular effects configuration I like that makes everything sound like a bowed instrument (very slow attack, no sustain, very slow decay) onto it. Here, it was a 1950's Kay acoustic through an electret condenser mic into a Boss BR8 digital platform.

the instrumental "reflection on parenting" is a later minimalistic mix of only my "bowed things" and Tony's banjo playing. listen carefully and you can hear a continuous deconstruction of John Newton's hymn 'Amazing Grace' occurring.

"Herbie-Blood-Sharrock" is a wild and funky bit that was recorded with the help of my multi-talented friend in Ohio, Eric Wallack. The sax and Les Paul you hear are him. The other guitars and so forth are me, simply sitting down in the studio and thinking about three of the artists that so impacted upon how I hear and think about music.

Many folks have heard keyboardist Herbie Hancock's music (http://www.herbiehancock.com, The Headhunters) , some before MTV brought his 'Rockit' into our living rooms. Herbie's played with everyone, and brought the concept of 'jazz fusion' light years ahead.

James 'Blood' Ulmer (http://www.hyenarecords.com/james.htm) is a remarkable guitarist whose 'Tales of Captain Black' was a seminal influence on me. He played with Ornette Coleman, Joe Henderson, David Murray, and many others. Ulmer's playing can be really frenetic and pointillistically funky, like sonic fractals chipping off his guitar neck. His brand new acoustic Blues record simply kicks ass.

Sonny Sharrock (http://www.sonnysharrock.com/thepress/quotes.asp) is another guitar hero of mine, who I first heard with MATERIAL on their great 'Memory Serves' record. Then later, my pal Bob Jordan played me (on flautist Herbie Mann's 'Memphis Underground' record) Sonny executing the most mind-blistering slide solo anyone's ever waxed. To describe this recorded guitar moment cannot be done. FIND THAT RECORD, it's on side B.
Anyhow, this piece is a tribute to all the things I think about when these great jazz-cats come to mind. Enjoy!