Earthly Pleasures
album Notes
This album is inspired by revival style hymns written around the turn of the nineteenth to twentieth century. They would have been sung in church with gusto and enthusiasm, and most are still in hymnals today. Music notation is only primitive data, less sophisticated than the simplest 8 bit computer language, but infinitely variable, infinitely expressive, just little black dots on five lines.
What would a future civilization think was the meaning of these old hymns? How would they decode this data? Would all the emotion and longing represented in this music still be evident? What might happen if, in thousands of years, someone or something, maybe some future artificial intelligence attempts to decode these long forgotten, little black dots on 5 lines that once inspired hope? Resolve? Love? Salvation? How would some being
far in the future interpret all this?
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That’s what I was trying to imagine with this album. I’ve slowed these hymns down, dissected them, and fragmented them into tiny grains. Some are slow and mediative, some are dots of sound twinkling like stars in the sky. Some sound like computers trying to figure out tiny bits of data. Sometimes slow moving tones intersect to form clouds of sound. Data becomes emotion.
• WHEN WE ALL GET TO HEAVEN 10:34
The source material is a hymn written by Eliza Edmunds Hewitt and Emily Devine Wilson in 1898. This is actually the first of these pieces I did and was the start of this project. Here, I have added one acoustic instrument, a beautiful viola part recorded for me by Heather Lockie. This piece was influenced by watching my mother die and thinking about the loss of memory, letting go of consciousness and the ascension of the spirit, if that’s what happens. I certainly don’t know. At the end you’ll hear some static: the loss of contact with our conscious mind, memories fading and we return to wherever it is we came from.
• AMEN 1 02:21
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• EARTHLY PLEASURES 07:41
Based on a hymn written in 1911 called “I Would Be Like Jesus” by James Rowe and Bentley DeForest Ackley. The first line of text is “Earthly pleasures vainly call me.” I’ve imagined the melody decoded by a computer in the distant future. The computer decodes the data, trying to find patterns in the little black dots, the little bits sound like stars floating in a galaxy of information. Anchored by the bass, played by the brilliant Reggie Hamilton, the computer puts together its own little waltz, awkward and innocent, until at the end we hear the melody stated fully. It too fades into space.
• BEAUTIFUL SUMMER 07:05
Written by William A. Post and Lizzie De Armond in 1904. Lizzie De Armond wrote articles, nature stories and hymns to support her eight children after she was widowed. Here I imagine many machines looking at this music repeating the notes over and over, slowly getting closer to making sense of it all.
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• MESSAGE OF MERCY 13:13
Based on the hymn “Who Will Accept Him Today,” by Fanny Crosby with John R. Sweney sometime around 1880. Fanny Crosby, who was blind since infancy, was one of the most prolific hymnists in history and one of the most famous women in the United States during her lifetime. In my version, the chord changes slowly wash over you, turning it into a meditation. Like meditating, I have little artifacts, little sounds representing memories, or thoughts that slip in and out. You can’t hold onto them, they just float away as easily as they appear. Some are reminiscent of rain or wind or children or whatever you
want them to be, little bits of memories.
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• AMEN 2 02::17
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• MONARCH OF THE SKY 09:57
Based on a hymn by Mrs. Emily Divine Wilson titled “Sound the Clarion,” written in 1900. The last line of the chorus is “Jesus, monarch of the sky.” Chords come and go in slow waves and evoke the distant calls of a church
choir.
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• I STAND AMAZED 05:58
Also known as “My Savior’s Love.” The original hymn I used as source material was written by Charles H. Gabriel in 1905. He is said to have written and/or composed between 7,000 and 8,000 hymns. He was born in Wilton, Iowa and died in Hollywood, California. In my fantasy, each note becomes three or more dancing around the original melody, trying to find its meaning.
Credits
Composed and performed by Jill Fraser
Heather Lockie: viola on When We All Get to Heaven
Reggie Hamilton: bass on Earthly Pleasures
Danny Goliger: Mix engineer
Mastering: JJ Golden
Art and Design: Sam Lubicz
Art Direction: Sofia Arreguin