On Grief

In late winter 2025, I recorded a piece for a symposium on invisible loss and disenfranchised grief hosted by Jan Hummer of Sycamore Roots.  Jan had sent me an audio recording of herself reading a poem that represented her unique experience of grief. I immediately began seeking sounds for this recording and had first imagined a stream in the background, possibly with something representing wind or birdsong. 

Having worked with the topic of grief for many years, I was drawn to creating a soundscape that specifically brought out some of my feelings on the topic and experience. I was also asked to incorporate some beautiful classical-style guitar performed by musician Grayson Zuber. As soon as I heard his wonderful playing, I knew I had to let that be the instrumental focus of this recording. 

I had been listening to the many sounds of birds calling and early spring arriving outside my studio windows in Buffalo, and found myself then creating a static backdrop for this piece, which I certainly heard now as rain. A few sheets of different textures of plastic through a microphone modified by some effects pedals from Chase Bliss, and I was up and running with a virtual rain factory. I then simply layered Grayson’s playing on top of that backdrop, which I had also added some bells and very low-volume tabla to. Nearing the end of the piece, the composition on guitar fades, and so does the rain as a chorusing cascade of tabla and shaker repeats a mantra-like phrase until fading into the distance like a long distance phone call that never quite ends.

A few notes about this piece: It is very much a rough sketch that has inspired me to get back to the drawing board with recording and sound collage-oriented art. This work still feels unfinished, and that is okay. I am choosing to view this as a draft or a launching off point for new recording, performance and/or immersive installations. It will be exciting to see what evolves out of this draft. You can listen to the piece in these two excerpts below. This work will be presented this winter 2026 accompanying dancers and visual art with a live reading of the poem. This page will evolve as the piece also evolves in reality’s timeline.