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All Ears (Gallery Walk)

by Balladir (Travis Puntarelli, Upfolk)

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No castle is big enough for my ghost. My ghost is too long. My ghost is too wide. Please leave my ghost outside. out. side.

about

ALL EARS
Meditations on Walking the Gallery
by Travis Puntarelli

In October of 2016, I was commissioned to compose a piece of music based around the open studio Gallery Walk in Bloomington, Indiana.
With no idea what form the piece would take, I went out to walk the galleries. I took three things: A hand-held recording device, a sign that read "All Ears", and a vow of silence. I walked from gallery to gallery, and listened.
I have always been amazed by the sounds of my city. It sings an unbroken tapestry of chaos and harmony, woven together by metal and rubber and voices and bodies. The sonic space is rich and full and constant.
I hear joy, sorrow, wonder, lamentations, heartbreak, friendship, frustration, all of it at once, on one corner of one street. I hear the town going up around me, changing, dissolving, improving, gentrifying. I hear friends meeting, culture colliding, younger people creating themselves, elders offering histories. I hear deep love and passionate appreciation, and beside it a heart-wrenching madness of humanity.
Any piece I would make about the Gallery Walk would be a piece about the city itself. Held in this container of limestone and institutions, the people are the heart and blood and mind of the city. If there is a story to tell, they have it.
The parameters of the piece were loose. I debated what should be the medium: a string arrangement? an improv dance? a marching band number? In the end I have settled on a short album of folk music, with phonographic evidence of my adventures at the Gallery Walk, and a book of impressionistic pennings to compliment it.
I've included lyrics to the songs, and also some transpositions of some of the interactions I had on my walk because I think they are interesting and strange. They were spoken with no prompts other than my sign and my presence.
I hope you enjoy this photo-phono-grapherie.

credits

released March 1, 2018

All lyrics, music, mixing and mastering by Travis Puntarelli.
Vocals on Layla and No Castle: Alex Ryan, Bryn Hatton, David Lasuertmer, Liz Moudy

Found Sound from the streets of Bloomington, October 2017. Special thanks to folks whose voices I have pictured here, including Martha M, David C, Russel, and Anthony B.

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Balladir (Travis Puntarelli, Upfolk) Bloomington, Indiana

Balladir is the creative musical workings of Travis Puntarelli, a song-carver who hails from Bloomington, Indiana.

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