This is who we hear at the top of our soundwalk: The Black-headed Grosbeak.

They say it sounds like an operatic American Robin. I can’t say I disagree. Its phrases rise and fall with ebullient fluidity.

This week we are back in Forest Park, in my hometown, Portland, Oregon. It’s the subject of a multifaceted series that is spooling out across all my music pseudonyms throughout the year, and probably into the next here on Substack and on music streaming services. So far we’ve been introduced to Forest Park Rain Suite I & II, The Wildwood Trail in Sound and Vision, and last week’s Ancient Forest Suite. This week it’s Forest Melody Suite.

The first thing I notice is that this breaks the rule I set for Listening Spot releases: no pianos leading the way. Forest Melody Suite has a Wurlitzer electric piano front and center through the whole 17 minute runtime. I love the deep tone of this particular electric piano, and I love the punctuated, syllabic structure of a phrase played on a piano. Maybe hearing all the melodic birdsong made it irresistible to reach for it. Or maybe it was just easier to start with. Honestly, I don’t remember. It was the path of least resistance, one way or another.

The environmental audio we hear was recorded in the Miller Creek watershed on the quiet northern side of Forest Park; definitely a top spot for migratory birds in the vast park. Here you’ll find a healthy fish-bearing creek (the only one in the park to host salmonids) and complex structure in the forest canopy. I kinda took Forest Park for granted, growing up in Portland. But it really is something special!

We hear plenty of Pacific Wren, Wilson’s Warbler, Cordilleran Flycatcher, Downy Woodpecker, Red-breasted Nuthatch, Song Sparrow and some tricky-to-ID baby birds too. The scene was positively alive.

Thanks for being here; for listening and reading. Ancient Forest Suite is available under the artist name Listening Spot on all streaming platforms Friday, May 30th.

I’ve been doing a lot of writing about Forest Park, here in Portland, Oregon, so I decided not to double up this week. In fact, I’m putting a pause on the Wildwood Trail Sound & Vision series, to pick it back up later this year, when the photos I took match the season better.

The environmental audio for today’s release was captured at Ancient Forest Preserve, a non-contiguous 27-acre chunk of Forest Park floating about two miles to the northwest of the 5200 acre park proper; an island outpost of old-growth, managed by the Forest Park Conservancy with little fanfare. Private forest lands surround it on two sides, while the Metro-owned Burlington Creek Forest fans out like an apron beneath it, providing public access.

This is what it looks like from above:

Recorded last December, this soundscape is quite delicate. Small water sounds are magnified and cave-like. Allow me to explain: Burlington Creek flows through this forest, entering a culvert beneath a gravel road at its eastern boundary. My microphones were just within in earshot of that culvert, a 6’ diameter pipe, which had an amplifying effect on the water trickling through. The stereo field captures both the foreground creek sound as well as the distant culvert undertones.

I tried to select instrument voices that blended well with this constellation of little sounds. Droplet synths, hammered dulcimer-esque synths, banjo, pan drum... Washy sounds and sparkly sounds.

Chestnut-backed Chickadees, Red-breasted Nuthatches, and Ruby-crowned Kinglets busily forage in the mild December evening light. Geese fly overhead. And, there’s a mammal or two as well. Possibly deer. Possibly a very quiet human. A mystery.

Ancient Forest Preserve has a squiggly horseshoe trail nearly looping back to itself. I made a leisurely circuit while leaving my recording gear to soak up the creek sound. I didn’t expect to see anyone else in the fading light.

What a memorable evening; what a charmed place. Thanks for revisiting it with me. Ancient Forest Suite is available under the artist name Listening Spot on all streaming platforms Friday, May 16th.

This soundwalk concludes a short series from the Redwood Coast of Northern California, including the Substack-only Fern Canyon Soundwalk, as well as Grove of the Titans Soundwalk and Preston Island Soundwalk.

Brown Creek Trail was the clear winner on the Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park trail map for soundwalkin’. It runs parallel to the busy scenic parkway, with a ridge rising up between the two, acting as sound baffling. It’s probably one of the quieter options in the park. The creek adds to the relaxed atmosphere, and draws in the birds. I loved this hike.

I’m going to drop this Steinbeck quote again, because I think it bears repeating:

"The redwoods, once seen, leave a mark or create a vision that stays with you always. No one has ever successfully painted or photographed a redwood tree. The feeling they produce is not transferable. From them comes silence and awe. It's not only their unbelievable stature, nor the color which seems to shift and vary under your eyes, no, they are not like any trees we know, they are ambassadors from another time." - John Steinbeck

It’s so true. I actually took more videos than photos on this hike. (The quote applies to video too. you can’t successfully make a video of a redwood tree.) I captured short clips out of habit, thinking they would lend themselves to Spotify “Clip” content. I used to do this for a while; add little video clips to all my tracks, just on that platform. It was tedious, but I rationalized it was a nice portal into visual world of the soundwalk, and I thought it maybe it would put me in the good graces of the algorithm. It didn’t seem to move the needle in that regard.

Then I started questioning how it changed a listener’s relationship to the music, seeing an <8 second video loop over and over. Further, I noticed the user interface incentivized interaction with these clips with an animated rectangle at the top of an album track list. For me, because the tracks are invariably longer than the video clips, it just made me feel less relaxed, and more aware of the skip button. This is not what I wanted to facilitate, so I don’t do it anymore.

So, no videos in this post either. Same reason. I want to facilitate settling in. Closing eyes. Letting the mind wander. Basking in the sound, not the pixels.

I was with my family on this walk, lagging behind just out of earshot much of the time. This was a “working vacation”, while out on some quiet trails.

There is a short spur loop trail in the middle of this valley, leading visitors by many outsized redwoods, named after “founding fathers of forestry”. And, here I thought it was just birds that were given honorific names. Generally speaking, I’m not in favor of naming birds and trees after people, but I’ll go along with the quote on the plaque at the entrance: Forestry is a good thing but love is better.

Speaking of loops, we went for the loop hike option which added some elevation gain on the South Fork Trail. Soon we were seeing the trees from a different point of view.

I read a trail user’s review that resonated with me. “This trail could be called ‘The Circle of Life trail’. Everywhere there is death of the forest but new life growing from it,” she wrote. It’s astounding how regenerative these ecosystems are.

The music is about what you might expect from me. The tempo is slow and measured. Arrangements are minimal; a string of duets for the most part. There are some droney passages. I like this one. It’s my hope it can be of some use to you. Thanks for listening and reading along with me here!

Redwood Soundwalk is available on all music streaming services today, May 2nd.

Decay is a natural process. It breaks down structures, so that new ones can form. Decay is also the attenuation of a sound over time.

Bearing this in mind, it is also the name of a new work I’m pleased to share with you, from my strictly instrumental project, Sleeping Animal.

Here I step away from his my field recording gear in an effort to evoke nature with instruments alone. Electric piano holds the center, while a blurred mix of synthesizers, vocals and ambient strings fill out the mix. The composition unfurls, loosening and coalescing many times over its short runtime of 14 minutes. Is it an album or an EP? What is a song, really? I sometimes ask myself. Maybe I’m just at a point in my life where the song as a structure is both less appealing and penetrating as it once was, on both the listening and composing side. Decay is tenuous and exploratory; a string of impressions, a meandering of attention akin to what one feels when walking along a trail. No verse, chorus, bridge here. It’s more about flow and sequence. I’m interested in mirroring structures in nature, inscrutable at the glance, but held in exquisite tension.

Decay by Sleeping Animal is available on all music streaming platforms today, Friday, April 25th.

Thank you for you for listening and reading. If something brings you enjoyment, please share my work with one other person. Word-of-mouth is fundamental to my ability to persevere.

The monochrome cover art photo was taken while hiking the Wildwood Trail recently, which played an important role in refining aesthetic decisions for Sleeping Animal releases, both musically and visually. This post goes into that.

And we’re back! More spring rain; more Pacific Wren and Wilson’s Warbler duets … It’s Forest Park Rain Suite II.

And now you might be thinking why split it up? Honestly I don’t entirely remember my reasoning, but the main thing that I noticed for some of my work is that once you get to the 40 minute mark, it has a pretty strong sedative effect. That’s not a bad thing, necessarily. But I’d like to think my music could be of service to those who want to lean in, as well as lean back.

I do quality control listening of my mixes with headphones at night lying in bed. I rarely make it to 40 minutes without falling asleep. So this “halfsies” presentation offers a good old fashioned intermission.

Thanks again for reading and listening along. I’m grateful for your interest. Forest Park Rain Suite II is available under the artist name Listening Spot on all streaming platforms Friday, April 18th.

Next week, the first of a series of Sound and Vision posts on the Wildwood Trail, and new work from my instrumental project Sleeping Animal!

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The environmental recording for Forest Park Rain suite was recorded about a year ago on the quiet northern side of Forest Park, here in Portland Oregon.

It was a rainy day interspersed with sun breaks. Many migratory birds had buy then taken up residence here. Among them, Black-headed Grosbeak, Wilson’s Warbler, Black-throated Gray Warbler, and Hammond’s Flycatcher. Deer can also be heard moving among downed branches.

I love the acoustics of the forest slope where this was captured. I love the soft rain sounds.

Like all Listening Spot compositions, this one leans into atmospherics and emphasizes melody. Loping, synthesizer phrases are layered with vibrato synth pads and various soft, shimmering sounds.

I’ve spoken a little bit about Forest Park in the past, but I've spent some time reacquainting myself with its trails over the last month. In particular, the 30-mile-long Wildwood trail that traverses the park from north to south. In the Spring of 1999 I hiked the entire trail (slightly shorter, then) in one day. A quarter century later I had the urge to complete it again, but not all at once, I’ll be sharing the fruits of that soon!

Til then, thanks again for your interest; for reading and listening along. I’m grateful for you. Forest Park Rain Suite is available under the artist name Listening Spot on all streaming platforms Friday, April 11th.

Forest Park Rain Suite II will land next Friday, April 18th.