Resinous Fold 2+4+3 is a multi-track audio-work comprising three solo shō improvisations from an ongoing series titled Resinous Fold. In this series of solos, I navigate between small tone clusters taken from gagaku harmonies of the shō while drawing inspiration from the flow of gagaku tuning pieces known as chōshi — music for one or multiple instruments which precede performances of the main body of gagaku repertoire. The Resinous Fold solos were played in traditional tuning (just intonation at A=430) and were recorded at close range, each employing a unique (stereo) microphone placement so that the 14 respective pipes of the instrument appear in a distinct position of the stereo field in each solo recording.

In 2+4+3 I further investigate acoustic and psycho-acoustic characteristics of the shō in layering three of the stereo recordings. Sum and difference tones and interference patterns one normally experiences when playing the shō are further transformed in the loudspeaker (or headphone) playback process; the listening experience becomes a dance between instrument, player, performance space, microphone, recording engineer, loudspeaker, listening space, and listener. The feel of the composite piece reflects traditional performance practice, where multiple players use staggered entrances to perform a given chōshi.

The shō's elegant external design alludes to natural forms yet hides an intricate free-reed technology within. Resinous Fold refers to the mixture of human-gathered beeswax and plant resin which is used to both tune and hold its metal reeds in place. Each work in the series is dedicated to present or historic elements of the instrument. 2+4+3 is dedicated to the malachite preparation which coats the bronze reeds; the development of bronze used as free-reeds; and cerumen — the resinous wax produced by stingless bees used on early mouth-organs in tropical mainland Asia, where the distant cousins of honey bees, stingless bees, are central to rainforest ecology. (Cerumen, also known as black beeswax, continues to be a significant cultural material).

My short essay on the shō's ethnobotanical and ethnozoological connections to ancient Asia touches on the shō's history, evolution and present-day connections to people, habitat, animals and culture at Unsounds: unsounds.com/shop/delicate-paths.