We’ve updated our Terms of Use to reflect our new entity name and address. You can review the changes here.
We’ve updated our Terms of Use. You can review the changes here.

Incantare Mundana

from Apodictic by Benjamin Skepper

/

  • Streaming + Download

    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    Purchasable with gift card

      $1.75 AUD  or more

     

  • Buy the Full Digital Album

  • Full Digital Discography

    6
    releases

    Get all 6 Benjamin Skepper releases available on Bandcamp and save 20%.

    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of Praeludium y Fuga, Apodictic, In The Field, Inimitable, Parnassus, and Eika 詠歌. , and , .

    Purchasable with gift card

      $48 AUD or more (20% OFF)

     

about

SPACE ART COMMISSION for FOREVER NOW

ARTIST STATEMENT

Humans are deeply fascinated by the cosmos, contemplating the birth of mother earth, surmising about the afterlife, devising methods to harness divine power and imagining what exists in “outer-space”. The human voice is the primordial tool to connect with the divine. Ascetics, shamans, priests and witches invoke spiritual chants and prayers to positively access and harness cosmological energy. Artists also believe they are conduits channeling this energy to manifest creation on the earthly plane. These represent terrestrial interpretations of consciousness and the soul, spiritual, religious or personal, as humans confront mortality, ponder the metaphysical and the interconnectedness of all things.

Based on the notion that the essence of the universe is composed of sound as vibration, I present our interstellar friends with “Incantare Mundana”: a mix-up of human voice, nature sounds, music and noise, in contradistinction to formal western music for which I have received theoretical training. The title of the work pays homage to discourse concerning the music of the spheres (musica mundana), conceiving of a cosmos ordered according to Pythagorean and Neoplatonic ideas.

Turning our consideration to the effect of music (and sound) on the soul and as a reflection of cosmic harmony, Pythagoras’ sublime speculations about sidereal harmonics and world harmony envisage the planetary bodies traversing the sky in a colossal cosmic chant. The music of the spheres imagines a universe where the revolution of each planet produces a distinctive tone, and this tonal harmony of the spheres creates a well-defined musical scale. Cosmic and musical structures are considered to express the same mathematical ratios proportioned by unequal but specific intervals. Predating the birth of Christ, this philosophy permeated thought throughout the Middle Ages, and research continues into different musical tunings and temperaments.

“Incantare” is the Latin word “to enchant”, and the derivation for the English word incantation. It references the human voice, subject matter of the field recordings, central to the composition of this sound piece.

Incantare Mundana is a poetic collection of chants, prayers and incantations personally recorded as I traversed the earth in search of the sacred. Japanese Buddhist Monks in Kyoto and Shinto Shrine Bells (bells awaken the spirits), Hindi sermons in Roman Churches, Russian prayers at Kazanski Cathedral in St Petersburg, Italian hymns intoned at The Vatican, the sweet voices of French Nuns in Paris, throat singing from the harmonic Gyuto Monks of Tibet and sacred musical sounds of the dancing Whirling Dervishes in Istanbul, Turkey.

In a time where fear dominates and humans confront planetary survival in this great cosmic disco, may this sonic offering impart a message of peace from mother earth and propel us towards a positive future paradigm!

credits

from Apodictic, released February 18, 2015
CREDITS

Composed and Produced by Benjamin Skepper Recorded by Benjamin Skepper Engineered by Benjamin Skepper and Yasuho Matsubara Mastered by Yasuho Matsubara

℗ & © 2014 contrapuntal & Benjamin Skepper All rights reserved.

FOREVER NOW COMMISSION by APHIDS EVENTS INC

Forever Now is a 21st century collection of artworks created to communicate to outer space. Contributed and collected from 118 different countries, Forever Now is this century’s response to the NASA Voyager Records sent into space in 1977. It is a sequel and an update to that visionary gesture.

44 audio and audio-visual works were selected by curators and encoded onto a Golden LP with its accompanying Digital Card. One of these records will stay on Earth in a public collection. One will be gifted to NASA, to take to the International Space Station. The third is intended to be taken on the next inter-stellar mission, which since the time of Voyager have been few and far between. Curators continue to work with eminent consultants in the science community to make this happen.

Stage 1 of the project saw the 44 selected works launched into outer space at MONA FOMA Festival on 18 Jan 2015 via a private company in Florida, specialists in transmitting messages into deep space.

Conceived and directed by Willoh S.Weiland. Curated by Willoh S. Weiland, Brian Ritchie, Thea Baumann & Jeff Khan.

license

all rights reserved

tags

about

Benjamin Skepper image

Benjamin Skepper Melbourne, Australia

“Embodying classical aesthetic, music and culture, Skepper is a musician with an extraordinary sense of the contemporary” (Rolling Stone Italy)

Benjamin Skepper is a classically trained musician, an innovator fascinated by evolving technologies and our deepest corporeal connections to music. He’s no less fascinated by issues of identity and the relationships between sound, medicine and healing. ... more

contact / help

Contact Benjamin Skepper

Streaming and
Download help

Redeem code

Report this track or account

If you like Benjamin Skepper, you may also like:

Bandcamp Daily  your guide to the world of Bandcamp

On Bandcamp Radio

Featuring Riley Pinkerton (aka The Rat Queen) from the theatrical NYC rockers, Castle Rat.
listen now