Aspirational Gardening
Always and on June 18
Dearests,
I will now for a moment use this platform as it was originally intended, in other words to give you information about music that is Coming Soon. Also hello. I will attempt not to cut-and-paste from my press release. Also I am learning to write press releases.
“June 18, 2022—Bringing together a roster of well-known collaborators working in jazz, concert music, experimental music, and noise rock, composer/performer Andrea Mazzariello’s “Aspirational Gardening” offers a saturated, soaring preview of his forthcoming full-length, War Footing.”
My first attempt not to cut-and-paste from the press release has failed. Or am I just doing it to be cute? You decide. However, all of that is true. I am releasing a song called “Aspirational Gardening,” (<=listen!) which is about my “real-life overgrown garden, moving from lighthearted regret at failing to maintain it to deeper reflections on contemplative practice, ambition, and coming up short. The lyrical space is dense and breathless, over a constant swirl of skittering programmed drum machines, hard-hitting acoustic drums, and layers of analog synthesizers. Brady Lenzen (of Minneapolis’ inventive cult-rockers Skoal Kodiak) winds through an intricate bassline, jazz heavy JC Sanford provides emphatic brass commentary, and Jason Treuting (Sō Percussion, Big Red Machine, Taylor Swift) punctuates the wall of sound with frenetic toy percussion blasts.”
It seems that the press release just won’t quit. Here’s something, though: I am going to play a solo show at Keepsake Cidery in Dundas, MN on June 18, from 4pm-6pm, and in tow I shall have a wurlitzer electric piano, recently meticulously restored and yet the humidity will nonetheless stick the keys, my mouth out of which singing shall issue forth, and a pile of download cards for the aforementioned track about “my real life overgrown garden, moving from lighthearted regret…to deeper reflections…with frenetic…blasts” which will be one dollar each. The downloads, not the frenetic blasts. Frenetic blasts are apparently free if you ask nicely, but maybe that is just a sweetheart deal.
I have never played for 2 hours before so I basically have to play every song I have ever written, except the ones that will really sink in the key-sticking humidity (I’m looking at you, “Lying Down,” about which Brady says “you play every note,” which is probably true.) Also the ones I can’t remember at all, or only ever existed on a wild setup, more on that soon.
Right now, in fact: I’ve never played just keys and voice before. I think this is a sign of personal growth and courage, as I am not hiding behind a wall of electronic hoo-has or trying to play multiple instruments at the same time with a headset mic reminiscent of Janet Jackson’s Rhythm Nation but in Janet’s case it was to dance and be famous and in mine it was because centering my face on a microphone did not work given my jitters and compulsions to keep drums going on one side and keys going on the other. Remember those days? Video evidence upon request. I almost linked to something from 2005 but then I said to myself “people don’t want to see that, and you have probably already lost them, and one should share music from a position of relative strength.” But then does saying it actually make it more enticing? You decide. You know where to find me.
I would love to see you on Saturday the 18th if you are a person in the vicinity of my home and “real-life overgrown garden.” If you are not, you could come to a NY show in September, or a NJ show the next night, or you could download the song from bandcamp on June 18. I’ll send a quick “here’s how” then. Speaking of bandcamp, if you bandcamp I would be in your debt if you followed me, as One More Revolution Records, by clicking here: https://onemorerevolutionrecords.bandcamp.com/follow_me
So I really like it when, out of all the mire of self-referentiality and “establishing a voice,” something real punches through at the very end, to make it all worthwhile, to bring it all together. That’s kind of my goal when I write these things. To warm up in prose and then, when the preheating is complete and the proverbial oven dings, to say a real thing. However, sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. Sometimes you want to share some music you made with your friends.
Or maybe it’s a bit more complicated: sometimes you want to want to share that music, you want to love to play, you want to feel like it is a thing you are supposed to be doing, a medium through which you are capable of communicating. For me, though, I think the fantasy of elevating my playing to something that feels boundless and unlimited is probably just a fantasy. I am here just to put one foot in front of the other, to work on it to the extent that I am capable of working on it, and to get marginally more comfortable as the years go by. So this is a bit of a milestone performance, even though it’s a little thing by fame and fortune standards. Going out there without a net, making an offering, as evidence of having tried and tried again. I hope to see you and I hope this note finds you “bringing together a roster of well-known collaborators working in jazz, concert music, experimental music, and noise rock,” or at the very least among people you care about and that care about you.
I sing you a song,
Andrea