The fourth PEK Solo effort of 2020 finds Boston-area reedist David Peck in a virtual duo with himself, using a digital delay in a call and response on a single instrument - the tenor saxophone - his primary horn for a large part of his early history, demonstrating his current improvisational thinking & language on his most familiar instrument.
"Every once in a while, there is a break in the crazy schedule here at Evil Clown and I have some time to do a solo album. Our grand olde pal, the Corona Virus, has provided such a break in spades.... At the beginning of the year, it appeared that the year would be our busiest yet... We did a bunch of albums in January, February and the first weeks of March, and then I was forced to cancel a bunch of wonderful performances scheduled for the months that followed. So, I caught up all my old business: web site, social media, distribution, and the other non-musical activity required to drive the enterprise. Then I took a month off... my biggest rest since I started up in 2015 after my long hiatus. In mid-May I started up again, conceiving some new means of producing some of the enormous output normally achieved by Evil Clown
This is the fourth PEK Solo effort of 2020. There probably would be more, except I have been focusing on studio construction of structurally complex works involving many of my instruments, overdubbing and computer sound processing, which take longer than my more usual methods. I am super happy with Some Truths are Known - a four hour composition in 3 eighty minute movements for myself on 110 instruments... and I just finished The Strange Theory of Light & Matter, a much simpler session for 4 PEKs each playing through the entire duration on a bunch of different horns
I had an open weekend while we wait for some new additions to Yuri's drum kit before we finish the last pass for Metal Chaos Ensemble - Don Quixote. Rather than start a new complex work, I decided to do a monumental solo for the full duration of the disk on a single instrument: tenor saxophone. A while back, I did a great solo for contralto clarinet and electronic processing... PEK Solo - Non-Local Causality. While not my very first instrument, tenor was my primary horn for a large part of my early history. I started on tenor in high school after playing piano, clarinet and alto from the 3rd grade... I played rock in California on tenor in the 80s and studied tenor with Kurt Heisig in California during the 80s and George Garzone at Berkee in the early 90s. Throughout the 90s I used 6 different horns, and after the 2015 reboot, many more, but tenor was then and remains now at the center of my concept, and this effort demonstrates my current improvisational thinking/language on my strongest instrument
Until the stupid virus is over and more normal interactions are possible with other people, Evil Clown will continue to create new works using different methods which don't involve many other players: PEK Solo projects, and a very select number of Leap of Faith or Metal Chaos Ensemble sets involving no more than 3 people. The PEK Solos with fall into 3 categories: Large Studio Construction/Compositions for lots of overdubbing PEKs on many instruments, small ensembles of PEKs like quartets or sextets, and solos like this effort for unaccompanied single instruments (either full length, or several shorter pieces on different horns)...
As usual, the chaos of the universe throws problems which require our attention. Expression must be expressed. Music must be made. The chaos of the universe demands it."-David Peck (PEK)