Jim Fox (1953)
The Copy of the Drawing (1992)
Last Things (1987)

Jim Fox, Marty Walker, Chas Smith, Rick Cox

This recording brings together two of Fox‘s haunting electro-acoustic works, The Copy of the Drawing, for spoken (whispered) voice and electronics, and Last Things, for bass clarinet (Marty Walker), pedal steel guitar (Chas Smith), piano (Fox), and electronics. Last Things is a somewhat rhapsodic call and response between bass clarinet and pedal steel guitar; it is constructed of seven connected sections (or songs) that over the length of the piece slowly build in intensity. As the piece progresses, each section expands in length from the one previous and the bass clarinet’s tessitura rises as it embraces stylistic extremes of vibrato and timbre. Beneath the bass clarinet and pedal steel guitar cycle two expanding sets of harmonies, one played on electronic keyboards and the other on piano. The Copy of the Drawing is a sectional, non-dramatic, serpentine soundscape charged with a certain abstract mysteriousness—it weaves a whispering voice with strands of nonverbal, pitched sound. The text is built of fragments from twenty-three letters addressed to the scientists at Mt. Wilson Observatory between 1915 and 1935 (these letters are collected in the book No One May Ever Have the Same Knowledge Again, published by The Museum of Jurassic Technology, Los Angeles). The original letters offer intensely personal, often quixotic theories, thoughts, and mysterious revelations on a variety of topics, especially astronomical, cosmological, and theological issues. [CD and folder in jewel case]