Mirrors from Wavelengths by Waterhouse
Instrumentation (in order of appearance): Shruti Box (C/G), Fretless Acoustic Bass Guitar, Electric Guitar, Banjo, Mandolin, Udu, Triangle, Cowbell
6 of the 11 tracks on Wavelengths were built around the drone of the shruti box. The shruti box is based upon an ancient Chinese instrument called the sheng. It was further refined in India and is now most commonly associated with Indian classical music. It is a wooden box with back and front panels that open to reveal large and small bellows (think the breathing aspect of an accordion). The bellows are the lungs of the instrument. They open and close in response to one another, pushing air across metal reeds and out small holes on the front panel arranged in the form of a one octave keyboard, low G to high G. Though usually pumped with the hands, my shruti box has a foot pedal that can be attached allowing me to pump the bellows with my foot, freeing up my hands to simultaneously play another instrument. This beautiful instrument was expertly built by Stefan Cartwright of the Shruti Box Company in Wales, UK. In each song in which it appears, I used two notes: the root and perfect 5th of the song’s key. These 6 tracks traverse the first 6 turns of the circle of 5ths (C to B/noon to 5:00) though they don’t appear in that order (the order was decided based on how I felt the tracks would best flow from one to the next and tell the story of the album). On future albums, I plan to complete this journey around the circle of 5ths (F# to F/6:00 to 11:00). Mirrors is noon on the circle of 5ths: key of C, root note of C paired with a perfect 5th, G. Though I was happy with how the mic captured the Shruti Box on each track, this one was my favorite. It seemed to pick up some particularly majestic overtones.
Waterhouse is the music of Chris Paradis on vocals, guitar, banjo, mandolin, bass, percussion, ukulele, whatever else is lying around and also involving the occasional collaboration with a friend. For booking or music lessons, you can reach him at waterhousemusiclessons@gmail.com.