Back to winter today! Decided to start the day with a run in the cold wind… no sunlight to be seen! It’s exciting hearing the wind rustling through the hedges and watching the dance of the beautiful trees flanking the river bank. It always evokes in me a wonderful feeling of timelessness, that in the big picture, nothing really matters!
Many of the tracks in my next CD Found in the Sunlight reflect this emotion:
Forever, one of my earliest pieces seemed to come out of the past and felt like a song that had already been written before all things. I played it to a friend at the time and was overwhelmed by his response. He said it had moved him deeply and that I must keep writing and get it out to others to hear… this had a big effect on me and inspired me to keep going!
Ten years on and I’m quite amazed how much I have written!
After the Clouds was named after my father’s (William Saunders) poem. Shortly before he died he asked me to play him one of my new pieces. He then read his poem to my piece and we finished exactly at the same time! It was quite amazing and the piece is very special to me!
Mountain Stream and Dartmoor Stream in actuality both feel like very old friends who I’ve known forever but have forgotten how we first met! The tracks are rather like a portrayal of a glimpse of their journeys and the story that each one is telling.
Sunlit Waterfall was written on a beautiful sunny morning when the blue, cloudless sky was almost intoxicating after days of greyness. The first part just bubbled out of my pencil but the second part was like a jigsaw puzzle with arrows and scribblings everywhere! It happens like that sometimes! It’s amazing how an actual sunlit waterfall is so full of joy, it’s almost like the planet is singing its ecstasy through this cascading dance of diamond bubbles!
When the Sun Goes Down also holds this same feeling that behind the stage of our own own transitory lives there is a backdrop of rock, a serene knowing or wisdom that is unruffled, always calm, always still! Its quite an experience watching the sun gradually sink into the horizon especially by the ocean there is a sense of loss and sadness that the day has ended never to be revisited except in thought! It’s quite emotional when you watch the very last scrap of red disappear!
The sun was shining merrily on the day of the recording but we were amazed to wake up to a generous coating of snow which made driving pretty hazardous for all concerned. John and Alexander were staying with a friend 2 miles away from our own hamlet and the roads were lethal! But thankfully, after a nerve- wracking drive through snow and ice we managed to get to the recording studio and got on with the job in hand! …..