A Sonic Deluge of Transformation

Františec Kupca, Tale of Pistils and Stamens, 1919-1920

Paul Dolden
Beyond the Walls of Jericho 

(1991, Remastered 2012)

“Beyond the Walls of Jericho” is the third and final work in a trilogy of works I call the “Walls Cycle.” The three works are perhaps the most intense sounding music I have ever created in the studio.

All three works were inspired by the biblical story of the Walls of Jericho, in which sound was used to collapse walls and create social change. This third piece works extensively with human subjectivity, which it also dissolves into anonymous massed textures. This subjectivity is represented by the multi tracking of “free jazz” gestures and colors. I recorded dozens of free jazz musicians honking, screaming with the motives of this work on their horns. At 45” you hear the same music played extremely softly with the microphones placed almost on each instrument. In the original program notes, I refer to these dense simultaneities as representing a collapsing of meaning and creating a perception of absence and stasis. Then I argue that these moments allow for a remapping of experience and existence or, in other words, allow us to reinvent ourselves. In this way the revolutionary history I have been exploring becomes in the end a personal existential choice to create our own reality because we are free to do so.

–Paul Dolden

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Sometimes words fail, but the experience remains, always. When the experience is so charged, so imbued with another “kind” of meaning, our material perceptions become moot. It’s then that the door opens.

Walk through it. If you’re sympathetic to the unknown, you’ll recognize that you’ve reached the limit of your sensorium… and you’ve crashed through it! On reflection, what was once a seemingly unreachable horizon, has now become an awareness of a barrier that has been breached. What will you do next?

Walk through that door.

A new horizon presents itself. It’s more beautiful than any sunset, more transcendent than any possible entheogenic junket you can possibly take. It seems unreachable, but you know that a rung on the celestial ladder has just been trounced. Those behind you will have to deal with it (and they will look to you for advice) but you… you made it! You are elated; you begin to think that there is no reason why this next horizon can’t be attained either. You steel yourself.

As the ascension proceeds, each step explodes like a progressio harmonica on the pipe organ of the Universe. A resonant unfolding of realities manifests, and you’re in the thick of it. 

Keep your eye on the prize, the next horizon waves at you.

A word to the would-be listener. This is an extremely intense piece of music. I personally like to listen to it through headphones at loud volumes. The micro dynamics on display in this work are legion! Amongst the chaos you can hear everything, every sound is unveiled, it’s the source of those sounds that remains a mystery. I will say this though, no one, NO ONE walks away from this piece unscathed!

–Michael Eisenberg

Paul Dolden began his career at age 16 as a professional electric guitarist, violinist and cellist. Excited by the possibilities offered by recording technologies, he turns to contemporary modes of production and dissemination in the creation of his music. At age 29, he wins the first of a string of European awards that establish him as a composer. Now the winner of over twenty international awards, Dolden’s music is performed in Europe and North America to wildly enthusiastic audiences.

In a career spanning over 40 years, Paul Dolden has perfected his unique approach to audio technology, using it as a platform from which to launch or capture otherwise impossible musical performances. In this way, he makes his computer behave like a new, virtual orchestra and manipulates it with as much sensitivity as he would a traditional one. His compositions are characterized by a maximalist aesthetic in which hundreds of digitally recorded instrumental and vocal performances are combined in multiple layers.

Paul has a large bandcamp presence. For those wanting to go the full monty, make sure you click on the merch link to access his “Golden Dolden” box set which is his entire oeuvre in glorious, high rez sound!