Some pictures and close-ups from the final painting done for Peter Breughel video…
From the video :
{ full story here if you have missed how we came to make the cover of this Flemish folk song }
§ Simone
Art Work
Pieter Breughel in Brussel – Wannes Van de Velde cover
Last June when we played in Belsele at ‘t Ey (Belgium), Dirk from the very nice team hosting us that night played this Flemish song that we then heard for the first time,on the piano… the moment was magical! And we both thought once we’d have some time we would try to work on a version of ours. Moreover the song from Wannes Van de Velde is about Pieter Brughel (the XVI° painter, that painted The Tower of Babel) and his dilemma and understanding of how due to political changes, from Spanish language people in Flanders had switched to French when his own language was Flemish.
This is the original version we worked from – pronunciation is so clear and detached despite of the speed space! It has been a challenging exercise to find the balance between some Flemish-Antwerp sounds and the way I normally would pronounce it in Dutch – that is: with an obvious French flavour!
The Tower of Babel, the famous painting from Pieter Breughel relates to the biblical story about misunderstanding between humans caused by different languages. For us it relates to the awesome richness of humanity, and more than other things reminds us of our stay in South-East of Turkey, in the areas of Mardin and Diyarbakir and to a certain extend in Lebanon. What we most loved was the blurred border between human groups. You can’t easily tell who belongs to which group, based on what? religion? language? accent? race??? Surprisingly and in its own way, Diyarbakir was much more cosmopolitan than Istanbul. Our plan for after the album’s release was actually to go back and cross the border to Northern Iraq, which sadly is at the moment totally impossible. Sadly also we see how this rich mixture of cultures is dying in one of the most important areas for our cultures.
For those who wonder, we both speak some reasonable Dutch since we lived in The Netherlands for a while but…. a loooooong time ago!
We hope you’ll enjoy it as much as La Jotinette! 😉
§ Simone
{very} Special Bundles for Album B Release
For the release of our album B, we have created some cool bundles…
They are 9 of these bundles specially made for Art and Astrakan lovers, each with a little original artwork created for the album booklet, which means, each of them is unique, and it’s of course a super limited edition that will each include:
- The album of course!
- A link to download the full album
- One of the last copies available of or EP Torkad – Kofrig ar Sorserez… released in 2005! 100% acoustic, and it includes the very first version of “Sell ouzh ar Stered” (with different lyrics Adam hag Eva)
- An original piece of artwork used to create the album booklet. Sizes differ a bit (and price also because it depends on the postage costs). They are all on very good quality watercolour paper and include various styles of mixed-media depending on each piece. (pleased note that it isn’t framed to keep the cost of postage reasonable)
- Some personal notes regarding the song linked with the art-work and hand-written lyrics
- A post-card with some of Simone’s Artwork print
- Shipping anywhere in the world + nice and safe packaging
Here they are…
1 – Sell ouzh ar Stered (Look at the Stars)
Sorry… already sold !
2 – En Anv Doue ma Mamm
Bundle price : 45€
3 – Gwerz Inês
Bundle price : 55€
4 – Sekrejoù ar C’Hloareg
Sorry… already sold !
5 – Gwerz an Yougoslavi
Bundle price : 45€
6 – Seizh Bloaz
Bundle price : 45€
7- My beloved has died
Bundle price : 45€
8 – Ar c’hased Arc’hant
Bundle price : 45€
9 – Ar Plac’h Yaouank ag an Oriant
Bundle price : 45€
Making new from old AKA dare to sacrifice
Our album is right now being manufactured, it’s a big achievement already! We still have a lot to do, but we can be more relax since the first big deadline is over (and we made it! 🙂 ) And since we were so busy last week, here’s a sneak-pick on how we created the album cover.
Our music too is pretty much also about “sacrificing” ancient (and beautiful) a-capela songs to turn them into new pieces. Sometimes we barely dare to. For some tunes, including some on next album, we waited for years before we dared to. Not by fear really. But because it’s sometimes hard to transform a song into a new tune that will at least compete with the original version.
§ Simone
What else do you need to release your next album?
… You need Gesso!!! Or at least, I need gesso!
What? Gesso is a primer used to coat canvasses or paper before painting, especially loved and treasured by artists that love multiple layers and materials as well as heavy textures. Well… like me! I love gesso. And I still don’t know how I run out of my precious primer, (well, no, not completely, I still have some black gesso 😉 ) , and not only I run out of gesso, but also I haven’t found so far any art-shop in my area in Greece (around Kavala, if you happened to be reading and know one, please! Don’t let me down, leave me a comment!).
Not only did I run out of gesso, but I’m painting for next album cover (ho, here comes the album!), so, what can I do?
So what else than go back to the old Do It Yourself method. Yes. Again. I found an easy recipe here. Basically baby powder+white glue+water. I chose to add some very white paint. I’ll wait until tomorrow to allow it to settle.
I sometimes wonder if I haven’t been cursed for really needing again and again to find last minutes creative solutions. Do I really wish things would be different? Noooooo ! 😉
§ Simone
Some work in progress art work for next album
Last Astrakan Project album (2012) was the first album ever I used my art work for. With the exception of Yann’s portrait, I did not specifically create the paintings for the album, but once they were finished (they were created between March and June 2012 whilst the album was to be released in September), there was absolutely no doubt in our minds they belonged to the album.
For our upcoming album, I had no idea so far. Absolutely zero! I even hadn’t been drawing much lately because I kind of wanted to get first an idea of what to paint… for the album!
Ha ha ha! Inspiration just doesn’t seem to work for me that way! Last week-end I started to doodle inspired by Shamanistic Sami drums from northern Scandinavia, like this one:
I loved the very stylish way animals and people get depicted, but above all the way they depict a world, they tell a story that you can follow. And I kind of got inspired… So inspired that
While composing music we often get into the same inspiration process, if we try to pull it too hard, nothing really happens, when we let go off the pressure about “this needs to be done”, then only ideas start to flow.
Truth is, most brilliant ideas aren’t really ours…
…best ideas come to us – if we allow them to.
Back to painting!
§ Simone
What is left behind during the creative process
When we released last month our “Within The Circle” tracks, I had done a front cover (>here<) with original art work, but didn’t get into editing something more visual with short descriptions from the songs – but it is done now!
I would never pretend to compete with any professional designer, but the more I get to work on the visual I want to add to our music, the more I enjoy the process. It is still a challenge for me to try to find something clear and easy to read, but also different from what I have already done. Here it is, it will now automatically download with the songs:
The little philosophical story relates to the colour circle-like that are from a picture I took from the process of painting the full cover, which means… it no longer exists. It is somewhere, somewhere under this painting. It is part of it, it was necessary to make the face emerge from a flow of colour. But it only exists as part of Her now.
Maybe every creative process is about this sacrifice, about choosing one version over another one. When we choose to play a formally a-capella version of a song on stage using loops and oriental instruments, we also kind of leave the old version we heard and learned from the elders behind. But it is still there, part of something new that would have never existed without it.
We so far don’t know if we’ll ever release it as “physical” edition, or maybe as a bonus? In the meantime anyway you can enjoy the music here (and download it for free by just entering your e-mail address) :
§ Simone
How to fit a music studio AND an art studio in a car?
Dear followers, if you’re used to read our diary between the lines, we have given a couple of clues already about our next destination.
It’s official! [first breaking new will start here]
We are moving very soon to Northern Greece, next to Kavala. This is the amazing place we are moving to :
This is one of the view that will inspire our upcoming projects and sounds, and actually we already composed/discussed/wrote many things from that particular place (if you want to share the feeling with us, you can check here on Google maps). Expect loads of pictures from Greece in next months!
So, how do we fit an art studio + a music studio above the usual staff in a car? Well… we don’t really know yet!
Because yes, we are moving with our car, Kavala is only about 450 km from Istanbul.
But for sure, it will help if we can sell some extra albums before we leave, it would kind of help…
So, [2nd breaking new starts here] we’ll offer until next Monday (December the 2nd, 2013) a special & ridiculously cheap price for our album, shipping included: 10.00€ which is about 13.50$ – just a little click on the link bellow and you’ll land on our on-line shop…
Help us with this campaign, share around with your friends and family, within your communities, by any way you prefer (over-use the social links bellow!) ! Only valid for one week! Then, we’ll come back to that later, we’ll have anyway to raise prices anyway, international shipping is much more expensive from Greece than from Turkey.
“Within the Circle” EP presentation {vlog}
[youtube http://youtu.be/PSCtWWnU5Ak]
Full download from EP: https://astrakanproject.bandcamp.com/…
Artwork on sale: http://goo.gl/toLfcn
A Green See Goddess for our EP
Very colourful again, even if at the moment you’ll only see it threw your screen, it will complete your music experience. The painting is an evocation of the Greek Goddess of the Sea Tethys, which will be perfect to go along with the second song of the EP inspired by a circle dance rhythm from the Karpatos islands.
Music will be released next Friday, 4 long tracks (about 25 min all together!) and available for download directly here, also on our bandcamp page and on our Android app. Yes! We’ll have our android app! How cool is that?
More Art from Simone on her Tumblr: http://rosaborboniana.tumblr.com/ or on her on-line shop: http://rosaborboniana.alittlemarket.com
. astrakan project . 