DISAPPEARING

A wildly imaginative set of solo works on prepared piano and drum set by Billy Martin (Medeski, Martin and Wood, The Lounge Lizards, Creative Music Studio). Informed by a series of his own visual artworks, Martin recorded 3 impromptu sets of performances at The Herman House Gallery surrounded by his art.

Excerpt from liner notes :
Last summer Billy Martin started to draw on paper and canvas with oil pastel sticks, charcoal, and gesso. The results, a soundscape of painterly bleeds, deliberate strokes, and ghost passages, provide alternate scores for solo improvisations. “The further I get away from the familiar, the better,” Martin told me recently, and with these new compositions, he clearly stretches out in unexpected ways. An upright piano prepared with pieces of bamboo, alligator clips, and small African bells adds a distinct voice to the mix. It’s a courageous direction for a drummer, and one that will undoubtedly bear more fruit. In the meantime, the tracks and images of Disappearing grace the deep pocket of a fertile imagination. - Douglas Dreishpoon (Chief Curator Emeritus Albright-Knox Art Gallery)


piano and drum set : Billy Martin
All compositions and artwork by Billy Martin aka illy B
Recorded at The Herman House August 2017  /  January 2018