studies on a river

"At the eleventh hour, Good Morning Tapes release a new album from Japanese singer and composer Hinako Omori, washing away all our worries with peacefully synthesised evocations of Maori spirits and Japan’s natural landscape, commissioned by the Serpentine Gallery and waltzing on beat-less, instrumental airs to a spoken word conclusion recited by Hana Pera Aoake.

"Ka ora te awa. Ka ora te iwi. The river is well, so the people are well," says Aoake on the final segment of 'Studies on a River'. "In a Māori worldview, everything is connected and contains mauri. Mauri is the life spark or essence inherent in all things as they contain the residue of ancestors through whakapapa or geneology. Within Western environmental histories, there is a gap in knowledge around what we can learn through an act of listening." 

Aoake's words resonated with Omori when they were invited by the Serpentine Gallery to write a piece of music for their 'Serpentine Reader' publication on the theme of circulation. Aoake's essay about listening to the river and other bodies of water parallels Omori’s own Japanese cultural view of water as a sacred source. 

'Studies on a River' places these two notions side-by-side, with Omori's recordings of water source and elegant 3/4 synth compositions matched to extracts from Aoake's writing. The first side presents the music alone, and the second is where the project really clicks, with Aoake's themes and Omori's gentle, washing sounds completely in synch. 

Quite beautiful."

- Boomkat