James Harley’s Wild Fruits was inspired by two texts; Pilgrim at Tinker Creek by Annie Dillard and Wild Fruits by Henry David Thoreau.  The five movements all involve combining extracts from the texts read by Jim Bartruff, Theresa Carson and Anne-Marie Donovan with sounds recorded in nature and, in some cases, worked over in the studio.  It was originally conceived as an eight channel surround sound experience but the commercial release has been remixed for stereo and Dolby ATMOS.  Obviously some of the spatialization is lost and I’d be curious to hear the ATMOS mix.  As it is I’m going to write about the 48kHz/24bit stereo version which I listened to on headphones because I find that’s closer to the immersive experience than speakers.

Each movement has quite a different feel.  The “Prologue” uses animal and bird noises and something akin to white noise behind the texts to create a fairly generic nature sense.  “Like a Ragged Flock, Like Pulverized Jade” uses lots of watery sounds.  The third movement “Chestnuts” is a bit weird.  Thoreau was clearly obsessed with the things and there’s a lot of text about the state of chestnuts at every season; these are read over sounds of rustling leaves and broken twigs and what sounds like something banging on a tin can.  Possibly a squirrel whose nuts Thoreau has just appropriated?

“Winter” has heavy rain and wind noises and lots of double tracking for the spoken texts.  “Epilogue” focuses on the passage of the seasons and the need to live in each; for example “in August live on berries”.  There are insect and bird sounds and the patter of rain on a tin roof. plus something that sounds like grunting.  Altogether the piece lasts about 63 minutes and it’s quite engrossing.  There’s a distinct mood and sound world for each movement (and how I would have liked to experience a different spatialization for each).  And, even in stereo, it’s really quite immersive.

It’s a digital only release and besides the hi-res mix and ATMOS there’s a CD quality version and MP3.

Catalogue information: Centrediscs CMCCD34726