Abstract

The Caves EP is a collection of field recordings intended to bring folk song back to the land. Recorded live in single takes on location, this EP bypasses the usual process of studio production and multi-tracking, and instead provides the listener with unprocessed stereo sound recordings of single moments in time, captured in resonant spaces around the Lake District.

The material recorded is all acapella (performed by vocalist Shannon Pearl), and ranges from original and improvised compositions to renditions of traditional folk song.

There is evidence of caves having been used for ritual purposes as far back as the Mesolithic period, and again through the Roman occupation as places of ceremony and song (Hutton, 2022), likely utilising the natural resonance to enhance the acoustic experience of music, singing and chanting far before the advent of PA systems and reverb plugins, which are essentially used to create artificial and fabricated versions of this authentic experience - this EP focuses on real rather than imagined spaces and on a simplification of the technical side of what it means to produce a recorded body of work, attempting to bridge the gap between listener and moment-in-time.