Product Description
A Projekt / SoundQuest Music co-release
2. Inanna’s Dream 08:11
3. Dunes Of Solace 15:59
4. Song Of Sending 12:34
5. The Gazing Pool 07:39
6. Changing Tides 49:06
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Avant Music News Pick of the Week, August 30, 2020
Inanna’s Dream is a multi-instrumental ambient sonic odyssey of pure emotion and enchantment. Through the six electroacoustic offerings, feelings of yearning, vulnerability and epiphany are infused into a heart and soul stirring expression that accesses the collective well of human experience. The alchemical blend of archaic and contemporary musical techniques and instruments, including the voice, activate a powerful opening into sacred space.
Music
The rich landscapes invoked by Inanna’s Dream are borne from a life deeply dedicated to music and the healing arts. Alongside her work in holistic medicine, Serena Gabriel has been intently exploring the interweave of ancient musical instrumentation with modern technology. Intention, physical movement and breath guide her path in the creative process. This dance of energy is expressed, for example, through the breathing bellows of the harmonium, the earth tones of the didgeridoo and vocals that originate from a place of devoted authenticity. Adding to the vocabulary are various drums and percussion, flutes and lyre which breathe life into the live looping techniques, audio effects and synthesizer textures.
Produced by ambient pioneer Steve Roach, this album is the premiere release on his new label, Soundquest Music. Steve’s unique atmospheric contributions add a soulful infusion to the album’s soundworld mythology.
As the listener embarks upon Inanna’s Dream, “Serpentine” and the title track set the course by way of a ceremonial opening, conjuring the spirits through elements such as didge drones, the mystic callings of clay and wooden flutes and frame drum resonations guided by Serena’s emotive vocals and chant incantations. Traveling on, “The Dunes of Solace” with its melodic harmonium woven tapestry and “Song of Sending” with its poignant wordless vocals reveal a universal sense of longing, reverie and reconciliation. At this point, “The Gazing Pool” appears in a mirage-like oasis, offering a tranquil alchemical combination of Steve’s radiant ambient guitar and synth atmospherics with the lustrous quality of Serena’s lyre. The closing track, “Changing Tides,” is a gorgeous electro acoustic slow flow of pure serenity and deep calm. Serena’s lilting harmonium and Nord Lead synth waves ebb and flow with Steve’s lush Oberheim orchestrations; this combination creates a unique and truly timeless space of boundless oceanic grace.
Inanna’s Dream is a dynamic radiant transmission celebrating the multifaceted richness of life in all of its exquisite beauty.
Bios
As a musician, dancer, healing arts practitioner and medicine music provider, Serena Gabriel’s years of experience working with sound and vibrational therapies infuse her evocative vocals, chants, mantras and music. She draws from a wide collection of electronic and unique acoustic instruments. A frequent live performer, she is equally at home in her recording studio full of synthesizers, loopers and effects while surrounded by an acoustic sonic palette of harmoniums, didgeridoos, flutes and percussion.
It is Serena’s aspiration that her dedication to the vast potential of sound for positive transformation can be experienced through the essence of her musical offerings.
Steve Roach is a leading American pioneer in the evolution of ambient/electronic music, helping shape it into what it is today. Grammy nominated in 2018 and 2019 consecutively, his career spans four decades and nearly 150 releases. Steve’s role as producer and artist on Inanna’s Dream presents the evolution of his years of collaborative work and album productions for select
artists worldwide. His work with Tucson-based Serena Gabriel was first heard on the 2020 collaboration Nectar Meditation. Inanna’s Dream is the premiere release on his Soundquest Music label.
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From Tucson Weekly
A new collaboration between two Tucson musicians serves as a welcome reprieve from the lingering summer. Inanna’s Dream by Tucsonan Serena Gabriel was composed as an “ambient sonic odyssey,” drifting between the worlds of new age, drone and electronic music. Inanna’s Dream is the premiere release on the Soundquest Music label, formed by local ambient pioneer Steve Roach, who is featured on multiple tracks.
While the album features several hallmarks of Roach’s style – sweeping synthesizer notes, tribal percussion fused with ambient tones, a massive yet meditative atmosphere – Gabriel makes the album unique with her hypnotic vocals and a combination of acoustic and electronic instruments.
With a goal of interweaving ancient musical instrumentation and modern technology, Gabriel touches on feelings of vulnerability as well as rapture. She accomplished this through cool yet mantric performances on the harmonium, flute, lyre and dholak drum. In usual style, Roach contributes his expertly layered atmospheres performed on a score of keyboards.
The album’s highlight is “The Song of Sending,” which features all the elements that make Inanna’s Dream unique. A calm harmonium is infused with Gabriel’s airy vocals and steady percussion. Several layers build as the drones grow darker, yet remain subtle as incense smoke. “The Gazing Pool” is another treat, with strings panning back and forth on top of reverberated tones like drops of water.
It should be noted, however, this album really is for fans of ambient music; multiple tracks stretch past the 10-minute mark, with the album’s culmination “Changing Tides” drifting on for the better part of an hour.
According to Soundquest Music, Gabriel is a musician, dancer, healing arts practitioner and medicine music provider, whose aspiration is that her dedication to the vast potential of sound for positive transformation can be experienced through the essence of the musical offerings she creates.
It’s fitting that the project’s name references Inanna, the Sumerian goddess of love and sensuality, but also war, because the album is as soothing and hypnotic as it is immense. -Jeff Gardner