With this one, I was mostly focused on getting a workable sound for the recordings going forward. I wanted to sing twice to give the impression of intentionality. As I went back over, following the original words of the improvisation, I started to think of the slight mismatches with an image in mind. I thought about hand tracing over something, how doing that implies that the original is the model. 

If something is a model, maybe it takes on that abstract sense of permanence we attribute to song. In fact, I often take issue with this feeling of permanence (existentialists would call it essence) because I think it is false. What I like about the air of tracing is giving both the sense of improvisation—of creation—and of completion and intentionality at the same time. I would like if it helped me, and listeners, to notice both of those aspects of any phenomenon.

Listen to this latest “Essai” on SoundCloud.

Did you see that big cloud
raising its head?

Giving a warning
to everyone
trying hard