the UNIQUENESS OF from SCRATCH

Invented Instruments

From the outset, instrument invention has been central to the group's development. Over the years instruments have evolved from junk assemblages - found, bought and homemade - to custom designed and built.  With it, a tonal vocabulary has developed from randomly pitched to finely-tuned and microtonal, and a rhythmic language from  basic beats to dovetail hockets and polyrhythm.

Central to this development has been the tuned percussion stations - rack-supported, four-tier combinations of PVC pipes, tuned-tongue bells, tuned drums and tuned-tongue bamboos. Four such stations, along with various other struck and spun instruments, made up the FROM SCRATCH sound that gained the group its reputation during the 1970s and ’80s.

Through the 1990s, new sounds were developed for Global Hockets and other projects - emphasising spontaneity and improvisation. Some of the more recently-developed instruments include the zitherum (drummed and bowed long stringed instruments), the metal pronged nundrum, tone-tree, Foley trays, sliding tube-drums, fingerpots, RodBaschet, song-stones, gloopdrum, Dr Drone, water-bells and aerial bells.

A PERFORMANCE STYLE

Performances operate as a junction for musical, visual and social ideas, instruments as signals to ear and eye. Unique instruments, rhythmic hocketing and seamless sound structures give performances a sense of timeless ritual; part-music, part-sculpture and installation.  A dynamic and distinctive sound and performance language has evolved where intricate rhythms are woven around a constant and often unstated pulse.  The music, though mostly structured, has an air of improvisation heightened by the rapport between players and an element of surprise.  What you hear you also see, and vice versa.