• Forever More Compact Disc

  Compact Disc (CD)

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  1. Breathing In and Out
  2. Lights and Shadows
  3. Rockabye
  4. Here I Am, Just For You
  5. Billie
  6. The Little Possum
  7. Call and Response
  8. Forever, and No Time At All
  
  Nat Bartsch - piano
  Robbie Melville - guitar
  Xani Kolac - violin/effects
  Anita Quayle - cello/effects
  Tamara Murphy - double bass
  Maddison Carter - drums
  
  All compositions by Nat Bartsch (control)
  Recorded at ABC Studio 345, Melbourne, 2 March 2020
  Recorded, mixed and mastered by Chris Lawson
  Assistant engineer - Jack Montgomery Parkes
  Produced by Nat Bartsch
  Artwork by Luci Everett
  Released on ABC Jazz
  
  In May 2018 I released Forever, and No Time At All. This album, for piano, celeste, and electronics, is a suite of lullabies I wrote after my son Will was born. The premise of the album was to create peaceful music for babies and children—but equally importantly, be enjoyable and soothing for adults (whether or not they had children of their own).
  Since FANTAA’s release, I have received a gentle stream of messages from people who play the album regularly. Many of them are parents, with babies for whom this music is part of their daily routine. However to a surprising extent, this music is used by people from other walks of life. My lullabies support people with PTSD, dementia, depression, autism, anxiety, stress and grief. It has been played in the final hours of a person’s life, and at countless births. It is such an immense honour and privilege to contribute music in these vulnerable and intensely personal moments.
  I originally trained in jazz piano at the VCA and for many years was bandleader of jazz ensemble Nat Bartsch Trio. In recent years my solo career has shifted more towards being a classical artist, however I deeply treasure the ability to use improvisation to modify and elaborate upon my compositions. Each time I perform my pieces it is like painting the same picture again—the essential, identifying characteristics remain the same, but the finer details change. It seemed a logical next step to explore how likeminded musicians could contribute to my lullabies in the same fluid and lyrical way. Artists for whom genre is flexible, listening is wide, playing is sensitive and compassionate.
  The ‘jazz’ iteration of these lullabies first premiered at the Melbourne Recital Centre in January 2019, at 11am, for a handful of parents and babies. With the lights still on, cushions scattered on the floor and the occasional shriek or coo from the smaller members of the audience, I played my lullabies in a quartet. There were solo sections; celeste parts were transferred to guitar, gentle arcs of bass and drums swept across the Salon. As we finished our set with my album’s title track, I was moved to tears but the incredible playing of my peers, their generosity, their honesty. I felt as though I was floating on air. As we came off stage, I suddenly realised that the members of my band felt it too. There was something about this music—its simplicity, its repetition, its gentleness—that provides a framework for accomplished jazz artists to play effortlessly over.
  In this unprecedented time, we are incredibly lucky to have been able to record this music. We tracked the album in one day, on the 1st March 2020, at ABC studios in Melbourne. The photo we took of the six of us, arms around each other at the end of the session, would be prohibited today. Just ten days later, life as we knew it had come to a standstill—social distancing rules were in place, tours and performances were cancelled, older relatives were in isolation. Editing, mixing and mastering occurred remotely with ABC in lockdown.
  Long before COVID-19 it seemed as though my lullabies can serve a purpose in difficult times—I hope that Forever More, a renewed painting of these pieces, will create a soothing soundtrack to the uncertainty and heartache ahead.
  
  Forever More is dedicated to Jeremy Hopkins.
  Nat plays Yamaha pianos.
  Robbie uses a Jim Matheas hand built classical guitar on ‘Here I Am, Just For You’
  
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