This started as an idle bit of tinkering around with the brilliant US Library of Congress Citizen DJ tool as part of the public domain challenge, and in particular the song The Old Oaken Bucket.

As I was travelling last week, most of the production was done in Apple Logic on the iPad with a virtual bassist and keyboard player filling out a couple of chord sequences I plugged in. I tried to keep them simple, on the basis I might have to play this myself at some point!

The spark of the lyrics was a Zen Kōan which came into my mind as I was mixing the music: “Before enlightenment; chop wood, carry water. After enlightenment; chop wood, carry water”. The methodical nature of that quote seemed to chime (for me) at least with both the music and the whole FAWM experience. I shared the words “Chop wood, carry water” when I handed it over to @oatst for the lyrics and vocals, and I love what he turned it into…

Whatever, it felt kind of fitting as a final FAWM tune… See you all again next year!

#zen #mindful #electronic #challenge #publicdomain

Links:

• https://citizen-dj.labs.loc.gov/
• https://www.loc.gov/item/jukebox-5370/
• https://www.sloww.co/enlightenment-chop-wood-carry-water/