Lyrics:
It’s the end of summer, my nose pressed against the glass,
Butterflies in my flowerbox, and a bumblebee appears!I watch the shadows moving like a sundial across the lawn,
The longest shadows touch my door as the flowers start to dance.They spring up in the air and smile at me – I have no need for supper then.
I watch this aerial ballet instead.They are so beautiful in the fading light, and they welcome the stars as the sky darkens
The moon is their spotlight.
It’s a magical night.eamon brett 2011
About this song:
I knew I wanted a spoken word sort of recitation on top of those loops, and asked a friend of mine, Mrs. Nellie Murphy, to record it for me. It was maybe two years before I went into the studio that she sent me a recording of the spoken piece, which I used to build the demo around. The main problem I had in writing the track was the ending. I rewrote that a few times before getting the arrangement that I went into the studio with, and even at that, I then decided to leave a few of the parts out so that the sparseness of the sound of the second half would contrast even more with the first half.
We had a lot of fun with this one in the studio – any of the instrumentalist who came in to track something were given free reign to give us some noise. All manner of ugly sounds were recorded and sampled for the first half by the drummer and cellist, which we then pieced through and chopped together to flesh out the soundscape of the first section, so that it was getting increasingly more like a whirlwind of sound building up to the climax.
The double bass and the ‘fundit singers’ were each doubling various vocal tracks I’d laid down. Méadhbh was singing with them too. And then later on, Méadhbh did a free improvisation over the top of the section that had no recitation, and out came this wonderful keening wail that she then promptly completely forgot. But that one take was enough. The “little people” on the track are two of my brother’s kids. They were sitting chatting in the studio after their dad was in with the fundit singers, and we recorded them chatting away with me and their dad about their day. Cutting through that to find bits of their conversation that we could use was easier than we expected, and the four spoken bits from them were the final piece of the arrangement to be added to the mix.
Song Credits
mrs. nellie murphy – spoken word
méadhbh sullivan – vocals
aonghus mac amhlaigh – cello
george guilfoyle – double bass
karl hand – drums
fundit singers: kevin brett, laura brett, ed moran
“little people”: caoimhe & éanna