Peter Salett Photo credit: Bernie DeChant
“Suite for the Summer Rain began simply. One day on a whim I tuned the low E string on my guitar down to C. Suddenly a new world opened up to me, chords played as usual made different harmonic and emotional impressions, and I started finger picking instead of strumming. Purposefully non-metronomic, Suite for the Summer Rain and Dance of the Yellow Leaf sway and swell, ocean winds whistling raindrops in new directions.” (Peter Salett)
How does “Ringing of the Bells” reflect the emotional and spiritual tension between grief and longing for a utopian world?
PETER SALETT: I have always loved the sound of church bells, a sound that sends vibrations throughout the neighborhood. “Ringing of the Bells” speaks of the funeral bells (as in the famous phrase, “for whom the bell tolls”) and is a plea – a longing by the grief-stricken for a world that can never exist, and there is no death. Sometimes my mind works through the past and imagines different scenarios and outcomes, and I sing about this quite a bit on the record – could something different have happened? And yet, in the end, what happened is what happened and it’s up to us to move forward, eventually. The first line says it pretty well – “What if the ringing of the bells / sang out a melody / there was no ticking of the clock / to be just was to be.”
In what ways does the musical composition — particularly the absence of a metronome and use of natural sounds — deepen the song’s emotional impact and thematic message?
PETER SALETT: Throughout the both records, I wanted to create a sense of the ebbs and flows of the natural world, the ocean waves coming to shore and then receding. And I guess if I’m singing “there was no ticking of the clock” it makes sense that the song shouldn’t feel like a metronome (or a loop).
It also allows for the refrain to really open up, the harp can flutter and fill in the space, and the listener can sense the reality in the moment as I’m asking the eternal question of grief – simply: Why?
Considering your cinematic background, how does “Ringing of the Bells” function like a scene from a film, and what imagery or mood does it evoke for the listener?
PETER SALETT: I’ve recently started describing these records as “cinematic adjacent”, they are meant to create visions for the listener – both through the use of lyric collage that spans the entire record, or the use of natural sounds that create a type of dreamscape that the music rests in. Each song or musical interlude is its own little scene in the larger context of the whole piece. The songs can be understood individually but for the full experience it’s about listening to the entire record.
Suite for the Summer Rain Pre-Save
Dance of the Yellow Leaf Pre-Save
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