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SUMIDAGAWA (after 'Subsets)

from Three​-​Crossing River (after YOKAI) by Laura Sampson

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about

This track, inspired by looking at Maurer & Moore's 'Subsets' retells the story and structure of river-themed noh SUMIDAGAWA (Sumida River), and explores how this relates to the image of the mythical Three-crossing river.

View this and the other YŌKAI images at White Conduit Projects gallery, London (until 27/2/22) and at www.maurer-moore.com.

lyrics

The river that separates two worlds is a violence, traversable by reflected light.

Once there was a traveller, who made a long journey from a place of comfort, to the bank of the Sumida River, for a funeral.

There, he met a mother reduced to a dance-crazed thrall through grief for her lost son, still searching for him. He’s somewhere on the other side of the river. She needs to get across. The ferryman takes her poetic turn of phrase as price of passage. But the traveller knows the truth: the boy is not lost, he is dead. Part of the mother, already on the other opposite bank, uncrossably distant. The funeral is her son’s funeral.

The traveller and the mother cross Sumida river together. During the funeral, the mother hears her son’s voice, the voice of his spirit, from inside the grass-covered earth-mound of his grave. For a moment, they are reunited, on the riverbank. The cost will be high. She will pay it. Which riverbank is far and which near, is a matter of perspective.

credits

from Three​-​Crossing River (after YOKAI), released February 15, 2022
Laura Sampson: Words, vocals
Sam Enthoven: Sounds, mixing
Stephan Barrett: Sounds

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about

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wordbird London, UK

Laura Sampson is a storyteller and writer from London, UK, inspired by world myth and folklore.

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