Featured on BBC Radio 3, Wooden Ox is a series of 10 audio-video performances recorded between January and May 2021 throughout the Sonoran Desert in Southern Arizona. This collection of discrete compositions uncouple numerous instruments from their conventional acoustic tones and usages. While not present in every work, Saxophone takes the central role in several performances. "Barew" is a Middle English word from an older term "bearwe"; which means "to carry", and is what we currently refer to as "barrow" (ex. wheelbarrow), a device used for carrying loads. Each instrument(s) in this series is treated as an object of possibility prior to it being acted upon as a strictly music instrument. As objects of possibility, they each carry the weight of their specific construction and embodied lexicon while also contorting and abandoning those basic restrictions. All 10 works occur in open desert terrain and the ambient soundscape of each place finds its way into the recording, either as an intentional auxiliary instrument or as happenstance of that time and place's volume. Wind, sand and wood accompany the actions made by Ruehlen's movements. Binding, amplifying and obstructing instruments allows the performer to touch and hear, to grapple with, the object in unfamiliar ways. As with much of Ruehlen's work spanning at least the last six years, he uses a personalized, off-grid electro-acoustic set-up where a live audience is absent and occurs in isolated, outdoor settings.

 

You can listen to the entire album, released on Unsilent Desert Press, HERE

Below are videos of each performance which are an element of the CD release on UDP.