Sean McCann
Sean McCann is a drone artist and a sound sculptor based in Los Angeles, California. McCann continues to establish himself in the circle of drone musicians since his wake in 2008. His vision is shaped by his approach, creating richly textured ambient drones and blissful synthscapes, each track with a unique instrumental axis. McCann’s orchestration has varied from banjo, violin, piano, electric guitar, to synthesizer and a plethora of other techniques throughout his catalog. McCann makes the transition from his field recordings to his improvisations like a drop into the abyss, fulfilling an amorphous shape to the loose fitting flow of his work.
Sean McCann is a drone artist and a sound sculptor based in Los Angeles, California. McCann continues to establish himself in the circle of drone musicians since his wake in 2008. His vision is shaped by his approach, creating richly textured ambient drones and blissful synthscapes, each track with a unique instrumental axis. McCann’s orchestration has varied from banjo, violin, piano, electric guitar, to synthesizer and a plethora of other techniques throughout his catalog. McCann makes the transition from his field recordings to his improvisations like a drop into the abyss, fulfilling an amorphous shape to the loose fitting flow of his work.
Tub Of Deep Green Ink
A limited CDr included with the A Castle Popping LP (R11, 2015). Tub of Deep Green Ink compliments the nature of the A Castle Popping, presenting ten tracks from 2011-2014. Ranging from layered string recordings, like the pastoral 2012 piece Inverness String Variations, to computerized-vocal experiments, as with ADR Aria & The Wind Sick (both from 2014). Human voice is dissected and stitched back together; examined under odd light. 2011’s Rooms of Night explores the interior of Sean’s old house …
Autumn Fair
Limited edition of 350 copies. Sold out at source To celebrate the 10th anniversary of Recital, we present Autumn Fair. A group LP comprised of 44 guest players (full list below), curated and edited together by Sean McCann. Autumn Fair aptly embodies the feeling of Recital as a record label; the infusion of abstract sound art and sentimental beauty – performed by both younger and older generations of artists. Oren Ambarchi - guitar, Ed Atkins - paper shredder, Jason Bannon - family, Derek Baron …
The Art of No-Art
*Includes a 364 pages, 12" x 8" bound book & PDF. Digital audio download. Limited edition of 100 hand-numbered.* A new book of scores by artist and composer Philip Corner (b. 1933). The Art of No-Art is a collection of 385 new graphic scores written between 2019 and 2022. Each score is a single-page meditation based around octaves. Though written mostly for piano, the scores could be arranged for other instrumentation (for those with fewer than an 8 octave range).
The Art of No-Art explores the …
Mother of Pearl
Edition of 400 copies on CD inside Gatefold CD wallet with gold foil printing, including 12-page booklet and 30 mins of additional music ('Red Sky' EP), available only on the CD. * Mother of Pearl is the first duo album from composers Sarah Davachi and Sean McCann. Two people, a couple, recording together at home. A slow, autumnal album made with no preconceptions or planning. Intimate, intended for ourselves. Sessions were captured simultaneously in two ways to build the shared space of percep…
St. Francis
**Edition of 200 - 180gram vinyl record - 18″ x 24″ folded color poster (blueprint).** The score by Schmid, reading by Landry, and edited/produced by McCann. Emily Martin and Derek Baron on St. Francis (Feb. 2021): What does it mean to pray? To address someone, to plead for something, to welcome humiliation and failure: Please, let me forget about the China Chalet parties, please let there be no countries and no war, please let me love you. Is prayer iteration, or just repetition: My god, my go…
Ten Impressions for Piano and Strings
**Edition of 200 copies**Sean McCann on the release (January 2020): "Ten Impressions dates from the fall of 2010, when I moved from San Francisco to Los Angeles. I was contemplating starting Recital at this time, envisioning the first release to be a double-LP of my ambient, slow works. Amassing violin and piano fragments over the next months, I ended up with over four hours of recorded material. Well, then... I sat and looked at the files on my computer and lost all interest. An odd gapping per…
Saturday Night
**Edition of 225 copies, includes 20-page color photo of stills documenting the recording process booklet** Saturday Night is the debut LP by old friends and collaborators Alex Twomey, Matthew Sullivan, and Sean McCann. Recorded over numerous evenings at the artists' homes, and completed just before the birth of Matthew's daughter, Flora. The album became an excuse to spend time with one another as well as perform. As the trio ordered take-out, drank scotch, smoked on patios, laughing off the we…
Puck
** Edition of 500, comes with 12-page “Puck” pamphlet + Two art cards with program notes** Sean McCann's Puck is here. Music for Public Ensemble, my previous album, was released three years ago. And three years before that was Private Ensemble. Puck is both public and private in nature. A smear of chamber works from Stockholm, Moscow, New York, and Kansas. Three aged personal recordings from 2008, 2009, and 2010 are also poured in the batter: a bedroom violin trio, ambient music, and a sad pl…
As Stupid As A Fish
As Stupid As A Fish is an album/art book documenting Sean McCann's performance, recorded at the Berkeley Art Museum in the Spring of 2019. 166 color pages, 8.5″ x 10″ perfect bound, scented with “Stupid Fish” perfume. Comes with 30-minute cassette of music made for the book. Limited edition of 50 copies, signed and numbered. A monograph made in the Winter of 2018, with a microscopic camera, paints, pens, and ultra-marine powder. Texts are hung throughout the book; revering dreams of night, sea…
Saccharine Scores
Saccharine Scores is an album/art book documenting Sean McCann's
recent chamber compositions. Ranging from the 10-person ensemble
performance of "Portraits of Friars" at Fylkingen, Stockholm in February
2018, to his first quartet piece "Victorian Wind", performed in Toronto
in 2014. McCann's scores leak pastoral and bizarre passages, dancing in
the banal beauty of sound poetry. The performances feature guest
musicians Sarah Davachi, Zachary Paul, Geneva Skeen, Celia Eydeland, Maxwell Augus…
Music for Public Ensemble
First full-length album by Sean McCann since 2013’s Music for Private Ensemble, built around a fascinating conceptual framework, spanning a wide array of aesthetic and conceptual ideas, many of them outside the field of music. Three years in the making, Public Ensemble employs the talents of many Recital allies; a mélange of voices and instruments: violin, viola, cello, contrabass, piano, bass clarinet, tenor saxophone, flute, trumpet, pedal steel, electronic keyboards (organ, farfisa, har…
A Castle Popping
“Music For Private Ensemble” is Sean McCann’s first new solo album since 2011′s “The Capital”. Demonstrating a more serious study of orchestration and timbre than his previous work; it is a big step forward. The four arrangements presented here shy away from the use of synthesizers and effects processing – instead relying on voicing and movement to actuate the album’s sentiments. Inspired by the grandiosity of John Adams, the concerned somberness of Gavin Bryars, and the guttural tape work of Fl…
Vanity Fair
Greetings, here we have Recital’s inaugural release, “Vanity Fair,” Sean McCann & Matthew Sullivan’s debut collaboration album. A fitting introduction to the ethos of Recital; the desire to turn a new page, to more accurately project what is significant and engaging in contemporary music.Matt and I had often talked about collaborating, as our musical understandings and interests align. Both drawn to minimalism and graceful ambience, we would trade tidbits and slivers of ideas casually over coff…
Music For Private Ensemble
“Music For Private Ensemble” is Sean McCann’s first new solo album since 2011′s “The Capital”. Demonstrating a more serious study of orchestration and timbre than his previous work; it is a big step forward. The four arrangements presented here shy away from the use of synthesizers and effects processing – instead relying on voicing and movement to actuate the album’s sentiments. Inspired by the grandiosity of John Adams, the concerned somberness of Gavin Bryars, and the guttural tape work of Fl…
Ten Impressions for Piano & Strings
Realized over a four year period, Sean McCann’s Ten Impressions for Piano & Springs is a document of transition and maturation. Slow moving cloud forms over corporeal landscapes, these impressions whisper of McCann’s imminent & decisive lean towards classical & avant-garde musics, culminating in 2013’s Music for Private Ensemble on his own imprint, Recital. Less a final statement on ambient music, more a meditation on change, discovery and process.
I
Beautiful modern composition from LA's prolific Sean McCann and En/Root Strata's San Fran-based Maxwell August Croy. Their first collaboration, 'I' feels timlessly enigmatic, drawing on a wealth of aesthetic and compositional tropes from their respective oeuvres to synthesise something wholly new and uniquely engaging, weaving the exotic timbres of Croy's koto and McCann's keening string arrangements in a sound that defies easy categorization. Beaming forth with the flurry of strings and breezin…
Prelusion
The definitive version of this triptych of tectonic drift originally released as a CD-R on Sean McCann's own Recital label in 2011. "Our Silhouette," which blankets the whole of the first side with jewel-like piano runs and distant fading synths, may be one of the artist's most elegant moves. The reverse holds two tracks of long-form organ/string plateaus that float elegantly in space, refracting light and sound in patterns around the head.
The Capital
RESTOCKED Second vinyl release "The Capital" by rising drone-star Sean McCann. These all new recordings prove - once again - his ability to keep his stretched out & richely textured ambient drones right on track. The A side opens with synth spirals and exstatic sounds, there's no going back now. B Side is full of violin explorations and lo-fi fieldrecordings. This is an amazing effort by one of Earth's most promising musicians.Sean McCann really sets the bar for how far a one-man project …