Forest Scenes

by MIZU

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256 Pi always up for a good classical crossover project every now and then, this was a very pretty and solidly exciting listen with a few interesting experimental twists

leavingrecords MIZU changed me

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Record/Vinyl + Digital Album
Color-in-color Light Pink & Red Vinyl. Artwork by Daedalus Li ♥♥♥

Includes unlimited streaming of Forest Scenes via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.

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Cassette + Digital Album
Artwork by Daedalus Li ♥♥♥

Includes unlimited streaming of Forest Scenes via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.

ships out within 3 days

Purchasable with gift card

$12 USD or more
Streaming + Download

Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.

Purchasable with gift card

$10 USD

1.	Enter 02:55		buy track
2.	Pump 04:56		buy track
3.	Rinse 02:40		buy track
4.	Pavane 04:08 video	info	buy track
5.	Flutter 04:04 video		buy track
6.	The Way to Yonder 03:12		buy track
7.	prphtbrd (feat. Concrete Husband) 04:44		buy track
8.	Realms of Possibility 10:49		buy track

about

There is a philosophical quality to MIZU’s second full-length, ‘Forest Scenes’. Through layers of gorgeous, yearning cello, pulsating electronics, and hyperreal field recordings, MIZU evokes a sense of depth by interrogating systems and exploring unknown territories both physical and cerebral. By way of its daring experimentalism, ‘Forest Scenes’ is patently modern and brilliantly ontological.

Proceeding from Robert Schumann’s ‘Waldszenen’ in name and, to some extent, concept, MIZU began work on ‘Forest Scenes’ immediately after completing ‘Distant Intervals’, conceiving and writing the record over the course of two inspired weeks in São Paulo, Brazil in Summer 2022 and completing it over the following year in New York. While ‘Distant Intervals’ engaged and inverted the classical idioms in which MIZU was reared, ‘Forest Scenes’ lunges even further away from that world. It is in no small way an acknowledgment of transcendent experiences and the thrills of self-discovery, whether in the vast urbanity of São Paulo, in the community among New York City’s queer spaces and dancefloors, or in the more abstract place of a self in transition. Pulling from these energies, MIZU loops in techno producer Concrete Husband, who features on “prphtbrd”, to further ornament the dancefloor flirtations.

While MIZU was socially transitioning during the creation of ‘Distant Intervals’, she began a physical gender transition in step with the inception of ‘Forest Scenes’. The record parallels this transformation, interrogating the boundaries between the forest and what is before / beyond it, building scenes of self-discovery through a kind of ecstasy in the unexplored. The forest is, at least in part, a metaphor for queer spaces, for spaces of self-discovery through community, through encounter. But the spaces of self-discovery, for MIZU, are also very much found within the songs themselves. This marvelous symbolic complexity holds Forest Scenes aloft, above mundane considerations of what is more or less beautiful. What is pastoral, what is modern, what is natural: all these considerations are teased out by MIZU’s compelling production, as she weaves electronic and environmental sounds, and cello both heavily processed and laid bare in a glorious, sweeping dream. But with the headlong dives into deconstructionist experimentation and the pathos, vulnerability, and staggering range of densities through a single instrumental body, MIZU asserts that ‘Forest Scenes’ could not be more her own, as she discovers herself within it.

Notes by Mark Trecka

credits

released March 22, 2024

Composed, performed, and recorded by: MIZU
Mixing and additional production: Ariel Loh
Mastered by: Taylor Deupree/12k Mastering
Drum samples on prphtbrd by: Concrete Husband
Vocals on Enter, Pavane, and Realms of Possibility by: imryll
Additional production: Ben Shirken
Album art and vinyl/tape design: Daedalus Li
Special thanks to Cody DeFalco and Evan Welsh

"Pavane" Video Credits
Artist: MIZU
Dancer: Lili (Luyan Li)
Directed and Edited by: Dan Silver
Concept by: Dan Silver, MIZU, and Lili (Luyan Li)
Produced by: Kayla Casey, Dan Silver
Cinematography: Kevin Johnson
Costume Designer: MEGHUN
Hair and Makeup: Shamis McGillin
Nail Design and Construction: Vile Sanchez
Set Construction: MC Love
Title Cards Designed by: Daedalus Li
Film Processing: Tony Landano and Kodak Film Lab NY
Equipment Rentals: Du-All Camera and Lightbulb Rentals

"Flutter" Video Credits
Artists: MIZU, Kennie Zhou
Director: Xiao Han
Producer / Movement Director: Kennie Zhou
1st AD: Shana Purnama
Cinematographer: Steven Baerga
1st AC: Arina Vala
2nd AC / Trainee: Noah Gravillis
Gaffer: Ian Chen
Grip: Aldo Vassallo
Wardrobe: Alice Eugene Seon
Makeup Artist: Shamis McGillin
Editor: Mason CW
Colorist: Daymian Mejia
Graphic Design: Daedalus Li

Filmed at Abrons Arts Center
Special thanks to The Brick

license

about

MIZU New York, New York

From gossamer harmonic textures to lush orchestral washes, MIZU builds expansive soundscapes through her singular cello playing. Her signature stratiform style of composition, melding self-recorded layers of her instrument with electronic manipulation and experimental production, explores themes of transformation and the infinite possibilities within queerness.

Portrait by Honglin Cai. ... more

shows

May 2

Constellation

Chicago, IL
May 3

Rozz Tox

Rock Island, IL
May 4

Trumpet Blossom Cafe

Iowa City, IA
May 8

The Cedar

Minneapolis, MN
May 10

Megalith

Portland, OR
May 11

Chop Suey

Seattle, WA
May 16

2220 Arts + Archives

Los Angeles (LA), CA
May 19

Gray Area

San Francisco, CA

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