It's a Wild Time to be a Human

Deep and wonderful instrumental music, mostly acoustic guitar, sometimes with fretless bass, and sometimes just a piano with no guitar, always flowing and gently ponderous. This music is unique and can suit any situation of intricate beauty.

On Passings, David Franklin plays acoustic guitars, piano, synthesizer and on the final track of this album he features a programmable Music Box . He is joined frequently by Michael Manring who provides his amazing fretless bass, and on two tracks David's son, Alex Franklin (aka Owl Licks) contributes magic on acoustic guitar. Warren Kahn did the mixing and mastering at Banquet Studios in Medford, Oregon.

Moving by, going past, the sound is joyful and positive at every moment, the bass glows and elevates the guitar sound, the sound quietly and simply supports the ideas of the instrument, be it guitar or piano. When there is more than one instrument, the interaction is about unity and not competition, no trading back and forth, they move together to paint one picture.

David Franklin has had a varied career. He supported himself in college as a rock and roll drummer, became a keyboardist in a rock band in New York City for several years, toured and recorded as an acoustic guitar-playing singer-songwriter, recorded an avant-garde album featuring “found sounds” (such as vacuum cleaners) and, as an environmentalist, spent a year walking across the country to help raise awareness of environmental issues, all the while performing music. Franklin, who also is a licensed psychotherapist in Northern California, once asked the enduring question, "Can all the people of this planet try to understand our connectedness, and accept each other as part of humanity rather than rejecting one another because of religion or politics or anything we don't agree on?"

Michael Manring is a technical virtuoso, using his bass in very different ways, honoring hundreds of recordings as a session musician and thousands of concerts throughout the world in venues including Carnegie Hall in New York, Yamaha Hall in Tokyo and Davies Symphony Hall in San Francisco. His sound is sometimes reminiscent of one of his teachers, the late bass legend Jaco Pastorius. Michael has an approach to the instrument that includes unorthodox tunings, techniques and methodologies, but his ability to communicate on a profound emotional level is what most touches listeners, for decades pushing back the boundaries of what’s possible on the bass guitar.

The first track on Passings is titled "I’ll Never Hear My Father’s Stories Again" (5:22) and features bass and piano with guitar, a tight sparkling weave of instruments and mind. This opener establishes the mood and flow of the entire album, moderate with lively spots, complicated melodic intricacies within a progression of simple forms. The subject matter allows us to process the most difficult of life's changes that we all must confront, without having a dark or gloomy sense, the sound is positive and honors happy memories.

Up high in the tallest branches, there are breezes with sunny higher reaches, working down into the heart of the matter. "The Meeting Tree" (3:41) features David's son Alex Franklin on Guitar and Michael Manring on bass. "We All Become Ancestors" (2:53) has a sad and constant presence, like the sky, with piano (no guitars here) and the glowing bass, which continues on the next track. "Sweet Dreams and Travel Well" (5:21) perhaps telling stories before sleep, with merry themes, looking ahead to new territory, turning the corner and climbing the stairs, guitar and bass.

Traditionally, a carousel, also known as a merry-go-round or roundabout, has the form of rows of wooden horses or other animals, mounted on posts, many of which are moved up and down by gears to simulate galloping, to the accompaniment of looped circus music. The track "Carousel" (3:47) is a joyful dream between Manring’s bass and Franklin’s guitar strings. The song takes a moment then heads out whirling, soon followed by "Laughing in Whispers" (3:05), a solo piano number, lilting dancing flickering that builds while rising but always stays true to the whisper concept.

"Changes" (3:55) is entirely solo guitar, thoughtfully walking down into deeper realms, the floor becomes the ceiling, with sparse tricky guitar finger flourishes, and Franklin saves the harmonics for last. Quickly progressing along a long path leading into quiet passages, "Another Perspective" (4:39) takes us back into a high velocity duet, two guitars, with fancy picking and power chords, featuring Alex Franklin on guitar.

This next track is easily my favorite in this collection of outstanding works, one guitar lifted by the haunting bass sound in "Ghost Tree" (3:42), with Michael Manring trading solo moments, always working toward the singular goal. Perhaps this is a story of a tree that now dreams alone.

"When Shadows Were Analog" (3:20) is a piano solo, slowly establishing a foundation, then the melody takes off on an ascending bippity bop that settles into a sunrise. "Perspectives" (3:46) starts with harmonics and a jolly melody telling a wordless story, joined by the Michael Manring gliding bass and becomes a journey through spring fields surrounded by glowing mountains in the distance, breezes tell of hidden places.

I imagine a herd of zebras enjoying the savanna, circling around the watering hole, on a bright sunny warm day. "The Zebra Song" (3:23) guitar shadowed by the bass at first, then merges proud and boundless. The guitar awakens after a restful short darkness into a new story, this is when the synthesizer takes an almost solid form, beckoning behind the guitar and basses gentle glowing touches as the guitar leads the way weaving melodies and ideas, "Back, in A Different Place" (4:12), small decorations gradually increase the depth of the sound's feeling. Now a piano alone, in a dark place, emerging from the void, "Dancing in Memory" (4:13), just enough to lead further into the mist of recollections, taking turns, acting out pieces of a story that come together, building into a full pirouette and then it is quiet again.

The closing track is "A Musical Essay" (1:32), an experimental episode in very different territory while keeping the overall smooth mood, played on a programmable, hand-cranked music box. Textures abound, yards of paper inspiring odd sounds evoking the shakey new grasp of an infancy, melodic fragments that rattle and sounds that resonate from far back in the soul.

David Franklin is always actively involved in musical projects, both writing and recording new and eclectic music, for dance performances and film. This is David's tenth album, all original compositions; his past included vocal folk-pop projects -- such as Patterns Yet Unknown and Strangers and Angels -- which usually contained an instrumental piece. Franklin also released a solo piano album called Traditional Christmas Melodies. One out-of-the-ordinary project was Shadowlands, an avant-garde album influenced by eclectic pioneers such as John Cage and Steve Reich, and geared to induce trance-state healing. The album’s experimental music contained the occasional voice or instrument, but primarily focuses on “found sounds” (vacuum cleaners, baby cries, computer printers).

Released in 2015, recorded by this guitarist and pianist is the instrumental Playing With Shadows which features Michael Manring on much of the recording. That album was nominated for several awards and spent 6 months in the top 100 on the international Zone Music Reporter chart; 2 of those months, in the top 10. It was also listed as Top 30 Albums of the Year by ZMR and featured on Echoes syndicated radio broadcasts, as well as receiving much airplay on a multitude of stations, both in the US and abroad. His 2017 album Songs Of Potential Embrace, is an eclectic collection of 16 pieces that could be categorized as new age avant-garde.

Overall Passings is a delightful collection of positive and uplifting instrumental tunes blending the gifts of Michael Manring's outstanding bass with the dancing fingers on strings that David Franklin brings, equally gifted on guitar as with piano, gently accenting the primary melodic works. The way David Franklin flows is all about creating a full and singular statement, compared to the back and forth dialog forms that we hear in jazz or rock; the obvious synergy with his son, Alex, reveals more about this non-competitive approach to music.

I imagine David the therapist, listening and saying just the right thing to bring the situation into clarity and creative focus. He specializes in working with teenagers, often incorporating music into his work. "My hope is that the sounds of these quiet instruments may inspire listeners to become more grounded and present, so that they can feel a deeper sense of connection with themselves and others.”

David believes music is one of humanity's most powerful tools for healing, and he hopes his music will help listeners connect to their inner feelings and ultimately create more of a sense of connection in their lives. This album, Passings, is a full and beautiful statement of such wisdom, as well as a tribute to the transitions we all endure, choosing to find the delicate beauty in each.