Listen
Kristin’s music is available on all streaming platforms.
For Frogs and Trees releases on May 19! Listening guide here.
The world is at an inflection point. With climate change progressing as quickly as it is, with species going extinct at unprecedented rates, with our culture and lifestyles proliferating in a way that will threaten even the survival of the human species, change is inevitable. Either we will change or we will die. The decisions we are making now, seem to be a process of conveniently ignoring the path that awaits us down the road, in favor of our own convenience in the moment.
This album explores questions of living and dying. I sincerely hope that dramatic change prevails, that some of our systems die in service of living in a way that allows more thriving on this planet. But our culture is still in a process of deciding if we are going to do the work necessary, to give birth to a new way of life. So, are we midwives overseeing the birth of a new culture, or are we death doulas whose job it is to help us pass from this life into the next? That is the fence we live on right now. This album prepares us for the questions. If we are on the verge of death (and we all are) how are we going to live? And what do we choose to care about and how do we show it?
When I grouped these songs together, with the intention of putting out a short EP, I gave myself these parameters for the arrangements: I invited my friend, Erin Christensen, to play cello on all of the tracks, and I only allowed myself to play one instrument and then to add any harmonies I wanted. I thought that this would help me keep things and it would be a speedy project. Nothing is ever as speedy as you’d like it to be. I tried to use the cello and the instruments that I chose for each song with varying textures and roles, so that each song has a unique aspect. Theo Spanos added drums for “Watch It Burn” and Miranda Kanter did the mastering.
Thanks for listening to these reflections and invocations. Wishing us all safe and fulfilling journeys through these times.
Love, Kristin