By the time I recorded my third album, released in 2007 on The Leaf Label, I’d obtained a sabbatical from my teaching job and embarked on one of the busiest years of my life – so busy in fact that I craved quietness and stillness, two things I found on my first tour in Japan in 2006, a trip that left its mark on me aesthetically . That desire for stillness and the Japanese influence manifested themselves in the music on the album. I had at last bought my dream instrument, a bass viola da gamba, and sound engineer Emiliano Flores, who so far had only mastered my albums, managed to capture its sound beautifully. The album was recorded and mixed partly in an attic in the suburbs of Paris by Emiliano, partly in my living-room in Paris by myself, and to the viola I added the sounds of the clarinet, the spinet (a harpsichord-related instrument), and my trusted classical guitar. When the album was released, I officially resigned from my teaching job, and embarked on a new phase of my musical life.
The bonus tracks are taken from a concert I gave in Tokyo in 2006 and are available in the digital and tape versions only - "Unfold out" and "Serpentine" have never been released elsewhere.