Introduction
I’ve recently started listening to At Water’s Edge on stillstream.com, a weekly ambient music show hosted by the multi-talented Rebekkah Hillgraves. While the show is a bit outside of my typical listening, I have found there is a a lot to admire in the show, the host, the artists and participants. Let’s take this opportunity to talk about this wonderful show that has quickly become part of my Saturday routine.
The Host: Rebekkah Hillgraves
As I hinted at in the introduction, Rebekkah is a multi-talented woman. She is a classically trained Soprano, a voice-over artist, a broadcaster, the owner and operator of the RadHaus Studio, and the owner of SheTech and Company (a web design and hosting company). Oh yeah, I forgot to mention is also a writer and performer.
The concept behind At Water’s Edge is, in Rabekkah’s own words:
The basic premise of the show is that music is everywhere, in everything: in the hum of a city, in the pulse of construction machinery or a heartbeat, in footsteps, in laughter, in breath, in the shuffling of an impatient audience… and, like John Cage’s “Four minutes and thirty-three seconds”, all you have to do is sit and listen.
Her ability to find the music in everything around us and bring it to our attention through her show is precisely what has drawn me in and keeps me listening from week to week.
The Show: At Water’s Edge
As mentioned before the show airs weekly on stillstream.com, Rebekkah also steams the show with visuals via LiveStream, and it is also available as a weekly podcast. The LiveStream broadcast of the show has enabled Rebekkah to incorporate a multimedia element to her show. Each show is built around a central theme, with an appropriate musical selection which is supplemented with images via LiveStream.
Examples of some recent shows include “The Price of War” which featured pieces by Wings of An Angel, Sean Derrick Cooper Marquardt, with photographs from Marocco, Essaouira. Patricia Holland-Moritz. Another recent show was ‘Mixing Bowl’, the theme of the show was remixed works of Cousin Silas and Christopher Alvarado. To supplement the music, the LiveStream broadcast featured images of a series of multimedia paintings by Ade Hodges.
It’s the attention to detail that goes into the show that makes it stand out compared to the hundreds of other ambient music shows that inhabit the internet. Rebekkah has a way of framing, and interpreting the music that the artists put together that is nearly immeasurable. It’s no wonder that featured artists make it a point to stop in during the show and chat with the participants…which brings us to the next topic.
The Chat: Participants and Artists
During the live broadcast of the show the StillStream chat is an essential part of the preceding. During the music portions of the show the chat will tend to cover a diverse range of topics: food, music, current events, weather, and artists projects.
Artists who stop in to chat during the show generally receive feedback when their works are being presented on the show. They will often talk about what inspired their work, and any projects they are working on or planning for the future.
Rebekkah participates in the discussion and gathers a lot of the feedback and discussion among the participants and artists and incorporates it into the voice-over portions of the show to add another level of inclusion between the show itself and the listeners.
In Conclusion
It is an honor to get to talk with the artists involved in creating the works that Rebekkah presents on the show. And the work Rebekkah puts into creating themes, selecting works, and making the experience inclusive for the participants and the artists is exceptional. Rebekkah’s concept of finding the music that is all around us has been an inspiration for many listeners to her show, and to many of the artists she has worked with.
