Andrew Wasylyk - Balgay Hill: Morning in Magnolia (2021)

Balgay Hill is a park and a hill in Dundee. Originally part of the estate of Sir William Scott, a 19th-century Scottish politician who had acquired the land through marriage. It was later purchased by Dundee City Council in the 1870s and has since been maintained as parkland. Andrew Wasylyk, a Dundonian and the alias of Andrew Mitchell (Scottish writer, producer and multi-instrumentalist including bassist for Idlewild), has celebrated the city before in earlier works through which he has built up a reputation as a reliable craftsman of simple yet complex instrumental music rooted in place. He uses the name Wayslyk in commemoration of his grandfather, Iwan Wasylyk, born in western Ukraine, in the town of Soroky, which was also the title of his first outing under this family name.

Suitably described as a “transcendental journey through ambient, library and jazz”, mixed throughout Balgay Hill: Morning in Magnolia are snippets of found sound. Rainfall, rustling leaves and distant traffic, even a lawnmower, appear at various times, often so merged in the mix as to defy their true source. These field recordings were made during Wasylyk’s walks through the park, which inspired the album.

The album opens to birdsong with an orchestral sound swelling in the distance, a shimmer of promise and the suggestion of dawn. Entitled ‘Blossomlessness No. 2’, the sense of uncertainty continues with flickers of the keyboard, gradually unfolding as the day awakes. ‘Through the Rose Window’ runs with this mood and is the first appearance of fellow Taysider, Rachel Simpson, whose flugelhorn and trumpet add a warm glow to proceedings. Without going anywhere, it stays just where you want it, a few moments of solitude, musing on the moment, the keyboard motif adding a sense of ebb and flow.

A drum machine and plucked guitar beckon in ‘Magpie Spring’, a jaunty melody and the overall sense of embracing the open space, an abbreviated brass section clipping in as it closes. While ‘Sun Caught Cloud Like the Belly of a Cat’ puts me in mind of early Pink Floyd or Genesis, and, later, Mike Oldfield, with no less delightfully plucked guitars and subtly changing background and slowly building orchestration.

Wasylyk describes this work as “hymns to the morning light”, this is most apparent in ‘Avril Hydrangeas’, which inhabit his meditations, walking the park in the early light. I can sense the opening of buds as the sun lands on them, guitars and keyboard tones dancing about each other. A hymn to the end of the day, ‘Western Necropolis Twilight’, is all muted brass and mournful piano chords, it not often the word necropolis crops up in song titles, that marvellously evocative and peculiar word given to the sprawling Victorian graveyards and elaborate tombs that figure in so many Scottish cities. ‘The Ghost That Never Arrived’ follows as a wistful companion piece.

A slight change of mood and a slowly repetitive clattering electronic rhythm: maybe the sound of the distant industry, introduces ‘Observatory in Bloom’, with a musical saw-like sound weaving sinuously about it. ‘Smiling School For Calvinists’ is a lovely track that shares its title with a book by author Bill Duncan, set in Dundee and nearby Broughty Ferry, about “a traditional community reluctantly confronting the modern world”. The track conjures dour primary school assemblies in both name and the aural ambience. But, during the progression, Wasylyk introduces an upbeat and uplifting melody, countering the solemnity of the background.

Album closer, ‘The Morning Light of Magnolia Hill’ takes us back full circle and is the most energetic tune here, cantering along at a brisk march, more electronic percussion, brass and some background chanting, which, for a moment, are indistinguishable as voices.

The music Balgay Hill: Morning in Magnolia offers a deep sense of place, filling spaces of the mind and awakening the senses; it adds textures and tangency to discovering all the things you never notice during a busy day.

Glorious, gorgeous music. Every listen adds more to the experience. Immerse yourself.