The Storms Endured

In 2014 a tremendous storm blew through Central Texas felling a tree on the grounds of our workshop that gave its timber for this instrument. Neither of the AAI artists ever previously worked Chinese Tallow, and when the bark was removed and the grain first met our eyes, we recalled the observations of Herman Hesse: “When a tree is cut down and reveals its naked death-wound to the sun, one can read its whole history in the luminous, inscribed disk of its trunk: in the rings of its years, its scars, all the struggle, all the suffering, all the sickness, all the happiness and prosperity stand truly written, the narrow years and the luxurious years, the attacks withstood, the storms endured.”