Last Updated on April 12, 2023, 5:53 PM | Published: April 12, 2023
With a run of increasingly successful albums, international tours, high-profile support gigs, and even an opening spot for Jason Isbell at The Criterion, John Calvin Abney has spent the past decade growing into inarguably one of Oklahoma’s most steadily rising stars.
And 2022 was surely his biggest year yet.
At the end of the year, and nearing the very end of a worldwide slate that saw travel of what he describes as “nearly seventy thousand miles on ground, sea, and air,” the singer/songwriter found his vocal cords badly damaged, pushed beyond their capabilities.
Then came the bad news: surgery would be required, and indefinite vocal rest would be non-negotiable until then.
No singing.
But as one of the state’s most unyieldingly productive artists, that wasn’t going to stop Abney from making music.
Newest effort
His newest effort, “Departure Nocturnes,” represents his third foray into the calm, rippling waters of instrumental, ambient music, and his second such release since the December 2022 news of the vocal damage.
This time around, all proceeds from the Bandcamp-only release will reportedly go toward funding the needed surgery and recovery.
It’s little surprise, then, that the new album’s themes are all inspired and informed by loss.
A nocturne is defined nebulously as a piece of piano music, essentially, for the nighttime, and in Abney’s hands, that means music for the kind of quiet, rainy nights spent in solitude, recalling all the moments and mementos of the past rarely remembered.
Opener “Felt Nocturne” – whether that’s meant as the past tense of “feel” or the crafting material is difficult to say – creeps in sparsely, just a lonely, late-night piano and what sounds like a sporadic deep sigh, the sound of longing and resignation.
The bulk of the album, however, both thematically and in the runtime, is contained within the 10-minute second track, “Half Dollar in F Major.”
The same sparse, texturally reverberating piano lists sleepily throughout beneath a rattling, swirling clatter of what sounds like, well, junk.
Like digging through a toolbox or a drawer full of discarded odds and ends, it’s the sound of searching, not for something or anything specific, but just to search. Exploring the random bits left behind and gone from memory.
Those sonic touches are made more literal in the title of the track “Lost Storage,” representing the things that we put away for safekeeping only to forget about entirely.
But by that time in the music, the clatter has stopped and is replaced for a few moments with something like a far-off bird call, the kind you hear alongside the sunrise after sitting up awake all night.
“Glass Nocturnes” adds the sound of soft rain, making the glass of the title most likely that of a window.
Penultimate, lilting “She May Just Be Far Off,” probably the most songlike track in the bunch, adds a high, wandering, ethereal tone, like tracing a finger around a wine glass.
It’s these delicate, creeping elements that each carve out an almost imperceptibly individual space for each short piece among the track listing.
But the piano always remains. Whatever noises or effects weave in and out, they’re always in addition to Abney’s soft, sad piano, always quiet, always wistful, save for just a couple moments of heavier stabs on the keys, as if becoming momentarily overwhelmed with the frustration of having to stay quiet.
It’s an appropriate sentiment for a singer so previously reliant on his voice, for the time being now forced to convey rather than say.
When the piano finally withdraws, it’s only at the very end, replaced in the criminally short “Close the Door Behind You” by a pulsating, chordal synth sound slowly but steadily ushering you out of this plaintive dream and back into the waking world.
The accompanying artwork for “Departure Nocturnes” is a drawing by Norman artist Ruth B. Loveland titled “Luck Worn,” depicting a collection of bottled soil samples, symbols, bones, and more, exactly the kind of ignored, earthen mile markers that Abney’s music is conjuring.
In one corner, above a group of jars, are the words “vapors, humors, and a little rain.”
It’s difficult to think of a better or more concise description of this album’s sound than that.
“Departure Nocturnes” by John Calvin Abney is available now exclusively on Bandcamp, with all proceeds helping to fund the singer’s vocal surgery and recovery.
To listen to and purchase the album, visit johncalvinabney.bandcamp.com/album/departure-nocturnes.
Follow John Calvin Abney online at facebook.com/johncalvinabney and on Instagram at @johncalvinabney.
Brett Fieldcamp has been covering arts, entertainment, news, housing, and culture in Oklahoma for nearly 15 years, writing for several local and state publications. He’s also a musician and songwriter and holds a certification as Specialist of Spirits from The Society of Wine Educators.
