The 5th song in the Plant Songs project is called The Elder. I thought it would be fun to work with the Aeolian mode, which is the natural minor scale. Most of the minor pieces in the world use borrowed chords, particularly borrowing the V (five) chord from the parallel major key. This makes the V chord major instead of minor, and supplies the leading tone, which gives that V chord more of a pull back to the i (one) chord - a little more dramatic tension and release perhaps. If one sticks to the Aeolian mode - the natural minor scale - the v chords remain minor. I was remembering a recent demonstration of the borrowed V chord to a student, comparing it to the minor v, and gosh that minor v sounded cool. And I was recently playing Ain’t No Sunshine by Bill Withers and realized it uses minor v chords and is in fact in the Aeolian mode.
I began by working out a chord progression, and the melody started to come in a little later. It was really fun to improvise over the progression of the A section, and I almost decided to just have the melody be improvised. But eventually I started finding some ideas that I wanted to keep. After I had most of the A section composed, I was improvising off of it, looking for some B section ideas, when I had a quite inspired moment of finding my way to some loud C major chords. It was an energizing moment for sure. It made me think that perhaps I should be doing an improvisation project, elaborating on the thoughts about working quickly to maintain optimum emotional connection that I wrote about in the Agastache post. It’s too late to change that now, and I don’t think I would anyway. But it’s interesting to think about that for the future. It’s been awhile since I’ve done a considerable amount of free improvisation and it would be fun to see what might come out nowadays.
My subject matter came about pretty quickly this time. Elder or Elderberry, is a shrub in the Adoxaceae family. Of Black Elder, there is a North American species that’s native in our area called Sambucus canadensis, and a European species called Sambucus nigra. There’s also Sambucus racemosa / Red-berried Elder around here, and there are other species out west. We planted two Sambucus nigra in 2017. It was one of the first shrubs we planted here. Sometimes I wish we had the native species, but perhaps the reason the birds largely leave our berries alone is because they’re the European species. They are epic plants, now ten or twelve feet tall, and almost as wide. The world of herbalism is abundant with stories of the spirit of the Elder and how the plant can cause problems for people if the ultimate respect is not given. I think the Aeolian vibe of The Elder reflects this nicely. Also, the phrasing of this progression and melody are intentionally a little vague and cyclical, which in my mind reflects the long standing relationship that Sambucus has had with humans and other beings. I want it to sound like this piece has been playing forever and will continue forever and we’re just tuning in for a while.
I love the few weeks in June when the Elders are flowering. Once you know them, you start seeing them everywhere along the roadside. Every year I make Elderflower champagne, Elderberry Jam, Elderberry tincture, and I dry berries to make Elderberry syrup when we need it in the winter. I also regularly use the dried berries for making kombucha. A couple times I’ve made traditional Elderberry wine too. Elder discourages colds and flus very effectively in my experience. Elder is big, powerful, ongoing, and magnificent. This may sound grandiose, but when I interact with Elder I feel as though I’m somehow interacting with the entire history of the Universe.
Our Sambucus nigra June 2020
Berries after after rain.
Berry harvest.
Sambucus racemosa growing wild on Mount Beacon. April 2024