Promethean Conception

PROMETHEAN CONCEPTION is the first collection of electronica by Seth Peter Clark. Formerly released as ENVIRONMENTALISM INTO THE NINETIES: THE ENTS MARCH ON WASHINGTON, this album showcases Clark’s three styles of electronic music composition. These are works for keyboard, Electronic Percussion Orchestra, and free sound experimentation with Direct Digital Synthesis.

PROMETHEAN CONCEPTION is structured as a symphony. The first three pieces act as an overture displaying each of the three styles of electronic composition that Clark is known for:

• THE GREAT GREEN BOAT RACE — Generative Piano.
• LOCUST ATTACK IN THREE PHASES — Synthesizer and percussion orchestra mashup.
• MANDIBLE CHATTER — Instrumental sounds transmogrified by Direct Digital Synthesis and Ring Modulation.

The fourth piece, WALTZ FOR THE CRADLE OF TIME, is an offbeat take on a classical piano waltz. This music returns us to the familiar territory of the Western musical canon.

The fifth piece, HEARD FROM AFAR—Electronic Percussion Orchestra marching music for giant marching warrior trees—prefigures the deep immersion into Clark’s strange world of Electronic Percussion Orchestra music that is to come.

Several of the following pieces display the different personalities of standard keyboard music. These range from classical to jazz to contemporary keyboard synthesizer music:

• 6. MODAL WALTZ — Classical piano.
• 7. CHARLIE BROWN, SUPERMAN — Jazz piano.
• 8. SAN FRANCISCO 2/21/91 — Keyboard synthesizer.
• 9. BETH AND MY BLOODY HEAD — Keyboard synthesizer.
• 10. BLUE LIGHT — Keyboard synthesizer.
• 11. THE OPEN WINDOW — Electronic Percussion Orchestra utilizing pitched percussion sounds.

The next section explores Clark’s free-floating work with pure sound, a world where electronic sound synthesis escapes the bounds of standard Western music theory and notation. This is music where timbre, not melody, is the main subject of the piece. Sounds are created directly with synthesis tools, or everyday found sounds are transmogrified by software into sublime timbres. In this way, new sonic and musical possibilities are discovered:

• 12. BORIS KARLOFF VS NJ — Direct Digital Synthesis.
• 13. KRYPTONITE FLIES THROUGH THE OZONE — Direct Digital Synthesis and twenty-four-track tape manipulation.
• 14. THERE WAS A LOUD AND PAINFUL RINGING IN HIS EARS THAT SEEMED LIKE SOME PART OF HIS PURPOSEFULNESS — Phase Vocoder transmogrification of Jew’s Harp samples and graphically scored Direct Digital Synthesis.

RED LIGHT recapitulates the keyboard theme and provides a grounding calm before the Electronic Percussion Orchestra section.

The third main section takes a deep dive into the strange and foreign world of Seth Peter Clark’s Electronic Percussion Orchestra music. Clark utilizes detuned pitched percussion to manifest narrative science-fiction scenarios and bring them to life:

• 16. OAKLAND GAMELAN EXPERIMENTS — Written with samples from the Mills College Gamelan Orchestra; this includes sketches of melody from WALTZ FOR THE CRADLE OF TIME.
• 17. THE APPROACHING FOREST OF THE DAWN — Electronic Percussion Orchestra marching music for giant marching warrior trees.
• 18. THE ENTS MARCHING SONG — Electronic Percussion Orchestra marching music for giant marching warrior trees; main theme.

The album ends with five pieces that recapitulate each of the three themes expressed by the different compositional styles:

• 19. GUESSWHAT? — Keyboard and Electronic Percussion Orchestra mashup.
• 20. THE LEAPING — Electronic Percussion Orchestra and Direct Digital Synthesis mashup.
• 21. YOU ARE A SPINNING CAROUSEL OF LIGHT — Solo electronic keyboard.
• 22. SWEET THURSDAY — Solo electronic piano improvisation.
• 23. There Were Bees Everywhere In The Room — 2026 Remix — 2026 REMIX — A newly presented version of the Direct Digital Synthesis, Phase Vocoder, and convolution-based final movement.