So named, the Collegiate Peaks are in the central Rocky Mountains of Colorado, in the vicinity of Buena Vista and west of South Park where the winds blow hard across the valley. Technically, they run from just southwest of Granite, then south to Mt. Princeton Hot Springs, one of the more famous hot springs in the world, west of Nathrop.
Each piece of music has something to say about Colorado, whether it is the rivers and streams which run all over and through the mountains, the wind which blows through the evergreens and Quaking Aspens (aka “Quakies”), the revelry in the ghost towns scattered hither and yon throughout the mountains, or simply the weather, in all of its forms.

You will find traditional music on this recording but, more often than not, you will find sound combinations to comprise a much deeper understanding of each composition: All of the songs here use entirely “found sounds”, most of which were gleaned from the folks over at Freesound dot org, where every type of sound can be found and there are no limits to the sounds created throughout the world…if it makes a sound, it is likely here. Consequently, my compositions follow the genre of music set down by the creators of Musique Concrète, a music form created in the 1920s-30s-&-40s, primarily in France, Germany, and the US.

NOTE: A few of the pieces require headphones or are otherwise heard very loudly through speakers, in order to hear the various complexities of the music.

One thing is certain, steam trains and their whistles can be heard coming and going throughout the songs, just as the steam trains of yore made their whistle-stops at each little town along the valley and into the canyons on their ways to the gold camps buried in the mountains. In this way, this recording is dedicated to my father, Richard P. Bissell, whose interest in steam trains and their whistles I never would have known without him.

Sounds include: jazz songs from the early 1920s; Ceddleton Station on the Churnet Valley Railway, UK; the Durango and Silverton Railway’s steam train whistles; the scientific discoveries of researcher Carmello Pampillonio; various pieces of music composed by Frresound uploaders then specifically manipulated by me; and so many sounds that are an endless array of dissonance!

**NOTE**: IN ORDER TO SEE ALL OF THE ARTWORK ON THE SITE, please click on each song’s title (on this page) to be taken to a separate page to see the artwork for that song (as well as the liner notes). When you click on the play button on the front page at the top of the page, it simply cycles through the music without moving separately to each page, thereby missing all of the artwork. These recordings are all about both the music as well as the artwork!
All artwork © 2020 Samuel Bissell