The Wind of Heaven
Hidden Valley seems to be far removed from our worlds. There, a musical encounter with Flies, Cicadas, Wombat Poo, and a little Waterfall unfolds. These characters become my Musickin—through the musicking—as the wind of heaven blows through the pipes of every critter.
Later in my studio: A contemplation re-enfolds on the affordances of identity and identitylessness.
The originary recording was made 2020, in the Budawang Mountains, southwest of Nowra, on the east-coast of Australia. This Country is the lead author of this work, and respects are paid to the Yuin people, who have been singing up these Mountains everywhen. My studio is on Gadigal Country.
– Jim Denley, December 2025
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Born in the Illawarra, Dharawal Country south of Sydney in 1957, Jim Denley has been active with experimental and improvised musicking since the 1970s.
He has performed in Australia, Europe, Japan and the US with artists such as Chris Abrahams, Clare Cooper, Keith Rowe, Joel Stern, Robbie Avenaim, Jon Rose, John Butcher, Otomo Yoshihide, Fred Frith, Phil Niblock, Trey Spruance, Clayton Thomas, Tess de Quincy, Axel Dörner, Adam Sussman, Ami Yoshida, Oren Ambarchi, Tony Buck, Ikue Mori, Sachiko M, Malcolm Goldstein, Michael Sheridan and Annette Krebs.
He is interested in what his music instinct might learn from language. From 1989 to 2009 he worked with the text/music group Machine for Making Sense, (Amanda Stewart, Stevie Wishart, Rik Rue and Chris Mann). Jim co-formed 180º with Amanda Stewart and Nick Ashwood in 2018 to continue the pursuit of text/music intra-activity. He’s been involved with the radically inclusive Splinter Orchestra since 2001.
He often records around the coves and beaches of Sydney Harbour, where for thousands of years the Dharug people would have played ngaramang (music).
His radio work Collaborations, produced by ABC Radio National won the 1989 Prix Italia for radio production.
Bloomsbury will be publishing his PhD research as the book, Towards ecological musicking: As Weather Improvisation.
