A retreat gives people time to slow down and drop the noise of the week. Live ambient music fits that pace, a slow, wordless sound they can sink into during yoga, a slow meal, or a quiet afternoon.
Thunderclap Murphy plays it live, so it is never the same twice. He works from a spread of acoustic instruments, layering flutes, kalimba, glockenspiel and others by hand into something that moves slowly and never quite repeats.
He comes back within the week with a plan and a fee.
A recent performance, filmed live.
Music made for stillness
Ambient music has always been aimed at moments like these. Brian Eno wrote Music for Airports to take the edge off a tense room, Max Richter’s Sleep is an eight-hour piece to drift off to, and East Forest scores meditation and retreats. Thunderclap Murphy works in that lineage, playing it live so the sound breathes with the group and shifts with the mood of the day.
It stays where you want it
The sound stays low and open, easy to drift past or lean into. It asks nothing of anyone, so yoga, meditation or a shared meal keeps its own shape while the music holds the room underneath. Thunderclap Murphy reads the group and brings the sound up or eases it back to match, so it fits the exact tenor of your retreat.
A corner and a wall socket
He brings everything himself and works off a single wall socket, so even a remote centre needs nothing but a corner to play from. Hear a full performance before you picture it in your own room.
What comes with him, and the hour it takes to build is set out in plain terms, from the four-corner sound to the pack-down.
Thunderclap Murphy is the performing name of Aidan Murphy, a Dublin musician with twenty-five years in Irish arts venues, whose ambient work is made to settle a room and hold it there. Send a booking enquiry for a retreat, and the group gets an hour of stillness they carry home.