Gabrille Roth & The Mirrors - Selected Works 1985 - 2005 (Time Capsule)

WHAT YOUR EARS SAY & WHAT THE COVER LOOKS LIKE

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WHAT WE SAY

​I'm only 20+ years late to the party but I'm now semi-naked, in a trance & busting ecstatic dance moves around the house & I haven't eaten breakfast yet and I suggest you do the same. So tune in to the jazz licked, hypno-percussive, border bashing, indigenous music uniting sounds of Gabrielle Roth's & her free spirited collaborators on Time Capsule.

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WHAT THE RELEASE NOTES SAY

Ground-breaking percussive ambient recordings to induce altered states of consciousness through ecstatic dance. Gabrielle Roth & The Mirrors were a world unto themselves. 

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Despite featuring an extraordinary cast of musicians (with credits including Sun Ra, Pharoah Sanders, Miles Davis, Santana, Stevie Wonder, Milton Nascimento and much more) and selling hundreds of thousands of albums, the music of Gabrielle Roth & The Mirrors remains largely unheard beyond their sphere. Conceived as live, improvised soundtracks to Roth’s transcendental dance workshops, musical acclaim was never on the agenda. 

Instead, for a passionate dancer and spiritual polyglot like Gabrielle Roth, movement was a means through which to channel a wide spectrum of teaching, from experimental psychology to psychedelic counter-culture. It was from this heady mix that she devised a movement meditation known as 5Rhythms, which came to define her life’s work. 

As “guide and catalyst”, Roth would dance to inspire the percussion-led instrumentals that would in turn fuel her 5Rhythms workshops, stimulating a secular form of ecstatic dance with roots in Native American shamanic traditions, Afro-Brazilian Candomblé and Yoruba drumming. 

Using anything from a Sioux pony drum to East African kihembe and Japanese Kabuki drums, Gabrielle’s lawyer-turned-drummer husband Robert Ansell set the foundational rhythms for The Mirrors’ recordings, each of which would then feature a rotating cast of friends and professional musicians. 

“The secret of everything we’ve done is that we never told anybody what to play,” Robert shares. “Instead of our albums being a musical vision of one person like me or Gabrielle, they were the musical vision of a whole bunch of people.” 

At times the recordings have a Middle Eastern flair, at others, West African and spiritual jazz modes come to the fore. Hints of kosmische musik, proto-house and electronic ambience are laced like LSD through the organic rhythmic structures. This was kaleidoscopic ambient music to stir the body and free the mind. 


In practice, the task of synthesising these different elements fell to Scott Ansell, Robert’s son and a recording engineer whose credits now include Nile Rogers, Duran Duran, Grace Jones. With meticulous attention to detail he captured and translated the dynamic energy of each drum onto record. Their sessions became legendary, and with access to the best studios in the NYC, The Mirrors sparkled. 

Despite being initially overlooked by the burgeoning ‘80s New Age market, which preferred pipes and gongs to The Mirrors’ heavy-grooving drums, Robert Ansell set up Raven Recording to self-release the music, creating a vast sonic archive of sixteen albums over almost forty years. 

The breadth of Raven’s catalogue is such that curator Pol Valls had to cut an initial selection of sixty-six tracks down to the eleven featured here. What crystallises is a stunning, mind-altering collection which spans, in Pol’s words, “a variety of genres, styles, and vibes within their catalogue, whether it is emotional, esoteric, spiritual, melancholic, hypnotic, dark, or at times a combination of these elements together.” 

Music for immersive and intimate environments, Gabrielle Roth & The Mirrors were born from the dance. In the hands of the right DJ, at the right time, in the right place, they might just return there. 

CreditsSide A: 

Night Whisper (Trance): 

Robert Ansell – pony drum, bata 
Gordy Ryan – asheiko, santa cruz bell 
Rocky Bryant – drum head 
Daniel Lauter – tenor sax 
Gary Thomas – didjeridu 

Eliana (Totem): 

Robert Ansell – taos drum, kihembe, tone block, triangle 
Gordy Ryan – asheiko 
Manuel Martinez – tone box 
Alex Blake – bass guitar, vocal 
Jose Martinez - cymbals 

Nomad (Trance): 

Robert Ansell – pony drum, concert toms 
Gordy Ryan – jimbae 
Geoffrey Gordon – shaker/pods, brass bowl, tamborim, background vocal 
Sanga of the Valley – jimbae 
Gary Thomas – didjeridu 
Jai Uttal – dotar, lead vocal 


Side B: 

Stefania’s Song (Still Chillin’): 

Robert Ansell – concert tom, misc. percussion 
Joe Bonadio – electronic drums 
Sara Carlson – vocals 
Allison Cornell – viola, vocals 
Harvey Jones – synth 
Rubin – Kodheli – cello 
Sanga of the Valley – bongos, conga, dun-dun 


Seducing Hades (Luna): 

Robert Ansell – pony drum, concert toms 
Rocky Bryant – snare, tom 
Delmar Brown – synthesizer 
Charles Burnham – electric violin 
Allison Cornell – lead and background vocals 
Devin Emke – guitar 
Hearn Gadbois – dumbek 
Nicholas Naylor-Leyland – background vocal 
Sanga of the Valley – mini jimbae 
T.M. Stevens – warwick bass 


Side C: 

Zone Unknown (Zone Unknown): 

Robert Ansell – pony drum 
Carl Adami – synthesizer 
Steve Dwire – drum program 
Bob Een – cello 
Harvey Jones – synthesizer 
Benny Koonyevtsky – log drums 
Sanga of the Valley – misc. percussion 


Silver Desert Cafe (Tongues): 

Café da Silva – conga, misc. percussion 
Bob Een – cello 
Devin Emke – guitar 
Yossi Fine – bass 
Amir Gwirtzman – zornafon, nay, arghul 
David Rosenberg – drums 
Sanga of the Valley - jimbae 

Totem (Totem): 

Robert Ansell – concert toms, 
Gordy Ryan – asheiko, jimbae, log drum 
Manuel Martinez – tone box, cowbell 
Paula Chan – bing flute 
Gene Heimlich – bass harmonica 
Jose Martinez – high hat, snare 


Side D: 

Dancing Path: Chaos (Initiation): 

Robert Ansell – kabuki drum, taos drum, concert toms 
Delmar Brown – synth intro 
Michael D’Agostino – electronic drums 
Yossi Fine – bass 
Kihende O’Uhuru – shekere 
Gordy Ryan – jimbae, asheiko, cowbell 
Serpentine - vocal 

Labyrynth (Luna): 

Robert Ansell – pony drum 
Gordy Ryan – jun-jun 
Rocky Bryant – snare, high hat 
Arthur Hull – kalimba, village congas 
Kevin Ansell - baliphone 
Joy Plaisted – harp 

Shavasana (Still Chillin’): 

Robert Ansell – pony drum, concert toms 
Joe Bonadio – electronic drums 
Morgan Doctor – drum loop, harmonica, thumb piano, misc. percussion 
Laur Fugere – vocals 
Harvey Jones – synth 
Dassi Rosencrantz-Cabo – fretless bass