Rachel Sermanni :: Everything Changes

http://www.rachelsermanni.net/

I’m in memoir mode, so here I go. I want to talk more about this particular song and video that never really got a decent introduction. It means so much to me. There’s a few videos I put all my heart in to, and maybe they’ll all receive a more detailed anamnesis when I feel the urge. I’ll natter on now for those who care.

It’s my opinion that true art happens as a surprise, in a moment of completely spontaneous genesis. A pearl of wisdom, a moment treasured.. be it lost or found, mixed with gem stones of memory, rooted in observations that burrow deep in to core of our soul. They all explosively collide from unexpected directions in a sudden spontaneous moment, to make a wondrous, sparkling artefact of personal and universal human expression.

Beautiful is a word I see often when it comes to describing some of the songs I film. I’m thankful when each time that word is evoked in a comment, as I had a beautiful mother, I grew up in her beautiful house, and lived among hundreds of beautiful paintings. Some she painted herself, others she bought from art students, some very special pieces she acquired from exhibitions but all so very beautiful. It is perhaps the environment in which I was luckily raised, that defines the way I wish to see the world, and the way in which I want you to view the world, in every little short I make.

It was the longest time since I had heard the most beautiful song ever written, and it coincided with the passing of my beautiful mother, my matriarch. There’s always a new love affair with a song to replace for a moment, the previous love. Sometimes it takes a while. It’s always a delight to find a new melody that resonates strongly within you. Hearing a piece of music that squeezes at your heart only the way mad passion can. Make you brim and spill with emotions you thought could not have been so concentrated within you.

It was only a month since she was buried. I neither heard nor tried to find an inspirational song during the many months of utterly disabilitating numbness that soaked through my skin to my very bones. A girl with the voice of an angel had sent me a few songs I hadn’t heard. It was time to immerse myself again, or else how would I pay for groceries? The first song I played of hers, was one I have linked. If my body had not already poured litres of tears I would have cried a river. “Everything Changes, everything moves, everything changes”. Be it that the singers lyric had been born of a genesis completely from her own circumstance, for me, as those words repeated, it become a mantra that helped me feel things again, especially music. A most important feeling, besides the unconditional love of my wife, who was a shining light in such dark times. Hearing the song began a new yearning to express and discover. I immediately flew to Scotland to meet her and start filming anything and everything. No plan had been discussed as to what would be suitable as a video.

Rachel Sermanni is not only a songwriter and a classically gorgeous vocalist, she’s an illustrator and a painter (I strongly advise you to follow her on Instagram). In a random moment, visiting her home in the Scottish Highlands between touring, Rachel, and her best buddy started drawing. Rachel began to sketch a woman. My mind filled with memories of my mother. It was my mother she may as well have been painting. “Everything Changes” we made sure was playing on repeat. After documenting every brush stroke, I asked may I keep her creation. In a moment of my own creative genesis, I decided I would film the life story of her painting, from its conception on her kitchen table, to its final resting place. In a gust of wind the painting would leave the hands of the woman who brought her to life, and so she would begin a life journey. She would be carried in the hands of mother nature, where she would find her way along the beautiful and treacherous wheel of life to her final resting place.

This, as well as a music video, is a tribute to you mum. The life you had. All of it’s highs and it’s lows. All the beauty you shared with everyone who knew you so well. I love you and miss you but see you everywhere and in everything. You shall never leave me, you are always in me. Thank you for all the beauty.