9.00 am: Studiology. ‘One Day’ alloys a sense of despair and militancy. These are also characteristics of the race riots and civil rights protests in the USA, during July 1964. Having reached the centre of the composition, a new motif needed to be introduced. I began to insert the Scourby/King collages, of which the drone track is the stretched composit. There was no guarantee that this would work. All I could do was insert, giggle, and stretch bacon-sliced components of the first sequence (‘I have a dream …’) along a rhythmic loop. The latter serves the same function as the weaver’s canvas: a structure in and around which the threads of sound are woven. The rhythm has to be internalised – made bodily, as though one would dance to it.

By mid day, the logic of the slicing, duration, and disposition of the samples had become evident. A compelling idea arose from within the compositional process. (Often some of the best ideas occur in situ, as opposed to at the planning stage.) But its implementation was impossible to audition in my head. It had to be realised as an act of faith-in-intuition, step-by-step, line-by-line. The progressive development became as increasingly surprising as it did frightening. By mid afternoon, I was entirely convinced of the process’ integrity. Curiously, it anticipated a collagist-character of sound that I’d assumed would contribute to the ‘Beth & Bill’ composition.

Before the close of the day’s work, I left off at a point at which I could take up again form immediately on Monday, and listened to the composition from start to finish.