Sweet flutes, soft percussion, and strings transport listeners from today’s harsh reality to a fairyland where the solo violin invites them to dance. This is Fairy Fantasy, the latest in a series of four fae-inspired albums (including the Grammy-nominated Fairy Dreams) from New Age music legend David Arkenstone.
“I had more to say,” David told our own Joanna Forest in a soon-to-be-released conversation for The Crossover Deep Dive. “I had other ideas of how to illustrate that magical world.”
Escapism, literary inspiration, and structured creativity all play a role in his process. “When I go into this world, there is a certain palette of instruments I use that illustrate it. So I prepare those. I start trying to get ideas for it, which I’m never short of, luckily, and I just try to craft something that is a magical world, a place where I feel like I’m illustrating something that people can go in and sort of have little adventures.”
Nature, of course, holds its own secrets and inspiration. “I have some forests nearby, and I remember there’s a couple places in England that have sort of very little structures people have made in forests for fairies and things. They’ve made little worlds for them, and you can walk through this forest, and I just thought that was amazing and so powerful.”
Among the special musical elements in Fairy Fantasy are small-scale instruments, such as delicate bells, to capture the wonder of a miniature world. “When I did the first one, which was called Fairy Garden, a number of years ago, I did a lot of research about the fairy world, and I’ve read a lot of fantasy books in my life. I sort of have developed a skill for creating these different kinds of soundtracks for my imagination, and I’ve been so lucky that it does resonate with people. People go on my little adventures, and I’m so grateful to have a career where I can just do whatever I can come up with.”
The musicians David collaborates with are another source of inspiration. “I used two incredible musicians on the fairy albums—Leanne Holmes on violin and Kimberly Zaleski on flutes. They did such a great job! I’m getting some more things ready for them because I like collaborating with them. When you use other musicians, they bring their whole history to your project—everything they have learned, how they play, their phrasing—everything. And it elevates whatever I’ve done. So I’m just looking forward to doing more with them, and then going to Europe at some point this year and playing some live concerts.”
With 70 albums to his credit, David has honed his creative process. “It probably takes me a month to write all the songs, and I make sketches and then flesh them out for maybe another month. Then I’m ready to record. That recording still only takes a couple of days because the musicians I use are so awesome. Then I mix it, and that takes several weeks. So it’s probably a three-month process from when I start.”
As for the future, David is always creating but waits for the inspiration that brings it all together. “I’ve started writing some songs, but I don’t know where they’re going to go. I enjoyed the Quest for the Runestone project because my son wrote a beautiful story for it, and I was able to incorporate a lot of what he wrote about in that album. So I’m hoping to do another kind of project like that—something with either an audio companion or something extra—because people really liked it.”
The full episode of The Crossover Deep Dive premieres today on our YouTube channel. We look forward to seeing you in the comments! Until then, stream Fairy Fantasy—the perfect soundtrack to your fantasy addiction (A Court of Thorns and Roses, Fourth Wing, etc.).
Stream “Fairy Fantasy” on Spotify now!
