I am often losing things. (I have even lost my keys while holding them in my hand.) So it's no surprise that when I closed my eyes and spun my Spotify list this morning, landed on something, then hit play, what came out of my speakers was something I realized I was finding after thinking it had been lost.
Today's music comes from Robin Spielberg, and per Wikipedia is, "is an American pianist, composer and author." According to her website, she is "heart and soul of interpretive solo piano."
My mother has been a pianist for years. At one point in my childhood, our church needed a place to store their baby grand piano, and it was moved into our living room. There was enough room for a walkway from the front door to the kitchen, but if you wanted to sit anywhere in the room, you had to crawl under the piano and sit on the floor.
There were times my mother would practice for services or special events, and would often pull in classical pieces from memory to warm up with. Piano music has always been part of my life, and maybe it's because of my childhood, but I can listen to a lone piano for hours.
When I was in college, I discovered several "modern" pianists and played their music in my dorm room after my mother went overseas for missions. It kept her close, but also helped me navigate through my fears of her never coming back. That music was a lifeline to me.
Piano music is something that both soothes me and makes my heart ache. It can immediately throw me back to times where I crawled under that baby grand piano and listened to my mother warming up. Piano can be haunting. Fierce. Dreamy. Suspenseful. Soothing. Sometimes, I would stand up and watch the little hammers strike the strings, watch her feet move on the peddles to evoke different sounds, watch her fingers press the keys. The whole of it fascinated me. How can something that looks so simple create so many moods and emotions? I am feeling the same way today as I listen to Robin Spielberg's compositions.
Today, when the piano began to play, all of the feelings I remember having while lying under that baby grand came back to me. Those sessions while my mother played were some of the few times I saw her truly happy (even when she was frustrated at mistakes she said she was making). I felt at home, wondering, hopeful, longing. I remember often feeling like listening to my mother was like watching falling stars: it was a wonderful experience that I knew would end, and I kept wishing it wouldn't. My childhood was often chaotic, and I mostly remember feeling that chaos. But, today, while I listened to the first songs play out, I connected back to some of the times that I felt safe and happy. I didn't even realize how much of that I'd lost, until today.
I don't remember adding today's artist to my Spotify list, and I don't recognize any of the songs I'm hearing. I'm being reminded again that I don't have to recognize a song in order to connect with it, and I'm so glad this was an artist I had added to explore. I had created a Peaceful list on Spotify, for those days when I really need to shut everything away for a while, and I'm finding that instead of picking through and adding a song here or there, I'll be adding Robin Spielberg's albums to that list, then removing songs that don't quite appeal to me (if I find any).
This is a perfect backdrop for testing a perfume, and I'm thankful to have it.
Today's perfume is Hidden Lodge by Solstice Scents. Solstice Scents used to only do perfume oils (and some other products like whipped soaps--which are wonderful), but a few years ago Angela St. John (the perfumer) decided to branch out into alcohol based perfumes. I have stuck with the oils (although I would dearly, oh so dearly, love to get my hands on her House Vanilla perfume) so this review will be for the oil version. Since I haven't tried the alcohol versions of her perfumes, I'm not sure how much they differ.
Again, I'll be giving my impressions, then post the official notes.
I only have a sample vial of this one, so I can't get as much out of it as I would from a bottle, but in the vial and on the wand, I get the feeling of windswept desert, something a bit herbal and green underneath, and the sense of dry underbrush and wood that has been lying in the sun for years. I grabbed this sample because I like the idea of hidden places where we can wander off, explore, find serenity. I am also finding it amusing that the music for today seems to pair so well with the concept of a Hidden Lodge. I often felt like I was in my own hidden world when I would crawl under the piano, so this fits perfectly. I also am getting a note in the perfume that reminds me of peanuts, which means there may be some form of sandalwood or oud in here.
On my skin, oh this is lovely. There is a part of this that reminds me of one of my favorites from Solstice Scents called Witch's Cottage. That one has soft herbs, sweetness without being sugary, and always makes me feel grounded and hopeful at the same time. This reminds me a little of that in the herbal edge, but this seems to have more woods added to it. I'm still getting a faint peanut note, which is opening up some more which makes me lean toward a soft sandalwood (although I suspect oud may also be playing a role). On my right arm, I'm getting a smoky note that isn't apparent on my left arm. It's a beautiful silvered campfire wood smoke that again reminds me of a desert, but one at night with the stars brilliant overhead, and the faint call of wild things beyond the light from the fire.
As it dries, the sweet herbal note remains dominant on my left arm, but definitely grounded and centered by a very dry wood. What I suspect is oud is wrapping through it all, mixing it all together very beautifully. This comes across as a dry perfume, but still has edges of sweetness. This would be amazing on both men and women. On my right arm, the smokiness merges with the dry wood, making it more dry wood than smoke, but still retaining that elusive smokey quality. This is dry, but soft, not hard or wrung out as some perfumes can be.
Dry, this has become a warm and soft wood with a faint sweet herbal edge with a lick of smoke. My right arm continues to hold a much more dry and smoked edge, but the whole feels like I've somehow found a way to compress an old wooden building with boards bleached by sun, surrounded by soft herbs and dark dessert with the memories of fire, into a perfume.
It is beautiful.
According to the website, "Hidden Lodge is a dry woody blend with traces of spice and smoke and delicate animalic undertones. The dry wood portion of this fragrance is comprised of a number of fragrance and essential oils. Sandalwood, copal bark, cedar and amber combine with additional wood aromas to produce a diffusive, warm, dry foundation for this scent. The addition of the woodsmoke with very conservatively applied nutmeg and clove enhances the incensey slightly sweet woods. A touch of a botanical castoreum blend conveys a very subtle and enjoyable animalic hint to the blend. Natural oud adds a rich and intoxicating body to the total composition. Hidden Lodge smells very incensey, warm, woodsy, smoky, slightly spicy and even has a bit of well-worn leather on the skin. The spices are more detectable after initial application and fade quickly to a subtle supporting role. On initial application, there is a sweet note similar to brown sugar along with a peppery zip. These nuances are an added dimension from the combination of wood and spice notes. Some of the woods in Hidden Lodge have a natural sweetness similar to that of caramel. Though this sweet characteristic is detectable, it is subtle and Hidden Lodge is not a sweet blend. Natural sandalwood and oud were used generously in this fragrance. Unisex leaning masculine." The notes are "Dry Wood Blend, Oud, Woodsmoke, Spices, Castoreum (Botanical Interpretation)
Aha! I don't get much of the animalic, but I am tickled to see that this is very along the lines of what I got from it on my skin. Angela really is a master at setting a mood with her perfume, and this one is just perfect for me today, especially paired with the music pick. I find myself balancing between feeling peaceful and thankful for finding moments of happy memories. All by determining to discover something new.
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