Garden Window Escape by Staraya Derevnya, artwork by Danil Gertman and design by Maya Pik.

Staraya Derevnya is a collective linked to sonorities which tap into impro music, whose main formula consists of the contemplation of plastic noises which are shaped by an ambient-ish repetitiveness, in addition to the relative contextual instances. The group is based in London, Tel Aviv, and Ciudad Juarez. It is formed by Gosha Hniu (cries, whispers, wheel lyre, marching band kazoo, percussion and objects), Maya Pik (synthesizer, flute, drum machine), Ran Nahmias (silent cello, santur, oud), Grundik Kasyansky (feedback synthesizer), Miguel Pérez (guitars), Yoni Silver (bass clarinet) and Andrea Serafino (drums). In 2025 was released the album Garden Window Escape which navigates through free movements and texture concerning the previous album Boulder Blues, this last characterized by a more familiar imposition.

These topics will be analyzed in depth with Gosha Hniu in the following interview.

So, how was the artistic path by Staraya Derevnya born, and did it develop until Garden Window Escape? This last album has sonically a mantric shape, moreover, his modus operandi is characterized by an impro music craftsmanship. Could you talk a little bit more about it?

“We are a collective of musicians, artists and animators with a fluid lineup and no fixed roles. We are trying to keep things interesting with a playful, spontaneous approach. That goes for both the music and the visuals, which are often improvised together at the concerts. While our work is far from being cheerful, we try not to take ourselves too seriously and keep a healthy dose of self-irony in everything we create.”

The previous work, Boulder Blues, has a more studied form without losing the majestic feeling on behalf of the union between free music and kraut-ambient sonorities. In particular, the first track, Scythian Nest, has a joyful creativity associated with historical free jazz and the new frontiers of techno music which draws multi-colored, neatly contrasted patterns. The following piece, the titletrack, is formed by jangling phrases through a lyrical and easygoing performative crescendo flowing. So can you talk about how the creative and producing phases happen for Boulder Blues?

“Boulder Blues is our lockdown record. We have never worked remotely before, until 2020 when we were invited to create a 20-minute piece for the virtual edition of Tusk Festival (you can watch it at here). We liked the experience, so after the festival we’ve just kept going until the album was finished.

“We never think of a specific genre when playing, but we are all “music-addicts” in some way, although the tastes are very different. I come mostly from rock music background and I see this record as a kind of tribute to the music I grew up on. The only lyric line in the title track can be loosely translated as “stone of sound” or “song of a boulder” or “rock of blues”. It is endlessly repeated until it dissolves into sound, the sound of blues.”

The first track from Garden Window Escape, which is named Tight-lipped Thief, is based on rhythmic and polyphonic pulses with differences in micro-movements, generating a magmatic matter immersed in a whispering, aired-viscous landscape. The lyrics refer to a thief or a generally dishonest person, where each textual element is associated with specific details of the instrumental component. So how did these instances happen on the track mentioned above?

“Like almost everything we do, this track is built from multiple layers of group improvisation. I do some editing – removing and adding elements, until a coherent structure starts to take shape. This is an intuitive process; we don’t plan or conceptualise before recording. Instead, the ideas emerge naturally as the track moves closer toward its final form.

“Sometimes all this happens effortlessly. This time however, it was unusually hard. Maybe it was because we recorded it during a particularly difficult period for all of us, or maybe it’s just the nature of the music itself, hard to say. But the restlessness and tension in this track is what I remember feeling while working on it.”

The track What I Keep In My Closet is structured in a fragmental form, where more precise instrumental patterns similar to a jingle clock mark time to whispering music. The phrase “I have a coat in my closet. I will never put it on” was gradually reassembled at the end, metaphorically with an elastic compression of timeline in the first greater part of the piece. What was this idea born, and what is the meaning behind it?

“I think our music has always had a dark undertone, but in the previous albums it was wrapped in a kind of mysterious, fairy tale atmosphere. It was like a bad dream, but one you could wake up from. I think that the new record doesn’t offer this escape route anymore. It has moments of suffocating, existential horror, like What I Keep In My Closet.

“As the album was coming together, I formulated its central theme as “memento mori” – thinking about death. That sad, I want to be clear that the last thing I want is to impose my interpretation of our music on the listener. I truly hope people can listen to the music and form their own associations, even if they’re completely different from mine.”

Onwards, Through The Garden is a well-structured song in a chamber-ish way, with a relevant psych component in addition to prog influences. The lyrics have a romantic fashion, where the melancholic theme deflagrates in an idiosyncratic crescendo, which fades into stochastic and high-volume chaos. So, can you talk about the creative process behind this track?

“I think of this song as a “quiet crescendo” of both the “memento mori” theme and the album itself. The Boy (you can hear his heartbeat) finally makes his way out of the bad dream through the garden window, and the world around him shatters into a kaleidoscope of colours and sounds.”

In conclusion, the last track Myshhh has a more rarefied consistency, representing a figurative summa of the entire album, nevertheless also an echoing resonance throughout the end for its most characteristic element of the whispering part, this one the real leitmotiv of the album definitively. Was this the real intention behind the cited piece?

“Unlike the rest of the album, Myshhh has no internal conflict. It offers what the rest of the album lacks: solace, restraint, and acceptance. I think the album couldn’t have ended any other way. It’s also a “travel song” – the kind you take with you when a long road lies ahead.”