Voices Part III - Resistance

Catégorie
Acousmatic music
Electroacoustic music
2020

I have always been touched by the human voice, spoken or sung, attracted by foreign languages and deeply moved by certain timbres, inflections, breaths or prosodies. My work on voice analysis and synthesis at the Laboratory of Experimental Phonetics at the ULB, and the understanding of the various parameters that affect its timbre, did not explain why I resonated with certain voices or vocal modes rather than others. This work is the third part of an intuitive and sensual exploration of this mystery.

It is inspired in particular by “The Master and Margarita” by Mikhaïl Bulgakov and texts by rebel poet/singer Yanka Dyagileva. Born 75 years apart, both authors tried to escape the grim soviet reality, in different ways, more ironic and satirical for the former and quite darker for the later. But both used a peculiar mix of fantastic and realistic elements to mock and denounce the system while transporting us to unexpected places, in a transfigured reality. 

They resisted soviet censorship, reaching their audience through clandestine channels: samizdats and magnitizdats. Today, after Putin's dreadful invasion of Ukraine and the extraordinary level of censorship and repression he imposed in Russia, it resonates with a renewed acuity.

Voices Part III also uses elements of sung voice and an iconic electronic voice, the Thereminvox, named after its inventor, Leon Theremin, as well as numerous digital transformations.

 

Voices Part III – Resistance was composed at ARTeM studio with support from the Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles (Direction générale de la culture, Service de la musique) and premièred on the 5th of March 2020 at the Abel Dubois Auditorium in Mons (B), in the framework of the Belgian Music Days.

It was awarded the First Prize at the International Musica Nova Competition (Czech Republic, 2021) and a Honorable mention at the 4th Iannis Xenakis International Electronic Music Competition (Greece, 2023).

Main Russian voice : Anya Pospelova
Additional Russian voice :  Alexandra Dementieva

Composer(s)
Duration
13'30
Line up
16-Channel, 8-Channel (Octophonic) or Stereophonic Media
Date de création