SOUND SCULPTURE // COMMISSION FOR CHAMBERBRIDGE DUO // 2010
a long moment (of pleasure)
Sound Sculpture for two female voices, mixing desk player and tape.
Composed as a commission within the workshop project FRONTIERS 2010
with the ChamberBridge Duo.
»… / and down / and further down and down / … / off-kilter dripping deep / … / on the caught samples singing it all away / catching the shimmer / the final crackle of silence / holding, releasing / dissolving«
(Jeff Noon: needle in the groove)
A long moment (of pleasure) is a slowly developing »sound sculpture«. Two voices and two raw sine wave oscillators move on by chance along the harmonic series, only structured by the »mixing desk player«, who opens and closes the amplification of the voices, following a seperate score, which is not synchronized with the voices and the sine waves.
This »sound sculpture« is a thought about time perception, about harmonic relations and about the intertwining of human and electronic timbre.
Voices:
Lara Bruckmann and Eva-Maria Zimmermann
Mixing desk: Evelyn Ficarra / Marcel Saegesser
Performances:
- May 5th 2010, University of California, Berkeley
- May 9th 2010, Old First Concerts, San Francisco
- May 15th 2010, Trinity Chamber Concerts, Berkeley
- May 16th 2010, Portola Valley Presbyterian Church
- Aug 21st 2010, Zingghaus Köniz, Berne
Review by Benjamin Frandzel
«A work that was a shift in both instrumentation and style was Marcel Saegesser’s A long moment
(of pleasure) for two female voices, mixing-desk player, and tape. With Zimmermann leaving
the keyboard altogether and joining Bruckmann in singing, the two performers onstage mainly
produced long-held pitches that were couched in an ambient, arrestingly lovely electronic
environment handled by Ficarra and Yamasato. Calling to mind the patient approach of
LaMonte Young’s long-tone pieces, this was a welcome departure from the busier and more
densely written works on the rest of the program.»
(from: San Francisco Classical Voice, «Old First Concerts», May 9, 2010)
listen to the recording