Classical Music 512 Items

Des Spheres is inspired by the movement of the planets closest to the earth. the Sun,which begins the piece, is positioned in the central axis. Each planet is represented bytwo sounds: one from a natural recording (Water-Air-Earth-Fire), the other from atiny analog synthesizer. This involves a cross synthesis, in which natural soundsremain inaudible, but modulate synthetic sounds by varying their amplitudes andfrequencies over time in order to obtain an evolving, and partly random timbre.The relative orbits of each planet around the solar axis have been reproduced instereo space. To make them audible, I have had to greatly accelerate thesemovements. The 51 minutes of the piece represent over 100,000 years. Likewise, theambits of the stereo pans for each planet/track correspond to the relative distances ofthe planets in the solar system from the Sun. Saturn therefore undergoes a left/rightmovement over several minutes, while it takes Mercury only a fraction of a second forthe same movement.Each planet corresponds to a pair of different sounds (natural/synthetic), composedfrom distinct pitches, textures, and timbral colors. It is these differences which, bycoming together in the same listening space, express an auditory vision of the solarsystem.Most of the time, I worked in a daze, feeling that the mixer was becoming anextension of myself. I composed daily according to the star which corresponded tothe day of the week (Monday: the Moon - Tuesday: Mars - Wednesday: Mercury etc.).Des Spheres is therefore a piece recorded over 8 days, but involving more than a yearof preliminary research.Far from being music for relaxation, Spheres has a quasi-hypnotic effect, due to thefact that the piece consists of a single large chord of 8 notes, but whose timbres varyin tone and duration. It is not uncommon for listeners to fall asleep on this trip,which is fine with me...Refusing to reproduce an existing astronomical model in which models of reality aretaken for reality itself, the piece refers instead to an organic vision, which in oldentimes was called “the spheres”, the idea that the forces expressed in humans arelinked to the movements of celestial objects.