In the late 1970’s I started to write and produce music involving
hundreds of parts or tracks. In the early days, the analogue recording medium
was very noisy when bouncing (or premixing) tracks together. Things improved
throughout the 1980’s and ’90’s, but a large multitrack
digital tape recorder was still out of my financial reach. By the late
1990’s the new computer and hard drive speeds finally provided me with
an affordable multitrack solution. For the first time in my life I was able
to achieve the balance between individual voices that I had so carefully
notated in the original scores. I achieved further musical clarity and a new
depth of sound by using quality compression, equalisation and reverb. To
remaster, I went back to the individual tracks. This was a huge undertaking.
For example, a piece like Beyond the
Walls of Jericho (1991-92) may be only 16 minutes and 25 seconds long,
but it is a large tape work comprising eighty hours of original recorded
materials.
Recordings always ‘freeze’ or crystallise musical and spectral
meaning for the listener. An odd sound combination that you have grown fond
of in the old master may not appear in the same way in the new one. However,
I think you will agree that I have stayed true to the original compositions.
I changed some musical moments and transitions in Beyond the
Walls of Jericho, and the tape components for Physics of
Seduction, Invocation #1, all originally released on the L’ivresse
de la vitesse CD in 1994. These changes were motivated by compositional
concerns and were created using the musical materials from the Walls Cycle.
The only new recordings made for the remastering process were the drum parts
(performed by Philippe Keyser) in
Beyond the
Walls of Jericho.
I invite you to discover many new levels of meaning and clarity in the new
masters, which are much closer to my original artistic intention.
What is the speed of music? At what point does music red shift to
ultrasonic velocity like all those spectral objects before it, break the
sound barrier and then follow an immense curvature towards that point of
incredible sound density, where music can finally move at such violent speeds
that it can no longer be heard, even by mutant membranes. The final point,
that is, where music breaks beyond the speed of light, falling onto a deep
and immense silence.
In this wonderful world, as we drift aimlessly across the mediascape,
floating among the debris of all the seductive objects of desire, voyeurs in
the cultural boutiques of which our bodies are only random and transitory
terminal points, we can finally know the terminal blast of music to be our
very own lost object of desire, the field across which bodies are coded,
tattooed and signified in an endless circulation of spectral emotions.
If music is so seductive today, that is because it finally delivers on the
catastrophe that is our last historical illusion. Music as interesting,
therefore, only in its dark and implosive side, in that impossible space
where music prefigures our own dissolution into a spectral impulse in the
circulatory system of the mediascape. The fascination with music today lies
in its violence as a force-field that scripts bodies, codes emotions,
processes terminal identities, and rehearses our own existence as crash
bodies, by its violent alternation as a scene of ecstasy and inertia.
Sounds appear from nowhere and they decay rapidly. They move across the
field of our bodies, and then disappear. They have no real presence, only a
virtual and analogical presence. Sounds without history and without a
referent.
The brilliant musical compositions of Paul Dolden are an
emblematic sign of the times. Dolden is the high
priest of crash music for the fin-de-siècle. A ‘DAT’ musician whose
music is at the forward edge of the ’90s, Dolden hardwires us
into the sounds of terminal culture. His crash music operates like a violent
force-field: an oscillating field of energy where rolling walls of sound can
achieve such maximal density that they suddenly fold back into perfectly
eerie silences. Paul Dolden actually
creates the crash sound of inertia and ecstasy.
The music on these two discs represents two different but related
compositional strategies. The first compositional strategy is represented by
the creation of the four solo tape works and the second strategy is the
creation of the five works for soloist and tape.
The creation of the solo tape compositions involves the composition of
several hundred simultaneous musical parts or lines on large manuscript
paper. Each part or line is individually performed on an acoustic instrument
and recorded. Once all several hundred parts have been individually recorded,
they are digitally mixed together with usually no, or very little, signal
processing or electronic effects. This working method allows for new and
complex polyrhythmic and microtonal tuning relationships between parts that
could never be performed by a live ensemble. This compositional technique
also allows for unique orchestration and density possibilities that can be
constantly transformed.
The exclusive use of acoustic instruments in these recordings could be
partially explained by the fact that I regularly perform on the violin,
guitar and cello. Therefore I hear a richness of human expression in acoustic
instrumental performance which, to me, is largely absent in any other
electroacoustic production method. Indeed the sound worlds found in these
recordings could not be created by current electronic synthesis techniques,
which are unable to produce a large palette of convincingly different timbres
or sounds. The narrowness of this range of unique timbres prevents the type
of orchestration strategies that can occur for acoustic sounds in which large
numbers of sound sources can be combined and the individuality of each sound
is somewhat maintained while there is a contribution to the overall sound.
Likewise, this music could not be produced by current sampling techniques,
which cannot create convincing long musical phrase structures which develop
according to the compositional language of each piece.
The second compositional strategy featured on these two discs combines a
live soloist with segments from three of these solo tape compositions. Often
new tape portions are added in order to compliment the timbral quality of the
soloist’s instrument. In creating these works for soloist and tape,
many details of the tape become masked by the soloist’s sound. However,
by being able to clearly hear one part, one gains a new perspective on my
sound world, as the solo line often highlights fairly hidden musical gestures
and directions. Moreover, one has the wonderful contrast between the tape, in
which hundreds of musical parts often create anonymous massed textural
effects, and hearing the soloist with all the subjectivity, subtlety and
detail he/she brings. As such one could compare the soloist to a clear single
line in an abstract dense visual field which creates a type of definition and
clarity by its sheer contrast to the surrounding density. In other words, the
tape works stand on their own but are heard in a different manner when they
are combined with a soloist. Another analogy would be when viewing a crystal
in which we know it is the same object even as we turn it and get different
visual perspectives.
The contrast between the anonymous mass effect of the tape and the
singular effect of the soloist also works as a metaphor for the relationship
between the individual (the soloist) and society (the mass effect of the
tape). The implication of this metaphor is discussed in the following section
entitled The
Possessed Individual.
The music on these two discs represents two different but related
compositional strategies. The first compositional strategy is represented by
the creation of the four solo tape works and the second strategy is the
creation of the five works for soloist and tape.
The creation of the solo tape compositions involves the composition of
several hundred simultaneous musical parts or lines on large manuscript
paper. Each part or line is individually performed on an acoustic instrument
and recorded. Once all several hundred parts have been individually recorded,
they are digitally mixed together with usually no, or very little, signal
processing or electronic effects. This working method allows for new and
complex polyrhythmic and microtonal tuning relationships between parts that
could never be performed by a live ensemble. This compositional technique
also allows for unique orchestration and density possibilities that can be
constantly transformed.
The exclusive use of acoustic instruments in these recordings could be
partially explained by the fact that I regularly perform on the violin,
guitar and cello. Therefore I hear a richness of human expression in acoustic
instrumental performance which, to me, is largely absent in any other
electroacoustic production method. Indeed the sound worlds found in these
recordings could not be created by current electronic synthesis techniques,
which are unable to produce a large palette of convincingly different timbres
or sounds. The narrowness of this range of unique timbres prevents the type
of orchestration strategies that can occur for acoustic sounds in which large
numbers of sound sources can be combined and the individuality of each sound
is somewhat maintained while there is a contribution to the overall sound.
Likewise, this music could not be produced by current sampling techniques,
which cannot create convincing long musical phrase structures which develop
according to the compositional language of each piece.
The second compositional strategy featured on these two discs combines a
live soloist with segments from three of these solo tape compositions. Often
new tape portions are added in order to compliment the timbral quality of the
soloist’s instrument. In creating these works for soloist and tape,
many details of the tape become masked by the soloist’s sound. However,
by being able to clearly hear one part, one gains a new perspective on my
sound world, as the solo line often highlights fairly hidden musical gestures
and directions. Moreover, one has the wonderful contrast between the tape, in
which hundreds of musical parts often create anonymous massed textural
effects, and hearing the soloist with all the subjectivity, subtlety and
detail he/she brings. As such one could compare the soloist to a clear single
line in an abstract dense visual field which creates a type of definition and
clarity by its sheer contrast to the surrounding density. In other words, the
tape works stand on their own but are heard in a different manner when they
are combined with a soloist. Another analogy would be when viewing a crystal
in which we know it is the same object even as we turn it and get different
visual perspectives.
The contrast between the anonymous mass effect of the tape and the
singular effect of the soloist also works as a metaphor for the relationship
between the individual (the soloist) and society (the mass effect of the
tape). The implication of this metaphor is discussed in the following section
entitled The
Possessed Individual.
Recorded musicians in the Walls
Cycle Isaac Bull: bassoon,
contrabassoon Paul Steenhuisen:
soprano, alto and bass saxophone Ian Crutchley: tenor
saxophones Lorne Buick: bass
clarinet Johanna Hauser:
clarinet Michelle Cheramy:
piccolo, bass flute Clemens Rettich:
flute, soprano, tenor, alto and bass recorders Glee Devereaux:
oboe, english horn Mark Tynan:
trombone Jamie Croil:
trumpet Paul Fester: tuba Gwyneth
MacKenzie: french horn Gary Sterle: french
horn Marc Crompton:
timpani, tom-toms, cymbals, glockenspiel, temple-blocks Trevor Tureski:
tom-toms, cymbals, vibes, marimba, bongos, congas, tablas, gamelan
instruments, snare and tenor snare Paul Dolden: acoustic
and electric guitars, double bass, cello, viola, violin, dulcimer, sitar,
banjo, mandolin, and piano Marko Novachcoff:
flute, alto flutepiccolo, panpipes, bamboo, soprano, alto and tenor
recorders, clarinet, alto, bass, contrabass and clarinets, cornet, alto horn,
ophicleide, tuba, soprano sarrusophone, oboe, english horn, heckelphone,
bassoon, soprano, alto, tenor, baritone and bass saxophones Andrew Czink:
piano Voices
soprano: Diana Ganske
alto: Janis Clark
tenor: Nick Curalli
baritone: David Pay
The
Possessed Individual is a metaphor for the soloists and their
relationship to the sound world found in the tape component of each
composition. The five works philosophically address the crises in our
traditional thought structures and our fast approach towards the impossible
dream of escaping mortality through the construction of an artificial or
virtual reality created through the use of advanced technology. These virtual
realities would create a world of shifting pleasures composed of strategies
of appearances which would allow for the remapping of experience and
existence. In this metaphor, the tape is a type of virtual reality in which
idealized acoustic situations are made possible only with the modern digital
recording studio. The soloist, or the Possessed Individual, often plays
materials that blend with or enter the virtual reality of the tape. At other
times, the soloist maintains his/her individuality by playing in a different
direction from the tape in terms of mood, tempo, dynamics, harmony or timbre.
Therefore the Possessed Individual, or the soloist, is also a metaphor for
all of us at the end of the second millennium, in that we are aware of the
breakdown of our traditional thought structures but unable to completely
escape our historicized subjectivity. Notwithstanding this predicament, we
are still possessed with an energy to create play, challenges and duels. When
these energies are combined with technology, they can ideally lead to new
sonic worlds and offer the possibility of remapping of our senses and
existence through transcendental æsthetic experiences.
The program notes for the works represent the evolution in my thought
structure to this philosophical outlook. For example, the program notes for
the Physics
of Seduction. Invocation #1 announce the crises of our traditional
thought structures and appeal to a type of musical listening and
transcendental experience unmediated by words or images. To evoke these
states, the program notes for the Physics
of Seduction. Invocation #3 propose a compositional strategy involving my
Theory of Excess. Finally, the program notes for Physics
of Seduction. Invocation #2 are a celebration of speed as one example of
a surface phenomenon that can create transcendental and hopefully new
experiences. The Resonance
Cycle pursues these themes with new detailing of the basic ideas.
Musically, the five works chronologize different strategies for combining
the live aspect of a potentially irrational, irregular and wild soloist with
the disembodied virtual reality of the tape. As mentioned above, in some
instances the soloist enters and plays with the virtual world of the tape. At
other times, the historicized subjectivity of the soloist is in musical
contrast with the tape and, in this sense, the Possessed Individual is one of
the last great heroic figures: the virtuosic soloist. The real drama of the
relation between the soloist and the tape and the details of these
interactions and strategies lie within the unfolding of the musical
structures. For in reality, within and outside of the musical experience,
things do not co-exist or dominate one another but work to exterminate each
other in a fatal regression of discourses. In other words, all metaphors one
could establish for the relation between an individual and society or
technology is ultimately facile in the face of the illuminating power and
transcendental potential of music.
Notwithstanding these limitations of written discourses, it is sufficient
to say that in the virtual reality of these recordings our heroic virtuoso,
or Possessed Individual, is a possible portrayal of subjectivity in ruins at
the end of the second millennium, and yet simultaneously a meditation on the
dark, and fatally attractive and seductive universe of The Possessed
Individual.