For fixed media and piano
Movement can cause change, and stillness can also cause change. On February 18, 2022, a planned strike (mouvement social) among Paris Métro employees caused the cessation of underground train movement for several hours.
The day before the strike, I sat on a bench in Pernety station (line 13) with a small recording device. As I sat, I listened to the sounds of the trains coming and going in both directions. Frequent platform announcements warned of upcoming “disruptions and delays”.
To compose this piece, I applied a spectral freezing patch at specific moments throughout my recording. This software temporarily “pauses” the trains, aurally disrupting their otherwise incessant locomotion. In addition, the track is designed to be played directly into a grand piano with the pedal held down. The sympathetic resonances (which you will hear in the attached recording) result in another, purely acoustic, form of spectral freezing.
Mouvement Social seeks to highlight the ramifications of everyday sounds, and to lead them into a new and unexpected setting.
The piece was first performed in Paris in 2022.
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