OLIVIER ALARY – VESTIGES
Listening to the orchestral sound of this composition, it is sometimes hard to imagine that what you hear is actually the sound of twelve amplified steel guitars and electronics, ‘conceived as an instrumental choir’.
It took Montreal-based composer Olivier Alary ten years to create this 42-minute composition in five continuous movements. In this period, he developed an instrumental practice ‘focused on the musical representation of memory’s spectrality.’:
“Through notation and specific playing techniques, his work explores the transcription of “auditory ghosts.” ‘Vestiges’ continues this research by bringing together a group of similar instruments, whose close timbral proximity allows psychoacoustic phenomena to emerge, revealing unstable, voice-like presences at the threshold of perception. “
I’ll simpy copy the liner notes for a further explanation of this technique:
“Through continuous, oscillatory slide gestures on the strings, the twelve performers set the instruments into resonance, activating a field of subtle interferences and harmonic fluctuations and giving rise to spectral, voice-like textures. […] The sonic language is shaped by techniques that introduce material instability. Noise, saturation, micro-variations in pitch, and the friction of the slide contribute to a sense of erosion and transformation.”
If this description triggers your curiosity, it may be interesting to watch the live performance below to see the performers at work:
Vestiges is an impressive work that is hard to classify into a genre. Some of the parts are definitely ‘ambient’, but other parts sound like a full orchestra leading to intense climaxes.
“Vestiges can be understood ad a form of sonic séance. The piece unfolds as a space where presence and absence coexist, and where sound hovers between emergence and disappearance.”
The work of Olivier Alary covers experimental/electronic music, film scoring (for more than sixty films and documentaries) as well as sound art. His music is released on labels like Fatcat Records, 130701, Rephlex, and Line.
Vestiges found a perfectly fitting place on the Line label – the label curated by Ricard Chartier to ‘take the tactile qualities of audio installations from the gallery space to listeners’ living rooms.’
It is (unfortunately) only available in digital form.
