Aimee Doherty

40125305

Composition Assignment

The Sonorities festival is a festival of digital and contemporary music, digital

arts, and sound art, video and installation art performed in both Belfast and
London. The concert was held in the Sonic Arts Research Centre, a brilliant
venue that created a great atmosphere for the recordings to be heard. The
first piece I heard was called Olympic Games by Panos Amelides. This piece
was not a live performance and the sonic lab was in darkness for the majority
of the piece.
This piece was focused mainly on how big of an event the Olympics is and
how it is spread all over the world. It is mainly constructed of synthetic
sounds, recordings of voices and news reports with different sound effects
added. This piece has two sides to it, the great achievements of the Olympics
and the darker side to human activity. The exploration of different vocal
timbres was very interesting, with the piece beginning with low whispers from
various people then progressing throughout to loud and clear vocal texts.
These voices and whispers came from all directions in the Sonic Lab. All of
the voices overlap creating a sense of busyness and excitement from the
crowds of people at the Olympic Games.
The composer uses sounds from the surrounding environments such as
running water and wind to add an atmospheric effect to the piece. We as an
audience are brought into this sound world and made to feel as though we are
actually present at the Olympic games. The use of silence in the piece is
fantastic as it really draws the listener in as we anticipate the next event and
sounds. The recordings used in this piece are from various different Olympic

games over different decades, we can hear how the quality of different news
recordings changes over time, which adds an interesting tone to the piece.
There are two key themes running throughout this piece, the first theme
uses mainly bright uplifting texts and synthetic sounds and then later is
juxtaposed with darker sounds and eeriness in the second theme. This
second theme displays the darker sides to human kind. A news reading is
clearly heard with no music in the background that there are 11 hostages.
We are unclear as an audience as to what will happen next. This creates a
sense of great tension in the music. This gives rise to the climax of the piece
in which a news recording states that 9 people have been killed. The music
abruptly changes to an ominous feel with more sinister sounds played in lower
registers to achieve tension in the sonic lab. There is a haunting quality to the
music used to reflect the mood of the audience.
This piece contains many contrasting moods throughout sending the
listener on an emotional rollercoaster whilst listening. The music builds up
towards the end again to a loud cheer and a roaring applause bringing us
back to our first theme. A loud major chord is heard in the background giving
us a sense of tonal clarification. The sounds heard are coming from all
directions in the sonic lab yet again and the piece finally ends with silence and
complete darkness. This piece was my favourite as there were so many
different ideas portrayed in the one piece.
A second piece I heard at the sonorities festival was called Trio dapres
Schoenberg is by Patricia Alessandrini. This piece includes the use of actual
musical instruments as opposed to sounds being previously recorded and
played through speakers. This piece is played live and the instruments used

included a piano, clarinet and a cello. From viewing the instrumentation we

expect to hear possibly a classical piece of music but as they begin to play we
realise that is not the case.
This piece was written with no definite structure or key and is atonal as
there is no tonal centre. This trio do not play conventionally and mainly focus
their playing on extended techniques to produce different timbres from the
instruments. We as an audience are fully engaged in this performance and
are constantly wondering what different sounds these instruments are going
to produce next.
The pianist plays the strings inside the grand piano more than the actual
keys to produce a unique ringing sound whilst the clarinet is muted and plays
over this to create a sympathetic resonance. The pianist plays cluster chords,
which creates tension among the audience as this produces very minor
chords. At times he is playing both the keys and the strings inside the piano,
which creates a great effect throughout the piece. The cello plays only the
high register and an artificial resonance is created by the electronics used
throughout. He uses different techniques such as plucking the strings near the
bridge of the cello to create high-pitched distinct notes. He also uses the bow
to create longer sustained notes throughout.
This music is very experimental with a lot of risks being taken. The whole
piece is very filmic in nature with some very haunting and creepy tones
throughout taking us into a completely different sound world than the first
piece heard. I found this piece to be very interesting due to the vast amounts
of extended techniques used by each instrumentalist. Each instrumentalist

was very engaged in what they were doing and was very effective in bringing
across their aim of the piece to the audience.
The final piece I listened to at the sonorities festival was called Night Study
1 by Felipe Otondo. This piece describes a night motorcycle journey across
the Mexican desert. The piece takes us on a sonic journey through different
landscapes and sound worlds of an imaginary trip.
The piece begins with a very interesting rhythmical idea, which sounds like
a drum however no real instruments are used in this recording. The composer
uses mainly environmental recordings, which have been captured in different
rural and urban landscapes. This rhythmic idea represents the motorcycle
travelling and is used many times throughout the piece.
There are many different mood changes throughout the piece and sudden
changes in dynamics to keep the audiences attention. There are also both
subtle and dramatic rhythm changes, which give us the effect of different
speeds of the motorcycle. There is a low frequency note heard in the
background, which sounds like a drone throughout the music, which gives the
piece some tonal stability. The environmental sounds heard throughout
include the sound of waves in the sea, birds chirping in the distance and the
sound of running water. There are small rhythmic motifs that repeat
throughout the piece giving us a sense of urgency as they are heard over and
over again.
The middle of the piece presents us with a calming section, which is dream
like in character as we are so relaxed as we listen to it. This gives us a break
from the small rhythmic idea and the constant pulse of the music. During this
section we hear running water and sounds of the wind, which are very

peaceful in character. This section of the music perhaps represents the

motorcyclist taking a break throughout his journey. The music then begins to
increase in pace and we can hear distinct ringing sounds over the rhythmic
drum idea. I think this represents the adventure and exploring idea of the
piece.
The piece has no particular structure or tonal centre. However, there are
many different timbres heard throughout the piece, which makes it very
interesting. The piece ends with a ringing sound and what sounds like muted
drums in the background. It is very tranquil and peaceful in the end which I
think represents the end of the motorcycle journey. The piece ends with the
sound of running water coming from all speakers in the Sonic Arts Research
Centre and then this gradually fades away to silence. The lighting used
throughout this piece was interesting as it kept changing as the music
changed and sometimes the audience were listening in complete darkness,
which created a different listening environment.
In conclusion, the Sonorities festival has given me a great insight into
different forms of music. Not only does music not have to include musical
instruments it also doesnt have to include a key or a structure. This concert
has really opened my eyes to all different types of music and has challenged
my views on what a performance, a composer and music really is. Overall, a
very enjoyable experience and I hope to hear more music like this in the
future.