| Bryan Jacobs | music composition and sound art |
about | | events | | music | | instrument building/sound art
Compositions for instruments and electronics
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Dis Un Il Im Ir |
written 2013
commissioned by Ensemble Pamplemousse
instrumentation: flute, piano, midi keyboard
awards received: Honorable Mention – Conlon Music Prize 2013
Dis Un Il Im Ir uses electronics in two different ways.
Firstly, the keys of the MIDI keyboard are mapped to a variety of software synthesizers. Each key works slightly differently. Some keys trigger multiple synthesizers and some trigger multiple notes on a single synthesizer.
Secondly, two contact microphones are glued to six inch long pieces of wood. They are placed on the strings of the piano's top two octaves, muting those pitches. The microphones are fed into a Max/MSP patch that detects attacks then triggers synthesized events. Differing synthesis is produced according to which contact microphone is excited. Although the piece is entirely interactive there is no live audio processing on the piano or the flute.
Flute samples, piano samples, and other synthetic sounds are triggered by the MIDI keyboard. Some keys trigger gestures of piano sounds that are performed slightly faster than would be possible on the real instrument. Such gestures are meant to push the already virtuosic performance into the super-human realm.
The keyboardist is positioned directly to the left of the pianist so that she or he can perform the left hand from the piano part at certain moments.
The title comes from a selection of negative prefixes.