Ce qu’on entend sur la montagne – Festival 33,7

Roby Steinmetzer (*LU, 1960)
Ce qu’on entend sur la montagne (2008) interactive sound installation
The spectator actively participates in the work of art: Through a video camera connected to a computer, their movements and gestures are captured and analysed. The symphonic poem “Ce qu’on entend sur la montagne” by Franz Liszt, the basic material of the installation, is treated by the process of sound granulation, which consists of breaking down the sound into “grains” of a duration of typically 10-50 milliseconds. The parameters resulting from the optical capture and its analysis decide which grains are played, at what speed, how many times and in which direction. The visitor is thus faced with a rather radical reinterpretation of Liszt’s work, with the possibility, indeed the duty, to intervene in the creative process. Similar to a conductor, he/she initiates, controls, and imposes his/her rhythm on the piece through the transcription of his/her gestures. The resulting sounds can be quite remote from the original work. Sometimes poetic, sometimes brilliant or resonant, they characterise what is heard on the mountain: the association of the “chant de la nature au cri du genre humain”, extract from “Ce qu’on entend sur la montagne” by Victor Hugo, in “Les Feuilles d’automne”. (Taken from Roby Steinmetzer, translated by Jil Hamm for United Instruments of Lucilin)