Ana Dall’Ara‑Majek

Imaginary soundscape depicting the world of shallow water microorganisms. The different types of sounds represent the diversity of cells and their behaviour. In this environment every being struggles for existence in a quivering dance. Bacteria quickly slither, protists flow randomly, ciliates bumps nervously against obstacles while some amoeba species greedily engulf their cytoplasmic neighbours.

2018.05.25 Premiere at Geometry of Echo, Elektro Arts Festival, Gheorghe Dima Music Academy Concert Hall, Cluj-Napoca (Romania)

[EN]
To Annette Vande Gorne
I had left for Place de Ransbeck in search of Rumeurs’s thirteen doors when I encountered an angry hymenopteran who fled my microphone by hiding in the cracks of a wooden beam. This is how my piece was first conceived. It features a carpenter bee and twenty doors recorded at Musiques & Recherches (Ohain, Belgium). In it, I continue my exploration of changes of scale, from a passage in human proportions featuring familiar sounds to the more abstract world of microfauna, where bacteria found in wood form wriggling masses. Between these two sizes of scale, the carpenter bee carves out wood shavings and comes buzzing around our ears.
This piece is part of Nano-Cosmos, a cycle of acousmatic pieces dedicated to insects, small arthropods and microorganisms.

[FR]
À Annette Vande Gorne
Partie Place de Ransbeck à la recherche des treize portes des Rumeurs, je rencontre un hyménoptère en colère qui fuit mon microphone en se cachant dans les failles d’une poutre. C’est ainsi que la pièce naît. Elle met en scène l’abeille charpentière et vingt portes enregistrées à Musiques & Recherches (Ohain, Belgique). Je continue l’exploration du changement d’échelle: le passage d’une dimension humaine, habitée de sons familiers; au monde de la microfaune, plus abstrait, là où les bactéries du bois forment des flux frétillants. Entre ces deux échelles, l’abeille charpentière taille des copeaux et vient bourdonner à nos oreilles.
Cette pièce fait partie de Nano-Cosmos, un cycle acousmatique dédié aux insectes, aux petits arthropodes et aux micro-organismes.

2019.08.23 Festival Futura, Crest (FR)
2019.03.20 Substrat 4, Satosphere, SAT, Montreal (CA)
2019.03.02 CEMI Circles, University of North Texas, Denton (USA)
2018.08.25 Akousma@MUTEK, Le Vivier/Gesù, Montreal (CA)
2018.08.04 Micro and Macro, NAISA North Media Arts Centre, South River (CA)
2018.04.25 Premiere at Electrobelge, Brussels (Belgium)

This work explores the spectral fragmentation in space of a fountain’s sound, and its spectral recomposition. The extramusical idea is one of a wishing well from which we are hearing mysterious resonances of wishes still trapped inside it. First I did a multitrack recording of a fountain with the Holophone H2-PRO. Then, I tried to recreate with the IKO the original 7.1 recording. By processing each eight tracks with different effects, I was able to scatter the original image through different areas in space. Then, by bypassing progressively the effects, I reconstructed the image on a single location.

The piece follows this structure:
1) Spectral fragmentation with resonators. Exploration of slow spatial trajectories.
2) Reconstruction of the original fountain’s image.
3) Distorsion of the original sound. Articulated gestures. Exploration of rapid spatial trajectories.

At the end, I reconstructed the fountain’s image differently using only a mono source spread all around the IKO instead of using all eight tracks as I had done previously. I deliberately wanted the fountain to sound on an unnatural way in order to emphasize its magical characteristics. The wishes are still resonating there, waiting to be fulfilled...

2017.09.08 Premiere at IKO Concert, ICSA 2017, Graz (Austria)

Bacillus Chorus is the fourth movement of the Nano-Cosmos, a cycle of works dedicated to small arthropods and microorganisms. For this piece I was interested in bacteria - particularly their ability to multiply and modify their environment by working together. This led me to the idea of exploring musical polyphony as a bacterial colonization in which sounds duplicate by binary fission processes, contaminate each other, form bacterial chains, and slowly alter the properties of the entire work.

2019.07.19 Pre Visiones 4, CMMASMorelia (MX)
2019.04.11 Festival Genre Pas Genre, Université Paris VIII Saint-Denis (FR)
2019.01.22 Acousmatrix.e#7, Nîmes (FR)
2018.09.29 Mis-En Festival, Concert 3, New York City (USA)
2018.08.04 Micro and Macro, NAISA North Media Arts Centre, South River (CA)
2017.05.12 Elektro Arts, Cluj-Napoca (Romania)
2017.03.11 Cut & Splice Festival, Manchester (UK)
2016.12.03 Rainy Day Festival, Distractfold, Luxembourg (LU)
2016.10.21 Carte blanche François Bayle, Festival Influx, Bruxelles (BE)
2016.08.07 Premiere at 48° Internationale Ferienkurse für Neue Musik, Darmstadt (DE)

Diaphanous Acarina is the third movement of the Nano-Cosmos, a cycle of works dedicated to small arthropods and microorganisms. Typhlodromus Pyri are semi-transparent mites that live along the veins of vine leaves. The venation of the leaves is represented by longitudinal drones and the mites are depicted by composite-objects, as well as granular synthesis. Specific musical gestures are used to express their behaviour and different methods of proliferation. The swarm of mites evolves from an aquatic texture to distorted glitches. Extreme dynamic fluctuations represent the zooming in and out effects of a microscope, with its characteristic focus drift and sudden mechanical movements. Here and there, when we zoom in, we can hear the distinct voice of the Thyplodromus Pyri.

2018.08.04 Micro and Macro, NAISA North Media Arts Centre, South River (CA)
2016.06.14 Klang Copenhagen, Copenhague (DA)
2016.04.08 Experimental Sound Studio, Chicago (USA)
2016.04.05 Spectrum, New York (USA)
2015.05.08 UltraSons, Montréal (CA)
2015.03.20 Premiere at Distractfold Season 33, Manchester (UK)

This work is part of a 16-channel electroacoustic cycle called the Nano-Cosmos, a tribute to microorganisms and small arthropods. Collembolae (springtails) are small arthropods, some of them even as small as pixels. They travel through "windows" from the kitchen to the jungle. The work explores the notion of the “parasite” in music through the use of granular synthesis, glitch, micro-editing and random sound inlays. The work establishes a continuity between "texture-carried" structures ("individuals are subsumed in a collective activity") and "texture-setting" textures (“the basic framework within which individual gestures act") from Smalley's spectromorphological approach. In this work, these two structures are correlated to two different types of spatialization: immersive effects (creation of moving swarms with virtual sources) and a polyphony of localized sources (each physical speaker is considered as an individual). The 16-channel system is also used to create an aural version of Alice’s illusion: a “body swap” experience where scientists convince people that they are the size of a doll or a giant[1]. Inspired by the notion of this experience, I tried to alter the scale of familiar environments to make the audience members feel like they themselves are changing size, maybe even turning into the size of a springtail…

[1] Björn van der Hoort, Arvid Guterstam, et Henrik Ehrsson. « Being Barbie: the Size of One's Own Body Determines the Perceived Size of the World », Plos One, 6(5), 2011.

2017.05.19 Du son dans l'espace, Saint-Etienne (FR)
2016.01.21 UltraSons, Montréal (CA)
2015.07.18 The Engine Room Symposium, Londres (UK)
2015.05.11 to 2015.06.12 Premiere at The Engine Room Exhibition, Londres (UK)

This work is part of an 8 or 16 channel cycle called the Nano-Cosmos: a tribute to microorganisms and little arthropods. Akheta’s Blues explores the particles world. The title refers to the minimalist and repetitive song of Acheta Domestica, better known as the House Cricket, upon which the work’s structure is based. The piece was composed in 2013 at Studio Hexa, University of Montreal.

2019.03.20 Substrat 4, Satosphere, SAT, Montreal (CA)
2018.08.04 Micro and Macro, NAISA North Media Arts Centre, South River (CA)
2017.11.30 Carte Blanche Daniel Perez Hajdu, Espace Senghor, Brussels (BE)
2017.05.19 Du son dans l'espace, Saint-Etienne (FR)
2016.06.01 CIRMMT Student Symposium, Montreal (CA)
2016.01.20 UltraSons, Montréal (CA)
2015.11.05 MUSLAB, Buenos Aires (AR)
2015.03.28 Distractfold/Audiorama, Stockholm (SE)
2015.03.01 Mantis Festival, Manchester (UK)
2015.01.29 Internationale Gesellschaft für Neue Musik, Basel (CH)
2014.06.07 New York City Electroacoustic Music Festival, New york (USA)
2014.01.28 Elektroakoestisch Logos Tetrahedron, Ghent (BE)
2013.10.04 to 2013.10.05 Digital Art and Music Festival, Kentucky (USA)
2013.08.29 Premiere at Distractfold Season 11, Manchester (UK)

Rematch of a badminton game from a former piece composed several years ago. Unpredictable action’s game, surprise effects, turnaround, anticipation versus reaction, high serve, low serve, attacking clear, drop shot, net shot, smash, slice, backhand play… the game’s rhythm becomes the music’s rhythm.

2017.11.30 MUSLab Tour 2017, Rio de Janeiro (BR)
2017.10.22 MUSLab Tour 2017, Mexico City (MX)
2016.10.21 Carte blanche François Bayle, Festival Influx, Bruxelles (BE)
2015.05.28 Premiere at Festival Monaco Electroacoustique 2015, Monaco (MO)

Inspirée du mouvement surréaliste, “La Lechuga” est une pièce qui met en scène une laitue dans toute la splendeur de sa trivialité. Le point de départ du projet est l'enregistrement d'une laitue romaine et de comédiens qui réagissent à la vue du légume. La pièce explore les différents degrés d'écoute, le timbre de la voix et la morphologie des mots en Espagnol. L'histoire sonore décrit tour à tour d'étranges transformations de la laitue, suscitant de la curiosité, de l'attirance, jusqu'à la peur. "La lechuga, ¿Qué es eso?” Qu'est-ce que c'est? Laissez les personnages vous le conter… (Narrateurs: Ida Toninato et Alfredo Mendoza)

2015.09.20 L'audible Festival, Instants Chavirés, Bagnolet (FR)
2014.12.11 Air Album Release Kohlenstoff Records, Akousma-Conservatoire Musique Montréal, Montreal (CA)
2013.11.27 Festival Manca, Nice (FR)
2011.11.18 Sound In Space Competition, Boston (USA)
2011.08.26 Festival Futura, Crest (FR)
2011.06.18 KM Pantin Saison 2011, Médiathèque Marguerite Duras, Paris (FR)
2011.01.??. Premiere at E-buzz, Montreal (CA)