One line

Chaya Czernowin: IMMATERIAL

for 6 amplified voices
I. A Book of Madrigals and Intermezzos
II. A Sound Theater

(2021)

Immaterial is the final part of the triptych »Vena« and itself consists of the two parts A book of Madrigals and Intermezzos and Sound theater. The piece is an experiment on the question of what happens when the voice is detached from its affectedness. What happens when the voice is just a sound, or the essence of an emotion, or a color, a movement, a line? The main part of Immaterial is an imagined, immaterial »sound theater«: the sensory drama of the madrigals becomes a wordless, storyless theater, where pure sensations and modulations in sensory perception from visual sound to felt sound encourage the audience to become their own storytellers.

 

In this work I try to find out what happens when the voice is released from its role. What happens when the voice is a sound, or the essence of an emotion, or a color, a movement, a line. The main part is an imaginary, immaterial sound theater, where the sensory drama of the madrigals becomes a deep underwater theater. Pure sensations and modulations between visual sound and felt sound create a provocation and allow listeners to become their own storytellers.

(Chaya Czernowin)

 

World premiere on February 2, 2022 at ECLAT Festival Neue Musik with the Neue Vocalsolisten.
Commissioned by Musik der Jahrhunderte, financed by the Ernst von Siemens Music Foundation.