CD – Galerie Weisser Elefant

Éliane Radigue is a French composer, who was one of the first artists to make use of analog synthetizers, experimenting with other aspects of electroacoustic and minimalist music. The Galerie Weisser Elefant organized a well-deserved tribute to the composer and called on several important artists, including Alva Noto, Schloss Mirabell, Robert Lippok and Band Ane. The album begins with the master Carsten Nicolai, who in 4 minutes and 15 seconds is able to instill a feeling of relative quietness, by marking the passage of time with an elegant, meditative and controlled airiness. The second track is performed by another artist based in Berlin, Schloss Mirabell, a classic musician always interested in contemporary developments, who tends to create connections between experimental arts and science. At the Galerie Weisser Elefant event, the sounds could be mixed by the visitors and other records were also available, some of them playable at different speeds. Carsten Nicolai called this installation “construction kit noto ∞”, but on demand the visitors could also listen to a piece Radigue composed in 1973, ”Biogenesis”, when she recorded with a microphone and a stethoscope the sounds from the belly of her daughter and the heartbeat of her future grandchild. The sounds of the other installations and objects are mixed and crossed together in the music by Radigue. Similarly, in Nicolai’s space there are some other surprising frequencies, overlapped or just created. The dark and drone composition by Robert Lippok, ”Ero1”, is irreproachable, as is the charming score by Band Ane, a Danish composer and performer, who performed here a short but dreamy and suggestive track. On January 24th 2020, Éliane Radigue celebrated her 88th birthday. In her last composition, the fearless musician got back to more traditional instruments, but this doesn’t really change the impact of her journey and her search for a vivid contemporaneity.