dúo, a collaboration between Alicia Champlin and me, is an improvisation for bow chime (sometimes also called a steel cello , even though there are subtle differences) and live coding on an multi-channel setup. In play, the broad acoustic vocabulary of the bow chime is picked up with a single microphone in the room, to then be manipulated, layered and spatialized on the multi-channel setup through live coding, blending the two in a dialog between pure vibration and processed sound.
The performance is inspired both by cymbal baths, a kind of sound bath with a more meditative focus, as well as performances involving room resonance and feedback loops, such as the concepts by the late, great Alvin Lucier. Feedback from the loudspeakers, room resonances and background noise, including noises and utterances by the audience, are invariably picked up by the microphone. This augments and blends with the deeply resonant sound of the bow chime, creating a grand, sometimes unpredictable but beautiful feedback loop between performers, space and audience.
Using live coding (in Mégra, an abstract, high-level language) to manipulate the sound allows to interact and improvise through concise code gestures, while sharing the thought process with the audience through projecting the code. The language embraces a certain degree of non-determinism, and also allows the performers to lean back and listen to the sound unfolding.
Four instances of the project have been performed so far: