In this section, I will describe resonance as a physical phenomenon and the idea of emotional resonance. Finally, I place “Rooms of Resonance” in a sociological relation, and the perspectives this artistic project has opened.
Physical resonance:
Resonance is a physical phenomenon that occurs when an object is exposed to a vibrating influence that has a frequency that almost or fully corresponds to the object's natural frequency or eigenfrequency. When this happens, an exponential quantity of energy accumulates and the object starts to vibrate on a disproportionate higher level. It is possible to calculate how and when resonance occurs, which is an approach I decided not to go for in this project. When discussing if I should invest time and money on measuring resonance, Martin T Andersen, PhD and physicist at Hottinger Brüel & Kjær (world renowned company for sound measurement) said: the combination of this technology and your human brain and musical skills, is stronger than any computer.
So, my approach has been hands-on: I attached the drivers on an object that seemed to vibrate well, and then – through my improvisations – searched to find which frequencies triggered the object to resonate in the most inspiring manner. Sometimes it was playing a tone which is similar to a sine tone, and most often it was a combination of many frequencies that created the most interesting sound and resonance; for instance, the previous mentioned multifaceted polyphony that occurs at 16:40 on "En verden, der melder sig", where I play two clarinets at the same time, while also singing/humming.
Emotional resonance:
"It resonates with me" is a common way to express that we relate to something or someone, or rephrased with a terminology from physics; we experience our eigenfrequency being activated. In this chapter, I want to share some of the artists that resonate with me in this project, a topic that also could be named "context."
I have been a part of the Danish music education system since I was seven years old. After I learnt how my instrument basically worked, I spent countless hours imitating my musical heroes as well as being a dedicated student. I thought and felt this educational approach helped me develop my musical voice, which to some extent it did. I will leave a deeper discussion of that topic for now, but my point in this regard is: The more skills and knowledge I gained as a musician, the stronger my desire became to develop my own personal musical language. Consequently, I started to focus more on creating my own distinct output instead of imitating others. So, now my goal is to create works that balance between tradition and an inner urge to express and share a personal perspective. I strive to make my works an aesthetic innovation, which many listeners often experience and respond to as being avant-garde. That is why it resonated with me, when Elof Westergaard quoted Per Kirkeby for stating that: "there's a lot of avant-garde in tradition." Composer and musicologist Larry Sitsky has written that we need to distinguish between modernism and avant-gardism, where the latter is known for purposely provoking the audience. He would probably claim that my music belongs to modernism. To me, modernism is even narrower in its original meaning, which means that it is hard to objectively label music that is new in its expression, but not intentionally meant to provoke. To me, avant-garde can be used in a transdisciplinary sense for something, which pushes existing boundaries, and therefore requires the listener to be open to something new. With that in mind, I see my work as a part of an avant-garde scene, which is rooted in tradition.
What is my tradition, then? As I see it, my reed playing and improvisations could be summed up as inspirations from Danish folklore (Carl Nielsen, Thomas Laub, etc.), North American jazz (Coleman Hawkins, Eric Dolphy, John Coltrane, John Carter etc.), European free jazz (Evan Parker, Sven-Aake Johansson, Peter Brötzmann etc.), non-Danish folklore (Gnawa, Pygmy, Sufi etc.) and electronic music (Else Marie Pade, Eliane Radigue, William Basinski, Loscil, Colin Stetson etc.). To me, all these artists share a sense of mysticism and spirituality, and I am generally drawn to music that conveys a sensory experience.
In 2012, I moved to New York and was advised to take lessons with Sophia Rosoff, a classical piano teacher who mainly taught how to express a clear and personal musical vision. At the audition, I was asked by her helper to unpack my saxophone in the lobby, and just go in and play the piece I had prepared. So, we never spoke, I just started playing a jazz standard called "All of Me" - a Broadway tune that I thought this old lady would relate to. When I was done, she said; "Why are you playing that tune? You don't sound like it. You sound like pine trees, waves and open landscapes." What she did not know was that she had just perfectly described the landscapes I was surrounded by as a child. I was mind blown, and was accepted as her student. One of the exercises was to imitate specific sounds from my childhood such as water, or the wind in the pine trees and adapt it as a conscious layer in my music, just like I had done with my musical heroes. My musical voice had never developed so fast before I started practicing how to resonate with myself through music. Later I learnt that many composers like Per Nørgaard, Arvo Pärt, Sofia Gubaidulina and George Crumb also sought inspiration in the acoustics of their childhood. This approach does that I as clarinet player, is mostly interested in developing a musical vocabulary from all kinds of sounds and acoustics I resonate with, than a specific clarinet-curriculum. I never transcribed a clarinet solo or tried to play a classical composition; I spend my practice time on evoking an abstract echo from my past. This has made me work on different extended techniques, where especially circular breathing is important, as it allows me to sustain a note, while breathing in. A more self-made method is a way to listen and react to my acoustic output: I play a note and then try to divide into as many elements as possible; primary tone, overtones, air, spit, tounging, pad sounds, finger sounds, singing. Suddenly one note becomes like a synthesizers note consisting of different oscillators and filters, which I visualize as different parameters I can mix and adjust separately. It is a way of thinking and playing that I have developed after working on music through electronics and also listening to electronic music. It is a sort of acoustic post-electronic approach to improvisation, which is an approach I hear many places on the European contemporary music scene (The International Nothing, Susana Santos Silva, Axel Dörner, Magda Mayas, Isak Hedtjärn, Kaja Draksler a.o).
Audio drivers are widely used by a variety of artists. I will now mention some I have come across, both locally, which to me is Scandinavia, and also globally.
In Scandinavia, I have been inspired by Rune Glerup (contemporary composition), Jacob Kirkegaard (sound art installations), Ditte Rønn Poulsen (sound art installations), Ditlev Brinth (scenography), Marie Koldkjær Højlund (scenography), Jenny Graff (tactile feedback systems), Eirik Havnes (sound art installations) and Øyvind Brandtsegg (sound art installations). In terms of Scandinavian artists who apply transducers in an acoustic, live and improvised setup I know of Adam Pultz-Melbye mainly, who works with feedback systems, Ingar Zach who amplifies pre-recorded sounds through his instruments with transducers, and finally Gunhild Mathea Husvik-Olaussen whose work I will describe a little more thoroughly in the next section.
I have been influenced by a wide range of artists, outside of Scandinavia, to mention a few: Samson Young, Leandre Brass, Laurie Andersson, Bill Viola, Sergei Tcherepnin, Jonah Freeman & Justin Love, Cory Smythe, Tuomas Fränti, Haroon Mirzka, Florian Hecker, Camille Norment, Susan Philipsz, Christine Sun Kim. Each artist has, in my opinion, a unique and outstanding musical output, which in various ways relates to amplifying sound through objects. I know that there are many more, but I have deliberately not attempted to carry out overly comprehensive research, but rather spend time on developing my own setup.
Resonance as a societal perspective:
Hartmut Rosa, Professor in sociology at Friedrich Schiller Universität, has written many leading books on this topic, which on a perspective level have been a great inspiration. I also had the chance to hear and meet him in October 2020, in Ribe. Here is an extremely short introduction to his disturbingly relevant, thorough and widely praised research: Rosa states through empirical anthropological research that acceleration is the only way to maintain stability in our modern western society. We live in a society that constantly needs to increase its efficiency on all levels, in order to keep up with the accelerating pace. To cope with this, we strive to control the world – to conquer the world in all aspects. But this level of control is not maintainable in all aspects of life, which consequently leaves us with a feeling of being isolated, stressed and unconsciously incapable of experiencing cohesion with the world. This made Rosa ask: "If acceleration is the problem, then perhaps resonance is the solution?” As a way to accept reality, by consciously seeking to experience cohesion with the world. The difficulty with incorporating resonance is that it has two implications: first, we cannot decide when resonance occurs and secondly; resonance is unpredictable in its results.
Before I read the books, I felt and described that this transducer-setup gave me experiences of a strong cohesion with the world. Reading and hearing Rosa, while developing this project has empowered my vision and motivated me to develop this project from being an artistic research project, to becoming an overall method to engage people in listening and being. It has helped me to see how a contemporary approach to music and listening, also can be useful on a societal level. Not that I have found a societal solution in this project, but I have qualified a new artistic question: what are the potentials in creating resonating musical experiences, on a societal and musical level?
In this artistic research project, I have managed to only focus on the artistic potentials in my solo improvisations in a room with objects that are brought into vibration. While doing this, I have found a number of new potentials, which I will now try to transfer into works that include and hopefully resonate with other people.
During this artistic research project, I was given the opportunity to pursue answers to this question in the future: I was invited by The Danish Art Council and Holstebro Municipality, to formulate a strategy for how I could develop my artistic practice in ways that would be relevant on an artistic and societal level. I presume that I was invited because, in addition to this research project, I have created numerous comprehensive artistic projects where I have involved and engaged a selection of citizens/amateurs. As a contemporary composer I am interested in this because I find that the sound of the imperfect is rich and relevant. Music has in many ways become professionalized, which has the benefit that it often sounds very balanced, but has the long-term downside is that we build a listening culture where the sound of amateurs, or simply someone who is practicing and learning, is unconsciously perceived as incorrect by many. And then we have created technology that “professionalizes” our sound by having auto-tune, quantization etc. I am not advocating for less technology or professional musicians, but as a contemporary composer I find it inspiring and relevant to embrace and work with the sound of the imperfect, or should I say, human.
The challenging part about this approach is to compose music that is manageable and motivating for the musicians to play and also interesting to experience, for everybody. Using drivers could be a way of doing this – sending their audio to selected vibrating objects and in that way letting the amateurs sonically ignite a room, through a composition. This creates an immersive and almost unescapable way to listen and it makes the situation very site-specific. This approach also causes the listeners to be less prone to compare or expect the music to sound as it usually does, and therefore increases the chances that the listeners are open for a resonating experience.
From these thoughts I wrote a strategy for establishing a new musical platform which has been granted funding for 2021-23 from The Danish Art Council and Holstebro Kommune. In short, this platform aims to create projects that develops innovative musical formats, which at the same time involve citizens in the process and works.