Ploutôn - 2010 - 25’00
Ploutôn - The Book of Minerals.
A Composition for 43 Loudspeakers.
Specially created for the Zirkonium ZKM Germany.
A 25 minute electronic tape composition specially composed for the ZKM Zirkonium and commissioned by the Performing Arts Fund of the Netherlands (NFPK+)
‘Hades’ well known for being King of the lower world, is often forgotten by one of his other names: ‘Ploutôn’, which links him with the world of Minerals and Ores.
Actually, he rules over everything that exists beneath us: the ground. So, this links him directly to the other meaning of his name ‘Ploutôn’: wealth. – Yes, it’s all his.
His wealth is nowadays our wealth, but for how long? With our ever increasing hunger for Minerals and Ores, his Kingdom gets plundered of his richness.
For the composition ‘Ploutôn’, I looked at a more hidden treasure of his world: Minerals and their structures.
Music parameters used in this piece are obtained in an analogy from the world of Minerals. Elements combined into minerals create sounds and chords, generated by a specially created computer program: AudioLAB2 (written in C/C++). Positioning in space and movements of the sound find there origin in the structure of the Crystals and are positioned in the auditorium space by the special ZKM-Zirkonium software.
The Composition is configured in eight separate parts, according to the classification of all Minerals.
I Elements.
II Sulfides.
III Halogens.
IV Oxides and Hydro-oxides.
V Nitrates, Carbonates and Borates.
VI Sulfates, Chromates, Molybdates and Wolframates.
VII Phosphates, Arsenates en Vanadates.
VIII Silicates.
The timeline of the whole structure of this composition is derived from the famous Kimberley mine of South Africa (The depth of every mineshaft is the ratio for the length of the specific part).
The whole piece could be seen as a short - 25 minute - visit into a mine.
All DSP Software and composition software, recording, soundprocessing editing and postprocessing: Michèl Koenders.
Commissioned by: ‘NFPK+’
Has been performed at the ZKM in the Qube performance place for the ARD Höhrspieltagen (13th November 2010.)
© 2010 ZKM
Screendumps Classbrowser AudioLAB2
