Elevations is an installation inspired by dub techno, a musical genre that originated in Berlin in the 1990s (1). Dub-techno crosses minimal techno with Jamaican dub, from which it derives the use of massive delay effects. Because of its foggy aesthetic, its harmonic simplicity and its micro-variations in motifs, dub-techno is akin to the melancholy of the end of a party, when the bodies relax, the moment when the night gives way to the day. That is perhaps why researcher Alessio Kolioulis described this style of music as a “hybrid futuristic nostalgia (2)”
Elevations stages this specific time-space through a formal and poetic translation: the musical material is no longer the product of synthetic sounds, but of the pipes of a computer-controlled organ. This instrument – made especially for this installation by the Belgian organ builder Tony Decap – is designed as an eight-meter long row and takes centre stage in the space. Each of the pipes can be controlled individually, multiplying the possibilities: the organ can produce complex harmonic masses, as well as fragile respirations. The impact of this long row of organ pipes and the sound amplification of the instrument, plunges the audience into an immersive sonic environment, where the acoustic and the electronic are indistinguishable.
The scenography consists of 3 light bulbs slowly rotating by way of an old-fashioned mobile. The set is a careful balance between a number of elements: high-tech and low-tech, deep darkness and bright light, slow and fast, high and low. Interactive media control the movements of the mobile and the brightness of the light bulbs. The scenography fits seamlessly with the instrument and the music: a classical organ played by digital media and robotics.
The instrument and scenography play independently, humans are no longer involved. The machines replace humans in one of the last places we would hope to be irreplaceable, acoustic music. The ensemble breathes the atmosphere of an almost deserted, early afterparty, where people don’t know why they are still there, there is no reason to stay, but no reason to leave either.
(1) The title “Elevations” pays homage to one of dub-techno’s major works produced by the artist René Lowe, better known under the pseudonym Vainqueur, released in 1996 on the label Chain Reaction
(2) Alessio Kolioulis, “Borderlands: Dub Techno’s Hauntological Politics of Acoustic Ecology.” Dancecult: Journal of Electronic Dance Music Culture 7, no. 2 (2015): 64-85
Elevations (in collaboration with Kris Verdonck)
Concept & composition: Maxime Denuc
Scenography & dramaturgy: Kris Verdonck
Organ building: Tony Decap, Seppe Verbist – Pipes from Manufacture d’orgues Thomas.
Computer programming: Xavier Meeus
Light: Daniel Romero Calderon, Thomas Glorieux
Sound: Harry Charlier
Thanks to Yves Rechsteiner, Andre Thomas & Kristof Van Baarle
Production: A Two Dogs Company (Brussels), Le Ring-Scène périphérique (Toulouse)
Coproduction: STUK (Leuven), KANAL- Centre Pompidou (Brussels), Le Lieu Unique (Nantes), Centre Henri Pousseur (Liège). With the help of Federation Wallonie-Bruxelles, DRAC Occitanie, Region Occitanie, SACEM. A production in the frame of a residency at A two Dogs Company.