'Dissolving Clarinet Loops' / RBI
DJ and producer RBI releases an extended stereo version of her multi channel sound art work “Dissolving Clarinet Loops”
While known for her hard-hitting industrial techno production and DJ mixes, 2019 saw RBI create “Dissolving Clarinet Loops” - a meditative exploration of sound and noise. It featured on Naarm’s Northbank three times a day for four months. We have an exclusive recording of the extended stereo version before it is released on Bandcamp tomorrow. Listen below:
The eerie and transcendental piece was largely influenced by the American composer Alvin Lucier, whose creative process revolves around recording sounds over and over again into a space, forcing resonant frequencies to overlay such that the difference between sound and noise becomes indistinct. RBI expands on her influences:
“When I was creating this work, I wanted to choose a sound source that would be coupled well with this [Alvin Lucier/William Basinki] process, I needed a sample that would resonate with me musically.
I am very inspired by the work of 20th century french composer Gerald Grisey who was a pioneer of exploration in spectral music. A lot of Grisey’s work explores the spectrum of tone colour between harmonic overtones and noise, and where he often explored the slow up-folding of musical concepts.
I also have a deep love for the Finnish composer Kajia Saariaho who also explores spectral composition coupled so elegantly with idiosyncratic instrumental music. Saariaho explores extended clarinet techniques in her works Duft and D'Om le Vrai Sens, which I was listening to a lot and were inspirations for me at the time when I wrote this piece…”
The ~40 minute piece revolves around a breathy clarinet tone multiplying over itself whose essence resides at the intersection between spectral minimalist music and Lucier’s acoustic processing methods.
“The extended techniques I employed for this piece were simple comparatively however I wanted to capture a tone and atmosphere that was unique to the instrument. I layered overtones and breath notes.
Lucier’s slow evolving work submerges the listener into a world of new sounds unique to the room that it was recorded in. I find this process of slow evolving change and subtle timbral changes to be magical once you have the patience to be absorbed by it.”
Keenly, the space and atmosphere of the place of recording has also impacted the creative output of RBI’s work. RBI recorded at the Signal building influenced by the faint echo of trains that built themselves into the harmonic makeup of the piece, which is heard more acutely in the extended stereo version.
Currently RBI is working on her debut EP, having recently finished APRA’s Women in Music mentoring program where she was mentored by Andy Garvey. RBI is set to start another mentoring program later this year facilitated by the Australian Independent Record Labels Association.
Stay up to date with RBI on their website, Facebook, Instagram and Soundcloud
Header image and accompanying photos by Briana Davis
Article by Margarita Bassova
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