Neon (1999), 10m00s
Neon is the third and final piece in a cycle of works that are based on the book (“Owning your own shadow - Understanding the dark side of the psyche”) by Robert A. Johnson. One of the ideas examined by Johnson explores the place in human consciousness where light and dark touch, the edge where miracles occur.
In Neon the microcosm of human consciousness is elevated to an environmental scale. The creation of the divine thus takes shape in the exterior world when opposites touch such as matter/animatter, illumination/darkness, searing heat/glacial cold. The discourse of the piece concerns itself with the application of these ideas to the sound world by translating into sound such themes as: the friction and turmoil between these sets of poles, the ensuing collisions and the moments of beauty that these encournters produce.
Human presence manifests itself in this sonic vista by way of a series of high-pitched sounds. These occur throughout the piece as iterations, sustained tones, those with a melodic profile or those encased in a more complex harmonic structure. Concretely, these sounds at once striate the work and bind it together. Symbolically, this material functions as the bright light of human consciousness.
Much of the sound material for Neon was composed in the studio GMEM in Marseilles. Parts if this piece were mixed in the studios at City University, London. The final mix was complete in the composer’s studio in Brussels.
Performances
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Neon