Play with me! – an interactive sound performance

Duration: approximately 30 minutes

Play with me! was first presented in April 2019 during a concert in La Senne in Brussels.

Play with me! is an intimate sonic experiment, growing out of my desire to blur the borders between creator and audience.

The aim is to reveal my sonic experience of the world to other people while allowing them to play with this experience and rearrange it in any way they see fit. The public's role is just as important as the role as the artist, both of them together becoming a momentary co-creator. It is a piece that only exists in the presence of its public.

The core idea is an improvisation between myself and the public, using two distinct sound controllers, one of which is reserved exclusively to be used by members of the audience. The equipment used by the public is an Ableton Push. Each pad of the controller is labelled with a description of the sound it will play when pushed.

The controller can be used by more than one person at a time, inviting thus the members of the audience to collaborate not only with me but also between themselves.

The public will have access to approximately forty different recorded sounds, grouped in eight categories (base sounds, effects, ambiances, musical instruments, human voices, etc.). They are well calibrated beforehand, in order to avoid a too violent accumulation of sound.

The recordings used are exclusively part of the my library of personal recordings.

The performance is structured in three parts:

Part one: Introduction

I am facing the public, behind me, half hidden from view by my body, are the controllers that are going to be used during the second part of the performance.

A pre-recorded sound piece containing the explanation for the audience is played through the speakers. It presents the premises of the performance as well as some (very simple) technical details that the audience should be aware of when interacting with me. It is an invitation to explore the sonic world of another person hands on.

The voice narrating the explanation is my own.

Throughout the introduction I will be facing the public. The first phrase of the introduction, Hello, I am happy to see you all, immediately connects, in the mind of the public, my presence to the voice that is coming out of the speakers. I have decided to use a pre-recorded explanation because I believe that the contrast between a still live figure and a voice coming from another part of the room is much more powerful than an ordinary speech, which is, in the case of the performer not being a trained actor, or trained speaker, bound to have mistakes and lack depth.

During the explanatory piece I will try to make eye contact with as many of the members of the audience as I can.

Part two: The participatory piece

Once the explanation is over, I move away, revealing the controller that will be exclusively used by the public. On the other side of the desk, facing the audience, I will manipulate another set of sounds, responding to whatever the people exploring the given recordings do.

This creates a dialogue between creator and audience (and it also gives me some control over the sonic result of the audience and me together, to shape it into something coherent when necessary).

At a given moment, which will be decided by assessing the mood of the audience and the overall result, I will cover the pads of the controller with a piece of paper on which the word STOP will be written. As experienced before, during try-outs and in concerts, it is a quite effective and non intrusive way of informing the audience that their part has come to an end.

I will then proceed to turn the sounds off, one by one, leaving only those that I will use during the third part of the performance.

Part three: Solo live set

In the last ten minutes I will be performing a live sound set having as starting point the recordings used previously by the audience. The choice of ending with a well structured piece was necessary in order to round up the sonic experience and give it cohesion. It will also allow the audience to better understand my own interpretation of the recordings and perhaps give them a better understanding of why they were chosen for this project.

Personal observations

I have been experimenting the consequences of Play with me! in several settings. In group gatherings and one on one sessions in my studio, as well as in concert, with a larger audience. What I find most striking about this project is its unpredictable nature. During one on one settings people tend to be very careful of their choices of sounds, and their focus on listening is undeniably heightened. In a larger group I found that some people impose themselves as leaders, while others tend to take on secondary roles. It is also interesting to note the fact that, outside of a one on one setup, people tend to forget completely about the artist that provided the experiment and start focusing entirely on their sonic experience and their own curiosity.