"Aethernal Score’’, Aisha Devi’s commission for the BBC Concert Orchestra, is an attempt to intensify the vibrational capacities of the orchestra and divert the expected course of classical-electronic collaboration. Devi has always used her art to push against cultural presumptions, so it made sense to assemble the initial framework for the piece from some of her acclaimed back catalogue, meshing it with new compositions and reworking everything with orchestral elements that follow Devi's radical metaphysical and theoretical guidelines. It's best described as a twenty-minute "mixtape" that embodies the connections between the concert hall, the club and the sacred ritual - or even a demonstration of the orchestra's hidden potential.

Inspired by her Himalayan heritage, Devi has been exploring the entrancing sonic application of monastic practices such as throat singing for many years, as well as developing psychoacoustic methods. This led her to perceive sound as a way of expanding brain activity - something that also plays a shrouded role in the world of chamber music. Applying this to the orchestra, she began thinking about each instrument as a discrete frequency range, searching for its ethereal properties rather than fixating on an object saddled with cultural baggage. Using the density, amplitude and vibrational impact of the sounds in unison, Devi was able to summon the club environment, seizing that space's inherent power - Devi was making orchestral rave.

Two versions of the score are included on the release, one orchestrated in collaboration with Robert Ames and conducted by André de Ridder, performed on October 29, 2021 with the BBC Concert Orchestra at Queen Elizabeth Hall which was commissioned by Elizabeth Alker for Unclassified Live, and the purely electronic version - the synthetic backbone of the composition. Both are very different, and listened to together highlight the transformative power of instrumentation. The result is like a purge of history and hierarchy, with tools of colonization hollowed-out and fashioned into new shapes. A clash of grandeur and sensitivity, and a live deconstruction of the artistic ego, "Aethernal Score" is transcendent re-evaluation of classical and electronic sounds that doesn't just make you think, it makes you resonate.

Mastered and cut by Matt Colton at Metropolis.

Aïsha Devi - Aethernal Binaural [excerpt]

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Aïsha Devi - Aethernal Binaural [excerpt]

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