Graphic scores can be so beautiful as graphics, and also, sometimes, so very evocative as scores. I agree with the idea mentioned by @XHG that the main use of a score of any type is to allow music players to perform what the composer was imagining. In the case of a graphic score the directions are more ambiguous than a traditionally notated score. Thus we have all the beautiful interpretations submitted for this Junto, so varied, yet all inspired in some way by the same beautiful score by Franziska Baumann.

I don't know how to read western notation, and I can't play the piano, but I tried to perform the piece I imagined based on this score live with a grand piano patch from Roli's Equator while sending into FX in my modular which I tweaked to produce the echoes and scratchy fills which were responding to the pitches and levels of the performance in real time. I also used some plug-ins to shape the sound in Pro Tools. Modular FX included resonance, filters, PLL, modulators, delays. Pro Tools plug-ins included EQ, dynamics, tremolo, delay, and mastering tools.

So, after practicing and a lot of parameter tweaking, I recorded an improvisation of 35 short performance bursts, trying to capture the clusters of kinetic energy in the score, along with its layers and ambiguities and interconnections.

In the end I felt I needed to tighten up the spaces between the clusters after recording. Then quick mastering, and here you are..

Thanks to Mark, Tobias, and Franziska!

=========================================

More on the 654th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Just Notation — The Assignment: Interpret a graphic score by Franziska Baumann — at https://disquiet.com/0654/ 2

The cover image for this project is a detail of a graphic score, titled True Glimpses 1, by Franziska Baumann, used with her permission and the support of Musikfestival Bern. More on Baumann at franziskabaumann.ch 7.

Just Glimpses zoundsabar disquiet0654

Solar Winds - piano, cello and electronics
Ian-Elfinn Rosiu (cello), Quentin Meurisse (piano), Martin Loridan (electronics).
Recorded Live @ Festival-Mosaïques 2025

Solar Winds is an immersive sound experience. Prepared piano and cello are both acoustic sources and sound projection media, creating unexpected fusions between amplified and electronic instrumental textures. The vibrant sounds of the Earth's magnetic field and the powerful sounds of solar particle winds appear and mingle directly with the body and wood of the prepared instruments through active amplification and diffusion and projection devices.

Solar Winds est une immersion sonore. Piano et violoncelle préparés sont à la fois des sources acoustiques et supports de projection sonores, créant des fusions inattendues entre  textures instrumentales amplifiées et électroniques. Les sons vibrants du champ magnétique terrestre, ceux, puissants, des vents de particules solaires, apparaissent et se mêlent directement au corps et au bois des instruments préparés à travers des dispositifs d'amplification, diffusion et projection actifs.

Solar Winds déploie un dispositif d’amplification-spatialisation complexe, développant le principe de l'instrument actif pour deux instruments en dialogue (violoncelle et piano). Des microphones et enceintes de vibration positionnent l'amplification et la diffusion au sein même des deux instruments, permettant à chaque interprète de maîtriser, grâce à un système spécifiquement conçu, sa propre diffusion, tant interne – sur le corps de son instrument, qu'externe – vers le corps de l'autre instrument. L'intégration exclusive de dispositifs amplificateurs actifs par contact sur les deux instruments brouille la frontière entre acoustique et électronique, entre réel et augmenté. 

L'archet du violoncelle est également activé par la "greffe" d'un capteur piézoélectrique, qui, à travers le bois (et le jeu col legno) amplifie l'ensemble de l'instrument, situant ainsi la source de l'amplification simultanément sur la table d'harmonie et sur l'archet, conférant à l'activation une versatilité appliquée tant à l'instrument qu'à son mode d'excitation. Pour le piano, le microphone de contact devient un instrument de frottement-déclenchement, révélant sous un jour nouveau les moindres reliefs des composantes de l'instrument.

Dans ce contexte, l'électronique devient un élément fusionnel, se confondant avec le son acoustique amplifié. Les différentes sonorités diffusées dans le piano (captations NASA de vents solaires, champ magnétiques terrestres, sons blancs et granulés) fusionnent avec le discours musical dans le cœur même des instruments. Le phénomène de retour acoustique (larsen) est exploité, contrôlé, tantôt déployé dans sa dimension sauvage, tantôt intégré comme élément expressif.

Solar Winds (2025) - piano, cello and electronics

Martin Loridan is a composer and Professor at the Royal Conservatoire of Brussels.

His works are regularly performed in Europe and beyond by internationally renowned performers such as Claude Delangle, Rohan de Saram, the Arditti Quartet, the ensembles Klangforum Wien, Fractales, Mise-en. His work has been awarded prestigious international prizes, such as the Reinl Foundation Prize (Vienna), the André Jolivet Prize (Paris), the Vareler Prize (Berlin).

He graduated from the Paris Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique (CNSM) where he obtained four prizes in harmony, counterpoint, fugue and forms, and 20th/21st-century composition. He is currently completing a PhD at the University of Leeds, UK, thanks to prestigious academic grants and awards such as the Stanley Burton Research Scholarship and the Leeds Doctoral Scholarship. He is also the recipient of the Art Research Fund (Fonds de la recherche en Arts FRArt) by the National Fund for Scientific Research, Belgium (FNRS).

His doctoral research is an investigation into air and breath (‘souffle’) as a composition material. His research has led him to the study of traditional music (Villa Salammbô residence with the support of the French Institute in Tunis) and the development of new instrumental hybridizations: extended pedal system renewing the possibilities of the piano; works for the Naylute, a new hybrid instrument between the Arabic Nay and the Western flute; application of electric guitar pedalboards systems to other instruments such as the accordion. In these different contexts, he could develop the main axes of his research: the 'tactility' of breath (souffle) and its double human and instrumental resonance; the porosity of air (as a sound material) and its development within orchestral forces and electronic expansions in amplified works.

His scores are published by BabelScores.

New tracks tagged #AUGMENTED PIANO