Trance map

Trance Map researches the ways in which improvisation, sampling technology and soundscape design can be brought together to create an extended CD-length project and live performance of over an hour. The sonic materials of the project consist of:

i) manipulated recordings of Parker’s soprano saxophone
ii) samples of Wright’s extended turntable techniques
iii) fragments of found sound culled from Parker’s cassette and vinyl
collection.

Specifically, the research process involved the frequency and envelope analysis of ‘environmental’ samples of cicadas, birds and frogs and from this analysis, Wright designed filtered or time stretched manipulations of Parker’s saxophone improvisations and his own turntable ‘scratching’ that were modeled upon the frequency content and rhythmic accelerandi/decelerandi inherent in the original samples. This research gave Wright the compositional materials with which to mix freely from the live processing of saxophone and turntable improvisation to structured soundscape design and back again, sometimes deliberately blurring the line between the two. This concentrated research led to the development of an extended compositional structure and an eventual CD recording, but also of an open-form language for live improvisation. Therefore, whilst most improvisers build a shared language over a long series of performances, resulting perhaps in an eventual studio recording, in the case of Trance Map, the language was meticulously constructed in the studio environment and the CD release functioned as the beginning of a process of dissemination via performances in the UK, Holland, Belgium and France. When Trance Map is presented live in public, new material is recorded in real-time and mixed into the original structure, thus extending the potential density of the contrapuntal thinking, but also adding greater subtlety to the hinterland between ‘organic’ and ‘digital’ sound sources.