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Reflections on Performing Éliane Radigue's OCCAM I

2023; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 42; Issue: 5-6 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1080/07494467.2024.2348278

1477-2256

Rhodri Davies,

Musicology and Musical Analysis

In this paper, I will look at the collaborative aspects of the composition and the rehearsal process involved in making OCCAM I, and how the piece sits within the context of my solo harp commissioning project (2002–). I will discuss how Éliane Radigue's compositional method intersects with my improvisational practice, and how the performance techniques that I have developed and my particular relationship to the harp function as compositional material. I will highlight some of the technical challenges of performing her pieces—stamina, double bowing, refinement of techniques, timing, listening, partials, crossfades, tuning and projecting in a space—as well the emotional registers that are inherent in her work. I will then turn to the ways that OCCAM Ocean differs from other projects I have worked on and how it reshapes traditional concepts of authorship, authority and performer agency. Notably there is no conventional score to Radigue's pieces; rather she presents an image or images of water to the musicians. I will draw upon my long experience of performing Radigue's music as well as my work notebooks and two as yet unpublished interviews that I conducted with Radigue in November 2013 and February 2014.