Mikrozvuk #49: Diane Barbé + Clara Levy + d’incise

Diane Barbe

Diane Barbé is a French sound artist who combines experimental music, biophonic research and activism in search of forms of interspecies resonance. Her electronic works incorporate elements of drone music and microtonality, oscillating between dreamy lightness and weighty dystopia. A variety of flutes and field recordings can often be heard in her compositions, which in turn can spill over into dub-like pulsations. Diane has long created an ensemble of wind instruments, percussion, bird calls and small sound devices called The Alien Kin, which she uses for outdoor performances. This year she has a great album out on forms of minutiae, musiques tourbes, which she will also be presenting at LOM.

Clara Levy

Clara Levy is a French violinist and improviser. She will present her album 13 Visions (2022, Discreet Editions) at LOM. On the album, she pays tribute to two distinctive female composers whose musical aesthetics and philosophies share many commonalities. The first is the German mystic Hildegard von Bingen (1098-1179), the second the American composer Pauline Oliveros (1932-2016). On the album, and in live performances, Levy crosses the blurred boundaries between interpretation and composition, interweaving mystical harmonies with the concept of deep listening, blurring musical histories that converge in vibrating drones. In addition, Levy collaborates with many other composers and songwriters. Her music has been featured in various dance works and she has performed as a performer at venues focusing on experimental music, contemporary or classical composition, such as Wiener Modern, Donaueschinger Musiktag, Biennale Di Venezia, Théâtre de la Monnaie, Cafe OTO, Strasbourg Opera, Oscillation, Bayreuther Festspiele.

d’incise

d’incise is a sound explorer that uses anything that can be considered a musical instrument- software, field recordings, non-musical objects, percussion, or harmonium. Recently, however, he has been focusing again on analogue electronic sources. He is interested in musical reductionism, repetition and conceptual approaches. He extracts musical elements down to the smallest details. Live, his works are characterized by slowness and obsessive exploration of simple processes. He does so in his solo work, in various impro ensembles or in the Insub collective. The latter combines activities around the eponymous Geneva orchestra and publishing house.