Ferrari, Luc

***Les Arythmiques is one of the final works created by electroacoustic composer LUC FERRARI. A starting point for the piece was the challenge to represent in sound the jolt of electricity that had been sent across his heart to treat his arrythmia. The sound that he finally crafted to his satisfaction is the crackling, vaguely terrifying one that jolts Les Arythmiques into life and reappears throughout to interrupt the proceedings at the most unlikely moments. The sound environment that the electrical shocks interrupt is that of the EKG’s regular beeps, the distant tolling of a church bell, and even more distant sounds resembling birds. In other words, it’s the sound of enforced rest, of a patient immobilized. This relatively small repertoire of concrete sounds is examined with a disorienting repetitiveness that brings to mind the mobile-like quality of many of Ferrari’s electroacoustic works. Here that quality is combined with the lightning-quick stabs associated with Erik M and Otomo Yoshihide, two artists with whom Ferrari collaborated in his final years. Les Arythmiques ultimately moves beyond the hospital room by delving into an archive of remembered sounds. Murmurings in Italian give way to the English-language interjection “Are y’all familiar with the parts of a saddle?”—the composer’s reflection on material gathered in the American Southwest for his Far-West News series. Les Arythmiques was included as part of the ten-CD box set Luc Ferrari: L’Oeuvre Électronique (Ina GRM). This is the first time that it has appeared as a separate release. (STREET DATE - 11/17/2009)