Thrill (review)

This DVD-Audio/Video/ROM release from 2003 gathers together five multi-channel audio works by composer Ludger Brümmer, two of them paired with video work by artist Silke Braemer. This is a smart release in that it includes multiple versions of each track: the audio is available in linear PCM format, 16- or 24-bit resolution (depending on original source files), with a sampling rate of 48 kHz. Paired with the video parts of the DVD, the music is also encoded in stereo, Dolby Digital surround, and DTS formats. (Inferno der Stille, originally created in an eight-channel version is available in a five-channel mix, eight channels being normally unavailable in DVD player outputs, but Mr. Brümmer even provides the individual eight channels of audio as AIFF files in the DVD-ROM partition of the DVD.) In these ways, the composer allows listeners some way to experience this music, be their playback means ever so humble.

First, the audio-only tracks. The disc opens with Phrenos, an 18-min work from 1997 that won the Grand Prix—Pierre d'Or as best work in all categories at the 1997 Bourges Competition. It was commissioned by and realized at the Zentrum für Kunst und Medientechnologie (ZKM) Institute for Music and Acoustics Karlsruhe. A sharp, sudden opening becomes string orchestra/choir-like sustained sounds. These build to a second outburst, briefly climaxing in tape-loop-iness. The next outburst releases some human speech and the comic arpeggiation of speed-changed voice recordings—providing one of the rare moments of non-abstract electronic sounds on the entire disc. These sounds are then looped and they circle the listener, slowing down and returning to the bed of sustained pads. These fade to silence. Gradually, the faintest, most delicate blips color the quietude. Another short outburst and then the sonic wallpaper of a starship continues. About halfway through the piece, cascades of tinkling loops become audible; these circle and crescendo. A few feral gasps sound through this chiming orchestra of circling material. After a diminuendo to almost nothing, the faint "wallpaper" returns. It accelerates, a spinning arcade of sound transforming into a helicopter. This flying machine slows until another outburst (much like that of the opening) wakes the listener. Faint sustained sounds—now vaguely string-quartet-like—are followed by a longer out-burst, miasmic, taking us into the final minute of the piece. A gradual diminuendo and the clink of a small hammer on glass ends the work. Track three is the next audio-only work, de la nuit from 1999. Finally, Inferno der Stille from 2000 (track five) closes the disc. I find Inferno to be the most engaging work of this release, comparing it to both of the other audio-only tracks and to the two tracks with video. This "Inferno of Silence" draws source material from the Introitus section of Wolf-gang Mozart's Requiem. Mr. Brümmer also mentions developing metallic sounds through physical modeling procedures and details an algorithmic approach to this composition in the liner notes. The opening resembles a reversed and stretched sound capped by a sudden decrescendo. This is succeeded by extremely faint sounds, sometimes sounding mandolin-like. Close-to-inaudibility reigns until almost seven minutes into the piece, but then a crescendo begins, joined by brushes on metal, culminating in forte material at about nine and a half minutes in. Lovely, sustained choral-like sounds take over and Mozart's strings become recognizable, eventually crescendoing to an abrupt cut-off. A faint tinkling returns, then some whispering-like coiled metal, followed by a large crescendo depositing the listener at a loud and active plateau. With about five minutes remaining, the piece grows quiet again; there are distant sustained sounds, the brushes on...