The M/NM came to a close with an ambitious and maximalist piece by composer and guitarist Tim Brady at the Saint-Joseph Oratory. Indeed, the performance of La grande accélération: Symphonie no. 12 demanded one-hundred electric guitars, a percussion ensemble, and two orchestras to be separated in sections and placed carefully along the perimeter of the space.
Theoretically, a listener situated anywhere in the middle, (surrounded by the massive ensemble), should have been able to experience the full effect of the piece with little perceptual variation thanks to microphones and speakers being placed strategically to compensate for temporal delays. Also worth mentioning is that the piece required several conductors to direct different portions of the ensemble to ensure that everyone remained in time. The musicians too wore in-ear monitors with click tracks with this in mind.
So how did all this preparation translate in practice and what was it like to experience such an immersive piece? Well, it was very captivating to say the least. To start with, in keeping with the theme of this year’s festival, (the marriage between music and images), visuals and lights were projected on the ceiling and walls that matched vaguely the intensity of the music as the immersive piece unfolded. Readers of a certain age will know what I mean when I say that it resembled the visuals of Windows Media Player. Kind of trippy and pretty cool, (but really more of an afterthought compared to the music itself it seemed to me). On the subject of the music, it contained gentle string pads; tremolo from one-hundred clean electric guitars; hefty percussion solis; crunchy tutti chords; various swells that dovetailed from one section to another; and some electric guitar solos involving pick slides. Although efforts were made to have the listening experience be as uniform as possible, in reality the experience changed depending on if one was seated, where they were seated, and if at any point they chose to wander around the room. But this wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. In fact, I found that exploring temporal and perceptual variations was more fun than sitting in a pew for an hour. At various times I got closer to the percussion section, the guitars, the horns, et cetera, when something called my attention over to them.
I will admit that the description of the piece by itself made me recall the scene from Jake Kasdan’s Walk Hard in which the character Dewey Cox demands “an army of fifty-thousand didgeridoos!” to complete his masterpiece. However, unlike Dewey Cox, Tim Brady seems to be the furthest thing from a looney country singer; he seemed to me a very intentional composer and guitarist that created a fascinating listening experience. At times raucous, at times trance-like, perhaps a touch too long for my own liking, but an extremely interesting piece more than deserving of being this year’s festival closer.
