#metrobyoon

Have you ever wondered what Mozart’s bassoon concerto would sound like composed with electronics? Bora Yoon, one of the featured composers performing at the Multiphonics Concert is doing just that - a 21st century re-imaginging of the bassoon classic, Mozart K191 -- for bassoon and electronics. Inspired by found sounds and field recordings, Yoon transports the listener through music/sound.

Described by the New York Times as “mesmerizing” and by KoreAm Journal as “totally unique”, Korean-American experimental composer, vocalist, and sound artist Bora Yoon performs immersive audiovisual soundscapes using digital devices, voice, found objects and instruments from a variety of cultures and historical centuries – evoking memory and association, to formulate a cinematic storytelling through music and sound.

Brad Balliett asked her to write this piece for the two of them to perform at the concert at Le Poisson Rouge on October 11th with Balliett on bassoon and Yoon on electronics. When commissioned to write this piece Brad approached her with ideas of “re-imagining a classic, but also re-invigorating it. Featuring its beauty, and tapping into it to make a bit more universal beyond the lens of Mozart, opening new audiences to the work, while also making it economical for contemporary performance by being portable, and easy to perform anywhere.” Yoon’s interpretation of Mozart is bound to change the way you think about classic repertoire, you don’t want to miss out on this exciting night!

   Mozart's Bassoon Concerto is such a staple in the Bassoon repertoire, and re-imagining and re-invigorating it is very exciting! What was the inspiration for this project? 

Brad Balliett approached me, upon hearing what I did with the Hildegard von Bingen chant 'O viridissima virga' and 'O Pastor Animarum' in Sunken Cathedral, which John Schaeffer featured on his program   Medieval + Electronics = ?  http://www.wnyc.org/story/medieval-electronic-bora-yoon/

He wanted a more portable, relevant, and modernized version of the classic Mozart bassoon concerto -- and asked me to take a listen, put it under my pillow, and see what I could come up with akin to what I had done on 'Cathedral'.  

 Could you go into more detail about how you will perform with Brad and how that fits into your other works as an electronic artist/composer/vocalist?

Live at LPR, I will be performing live electronics, synthesizer, with a few sound toys and turntable.  We met up in Princeton NJ, and recorded Brad's remarkable ability to play an enormous range of multi phonics, broken chords, harmonics, tones, and textures -- which became the elemental language upon which to build the electronics arrangement that would set the new backdrop for Mozart K191.

I wanted to create a work that featured and highlighted the fragile, delicate, earnest beauty of the bassoon, which to me intuits the vision of a strange endangered bird, that is equal parts beautiful, as it is unique.  As a result, I explored and utilized a series of synthesizers, ring modulators, field recordings, and rhythm patterns, to break up the classic K191, and also bring out the tones and harmonics in new ways.

  You said that transport is a major aim of yours, could you elaborate more on your techniques, and why creating this atmosphere is important to you?

I use found sounds, and field recordings, to incite the associations of memory, weather, wind, and use the scale of sound, to either create a feeling of distance, or close proximity.  How the brain processes these techniques, is what separates it from straight reality, or a sense of magical realism.   Music is an incredible medium, to create this type of sense of compound textures, and simultaneous aesthetics, to create one where different people find different things to pick up on, within it.