Output details

Lullaby for Joni

Research content/process:

This composition project started from the question: how does the fetus perceive sound in the womb? It began with a review of scientific literature and recordings that revealed that the dominant features of the fetal listening experience are the maternal heartbeat and white noise, coupled to attenuated higher frequencies of external sounds. The pitch component of sounds is reduced and rhythmic clarity less defined. The first part of Lullaby for Joni explores comparative differences between listening ‘outside’ and ‘inside’ the womb by transforming the musical materials towards a state that reflects the fetal listening experience (see shift at bar 40). Engaging extended instrumental techniques developed by composers such as Lachenmann, the musical materials are largely stripped of their high frequency pitch components, and rhythmic definition is reduced. The double basses and low percussion articulate a maternal heartbeat, which is later coupled with a faster and higher-pitched ‘fetal’ heartbeat. By drawing attention to the listening experience inside the womb, Lullaby for Joni engages with the post-war investigation of ‘listening environments’, in particular the work of Cage, Lucier, Ablinger and electroacoustic soundscape composition. The work also proposes a very different kind of conceptual shift towards the musical genre of the lullaby. The challenge was to allude to the genre and its cultural connotations, without resorting to quotation or pastiche, by extending and transforming the musical language of the first half of the piece, gradually revealing new strands of material including the concluding berceuse sonority led by the harp. Lullaby for Joni was commissioned by Sound and Music and the BBC Symphony Orchestra as part of the Embedded Artist Residency Scheme. It was premiered 14 November 2013 by the BBC Symphony Orchestra, cond. Garry Walker, in a public concert at Maida Vale Studios for broadcast on Radio 3’s Hear and Now.