Des travailleurs de la nuit, a l'amie des objets.(Review)

Compact disc (mini), 1997, Collection Cinema pour l'oreille, Metamkine MKD024; available from DIFFUSION i MEDIA, 4850 avenue de Lorimier, Montreal, Quebec H2H 2B5, Canada; telephone (514) 5264096; fax (514) 526-4487; electronic mail info@electrocd.com; World Wide Web www.electrocd.com/

In 1993, the French electroacoustic performance and composition duo, Kristoff K. Roll, consisting of Carole Rieussec and Jean-Christophe Camps, released their musical travel diary, Corazon Road (recently reissued by the Montreal electroacoustic label, empreintes DIGITALes). This disc presents an acousmatic document of their travels in Mexico and South America, a reworking and reliving of the sound materials they captured during their voyage. This genre of sound art combines natural soundscapes, cityscapes, conversations, and the sound of life on the road with subtle in-studio processing, editing, and composition. Corazon Road beckons the listener to embark on an audio fantasy that reflects both the sound events and the emotional environments inhabited by the original auditors, a type of fanciful artistic reconstruction of the creators' sonic memories. The duo amply demonstrated their skill and adeptness at integrating and transforming large masses of diverse material into a convincing and coherent audio portrait. Since then, Kristoff K. Roll has worked on numerous pieces originating from travels and excursions in various parts of the world including Africa and South America. A trip to Brazil in the late 1990s resulted in "a long political epic ... which brings together the `bearers of utopia,' companions, and friends." Des travailleurs de la nuit, a l'amie des objets (From Night Workers to the Friend of Things), from 1997, originally an extensive live work involving several performers, has been released in a shorter acousmatic version as part of the Metamkine Collection. This "Cinema pour l'oreille" series is issued on mini CDs (not minidiscs!), each comprising a single electroacoustic work with a typical duration between ...