Jessica Ryckewaert - Percutronique (2009)

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Jessica Ryckewaert - Percutronique (2009)

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The neologism, Percutronique, is a perfect description of these pieces for percussion and electronics, in which the distinction between the natural and the electronically altered sounds is frequently blurred. Belgian percussionist Jessica Ryckewaert performs virtuosically on the bass marimba and vibraphone and coordinates her playing apparently effortlessly with the electronics in these three works by Belgian composers. Pièce pour deux percussionnistes et électronique, by Gilles Gobert, in which she is joined by percussionist Gérard Bernard, uses prerecorded synthetically generated sounds whose deployment during the performance is controlled by a third performer. In Passacaille pour marimba & live electronics by Pierre Bartholomée, and Philippe Boesmans' Day Dreams pour marimba et instruments de synthèse, the sounds that the soloist produces are processed live through MIDI devices, so that she is essentially playing a duet with an electronically modified version of her own performance. Bartholomée's work is a passacaglia, a form with a controlled musical structure, so the altered sounds are programmed to correspond very precisely with the performer, to produce a tightly controlled polyphonic work that is notable for its economy of means and its playful character. Boesmans' 30 minute Day Dreams is formally freer, with more the character of an evolving fantasia. His concerns are primarily with timbre and with pitch alteration, to create notes to "fill in" the gaps between the pitches the instrument is capable of producing, and the effect is in fact dreamy and hallucinatory. The sound is clean, with good balance and nice resonance.