Abstract
Visual Music is an art form that can enhance the emotional impact of music performance through the simultaneous projection of mood-congruent visual imagery. I illustrate the transcendence of the art by reference to two of my pieces. In Abîme des oiseaux , it was Olivier Messiaen’s ability to accurately transmute a wide range of celestial colours into audible sound combinations that enabled me to hear ‘the colours that moved with his music’ and, thereby, see what was in his mind’s eye. Visual mental imagery during music listening plays a pivotal role for the majority of listeners. In creating my own visual responses to music, I seek to modulate listeners’ emotional response by implanting my own form of visual expression in their minds. This is both the challenge and delight of making Visual Music. In my latest work Passeggiata , based on Luciano Berio’s Sequenza IXa for solo clarinet, I’ve used patterns and images gleaned from Deep Dream artificial intelligence to give an impression of an other-worldly ‘passeggiata’ in and around a mountain village in Liguria – the province of Italy where Berio was born and lived.
Highlights
It can be argued that the idea was initiated, in the 1920s, by Oskar Fischinger who was active as an artist in Frankfurt and Berlin
Walt Disney used some of his ideas in Fantasia but gave him no credit
My experience of producing Abîme des oiseaux leads me to uncover some of the mystery that surrounds visual imagery as it relates to music
Summary
It can be argued that the idea was initiated, in the 1920s, by Oskar Fischinger who was active as an artist in Frankfurt and Berlin He invented techniques whereby a series of frames, showing abstract images reflecting the rhythms of music, were put together as short films (Figure 1). My Initial research into the subject quickly revealed that the shimmering stained glass of Chartres Cathedral had provided, throughout Messiaen’s life, a joyful experience, a place where he could fully indulge the sensory impact of his synaesthetic world It was this new-found knowledge that enabled me to Experiencing Visual Music From an Artist’s and Listener’s Point of View Terry Trickett locate the hidden imagery that lay behind the composer’s notation for Abîme des oiseaux – a piece, for solo clarinet, that became eventually a central movement within Messiaen’s Quartet for the End of Time. That made my choice inevitable; it was his ability to accurately transmute a wide range of celestial colours into audible sound combinations that enabled me to see what was in his mind’s eye
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