The 11th L’Espace du son International Acousmatic Festival will be held in Brussels (Belgium) from October 20 to 24, 2004 along with the composition competition finals and the spatialization performance competition. Concerts by guests composers (Patrick Ascione, Bernard Fort, Natasha Barrett, Bernard Parmegiani, François Bayle) will complete the celebration’s offerings.

Composers Natasha Barrett and Denis Smalley will each premiere a new composition for the Sonorities festival of contemporary music, held in Belfast (Northern Irland) from April 23 to May 1, 2004. Natasha Barrett presents her new work, Abemolpas, April 27. This concert also features works by Christian Calon and Elio Martusciello. The following day, April 28, Denis Smalley will premiere his new composition, entitled Resounding. On, April 29 the concert will feature works by Robert Normandeau and Jonty Harrison. Finally, the May 1 concert will showcase the works of Barry Truax, including the latest “remix” of his classic composition Riverrun

Robert Normandeau will give a solo concert for the Danish Institute of Electroacoustic Music (DIEM) festival in Århus (Denmark) November 27, 2003. This concert will be the chance for the composer to present all his latest works in a multichannel format. In addition to Chorus (2002), Le renard et la rose (1995) and StrinGDberg (2001-03), this concert will be an occasion to listen to the new version of Éden (2003) and will see the European creation of Hamlet-Machine with Actors (2003) recently premiered in Vancouver. Apart from this concert, Normandeau will give a lecture and participate in two master class with Natasha Barrett (in concert November 26, 2003) and Wayne Siegel.

Finally available on electrocd.com, the two previous solo releases by Natasha Barrett on the Nota Bene label. Both Chillies & Shells (1998) and Rocks & Wraiths (1997) blends mixed works for tape and instrument and acousmatic compositions.

New Adventures in Sound Art (NAISA) will celebrate 5 years of Sound Travels on August 9, 2003 at 2:30 pm at Centre Island, Toronto by presenting Francis Dhomont’s Here and There, Prince Prospero’s Party by Norway-based UK composer Natasha Barrett, Inside Out by Toronto composer Randall Smith, Temple by Vancouver’s Barry Truax, and works by Italian composers Laura Bianchini and Michelangelo Lupone.

Field recordings have always fascinated electroacoustic composers, ever since Pierre Schaeffer’s Cinq études de bruits (1948), featuring processed train sounds. With R Murray Schafer’s Vancouver Soundscape 1973 (1972-73), these everyday sounds are articulated around a discourse which will be termed “sound ecology,” whereby sounds keep their original meaning, and no longer serve as anecdotic content to be used and abused at the composer’s whim. Jonty Harrison synthesises these two approaches in his short text {cnotice:imed_0052-0001/About Évidence matérielle/cnotice}.

Actually, every composer seems to have their own unique approach towards field recordings. If sound ecology has seen the burgeoning of microphone artists such as Claude Schryer and of course Hildegard Westerkamp and her famous {cpiste:imed_9631-1.3/Kits Beach Soundwalk/cpiste} (1989), sound travels such as French duo Kristoff K Roll’s CD Corazón Road (1993) are, in this respect, closer to the art of documentary film. Meanwhile, Brooklyn-based composer Jon Hudak starts off with an extremely minimalist palette so as to seek out the “essence” of sounds, which, to the listener, translate into soft, dreamy soundscapes. A student of the aforementioned Jonty Harrison, Natasha Barrett conceives beautiful landscapes of sounds with very discreet field recordings, that retain an aesthetic likeness to the acousmatic tradition.

Many young composers settle into this landscape (of sound…) and their work is of such interest to us, it would be a shame not to let them be heard. We shall first mention the California-based V. V. (real name Ven Voisey), who organises his found sounds into an architecture reminescent of “old school” musique concrète—doing so, he uncovers a previously unheard aesthetic affinity between Schaeffer and Merzbow… With Relisten, Austrian composer Bernhard Gal guides us through his carefully selected episodes of “found musics” (that is, musical structures that preexist within the environment.) Finally, because of its numerous ideas and its incredible pacing, the surprising flume ridge.halifax.lisbon (2001) from Montréal composer Cal Crawford will undoubtedly seduce listeners looking for unheard acousmatic grounds.

Two small treats to end with. First, the pretty Aenviron: one mini-CDR is a simple thread of five pure field recordings (with no processing!). After all, if there is such a thing as cinema for the ear, why shouldn’t there be a photo album for the ear! And to close the loop, may we also suggest to make a stop at Lionel Marchetti’s recent mini-CD with the evocative title, Train de nuit (Noord 3-683) (1998-99). This work for one loudspeaker, dedicated (couldn’t you guess?) to Pierre Schaeffer, remind us again of the ever renewed importance of environmental sources in feeding the electroacoustic ocean.