Pierre-Yves Martel (viola da gamba) is an instrumentalist / sound artist living in Montreal, Canada, where he revisits his instrument, using it in new contexts that engage with the contemporary world. As well as working as a solo performer and creating music for film, he has long-standing collaborations with Magda Mayas, Kim Myhr, Karl-Ludwig Hübsch, Philip Zoubek, Martin Tétreault, Eric Normand and Isaiah Ceccarelli.
Pierre-Yves Martel will be performing his work Estinto.
Estinto is characterised by slow music, extended in time and riven by isolated events in a frame of silence. Through restraint, observation and control, the interplay of viola da gamba and harmonica opens a space wherein each instrument can extinguish itself and finally blend into a single unearthly soundscape.
Like a painter working at the intersection of shadow and light, Pierre-Yves Martel gives voice to silence in a subtle play in which every intervention draws, in ghostly lines, the contours of a sonic architecture that is both distinct and enigmatic. The constancy with which Pierre-Yves Martel explores a single idea in order to give form to empty space make this work a fascinating exploration of spatiality and time, and an invitation to reflect.
Rasoul Abbasi is an Iranian Kamencheh player based in Auckland
Wednesday 30 January @ Audio Foundation, 8pm
$10 (+BF) presales from www.undertheradar.co.nz
$15 door sales