Tristan Perich & James McVinnie announce collaborative album Infinity Gradient
Infinity Gradient is the grand collaboration from composer Tristan Perich and organist James McVinnie, set for release on 21 November. A remarkable work with few precedents, Infinity Gradient is a duet between two musical instruments, millennia apart in conception. An hour-long symphony in seven movements for organ and 100 speakers in 1-bit audio, it was recorded for this album at London’s Royal Festival Hall at Southbank Centre, where the piece was as visually striking to look at as it was to listen to. Shot through with dynamism, it is a work of colour and contrasts which coalesce into a unique, transcendent whole. Perich’s modus operandi – combining the aesthetic simplicity of maths, physics and code with Steve Reich-like layers – again succeeds in connecting on a human, emotional level, to fulfill its purpose.
Introducing today’s first preview from the album, Perich says: “Section 1 of Infinity Gradient is the beginning. In a piece of music for pipe organ and 100 speakers that eventually builds to an extreme in all aspects, I wanted it to start small. Building from a flutter, the opening sound is from the organ only: a left/right hocket that James McVinnie plays on two manuals of the organ. The two keyboards allow his hands to play the same material in a way that the sound flows continuously from one hand into the other. Eventually he is joined by my 1-bit electronics, a faint pulsing cloud of electric tones from a multitude of small speakers. It’s the meeting of organic and electronic, laying the groundwork for what is next.”
