Clemens von Reusner

"play sequence" is based on the sounds of a harpsichord. Together with french harpsichordist Alice Humbert numerous sounds were created in an extended practice of playing the instrument and recorded digitally. After editing and sound processing several hundred single sounds became the material for the composition.

In addition to the familiar sounds of the harpsichord, the microphone reveals the noise components of sounds as well as the mechanical processes when striking a key. These sounds of playing and the mechanical processes are much more present in the harpsichord than in the piano. The composition emphasizes these noise components and works with their own quality.

So the focus is expanded from a musical instrument with a specific metallic timbre, which is especially significant in the music of the age of baroque to a music machine with their own mechanical possibilities.

Due to the variety of sound generating methods used here and sound processing in the studio, a multi-perspective, quasi "cubist" representation of the harpsichord sound is achieved between proximity and distance in different close and open acoustic spaces again and again.

"play sequence" was commissioned by the project "MusiKKirche" of the St. John's Church in Restorf in Wendland, Lower Saxony, Germany.

Spatialisation: Ambisonic, 8-channel, 3rd-order, 12:41