7 Options from Sonic Hugs by Cat Hope

7 OPTIONS BY CAT HOPE
Performed by The Low Tone Orchestra

This piece provides musicians with 7 different ‘ways’ to play low tones. The options are presented to each musician in different sequences and durations. The work explores the use of graphic notations as a way to encourage musicians to empathise with each other – ensemble playing shifts from being about coordination, tuning and being ‘in time’ to a more empathic and generous type of listening where moving in and out of each other’s timbre becomes the main focus of sonic collaboration. This focus means online collaboration becomes more rewarding, as latency becomes unimportant. In this recording, musicians are stationed in Perth and Melbourne, but play together. The work features a lament bass – reconfigured by Hz, rather than tempered pitch measurement, and in the very lowest ranges of human hearing.

The Low Tone Orchestra was in Melbourne: Cat Hope (sine tone generators and a.m. radio), Chloe Söbek(violone), Helen Svoboda (double bass), Aaron Wyatt (viola), Louise Devenish (piano), Jaslyn Robertson(synthesiser) and in Perth: Lindsay Vickery (bass clarinet) and Craig Pederson (trumpet). Recorded by Hadyn Buxton at the Digital Hub, Sir Zelman School of Music and Performance, Monash University.

Tracklist

4.	Cat Hope - 7 Options	4:46

Credits

from Sonic Hugs, released August 17, 2024
Cat Hope is an award winning Australian composer and performer who focuses on the extremes of sound – from extreme noise to barely audible delicacy. Her works have been performed worldwide by ensembles such as Yarn Wire (US), Hanatsu Miror (Fr), the BBC Scottish Symphony (UK), KNM (DE) and Norbotten Neo (Sweden). Recordings of her works are published internationally on labels such as Hat (Hut) Art, with her monograph CD Ephemeral Rivers winning the German Critics Prize in 2017. Her music has been discussed in books such as Score Writing (Thor Magnusson, 2019) and Hidden Alliances (Schimmana, 2019), as well as periodicals such as The Wire (UK), Revue & Corrigée (FR), Neu Zeitschrift Fur Musik Shaft (DE) and Gramophone (UK), who named her “one of Australia’s most exciting and individual creative voices.” She is a Professor at Monash University, Melbourne and a Fellow of the Hamburg Institute for Advanced Study. cathope.com

[Photograph by Tom Trevatt, Courtesy of Cat Hope]

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