Ice Songs, Gletschergesänge 2000 - 2009
For some time the vocalist and soundartist Franziska Baumann has been fascinated with the glacier as a sound space, and has been collecting the sounds of the ice during her trips to glaciers. In processing the sounds she examines their detailed structures, down to the tiniest sound molecule, and melt them together with her voice into new compounds.
"Where all the frozen things went…" Fieldrecordings on the Rhone- and Aletsch Glacier, Switzerland
„Gletscherklangstrom” and „Gletschergesänge” became part of various performances on the borders between installation, performance art and sculptural spatial sound concepts. “Where all the frozen things went...” is a vocal distillation inspired by ice sounds, a few generations of sound later.
Often, no more than a memory of the glacial sound space remains in the music; the glacier has found its vocal correspondences. But then it stands once more in all its power beside the voice.
The source materials, however, remain glacial sounds and voice alone. Improvisation always plays an important role.
Documentation on Swiss Television Klanghotel 2001:
Portrait of composer Franziska Baumann while working on her composition "Gletscher-Klangstrom"