Artistic Research Residency - IRCAM 2017

“Female Singing Voice 's Vibrato and Tremolo: Analysis, Mapping and Improvisation”

In the past years, I have been working on different types of sound articulations and their compositional implications. Controlling the natural projection of a singing voice, developing a rhythmical sequence from a slight vibrato to molto vibrato, or creating a vowels alternation (vowel tremolo) from a simple tenuto, these elements have been my first step to reconsider the question of timbre.
The Ircam’s Artistic Residency in 2017 focused on finding the appropriate audio descriptors, and on evaluating different analysis techniques to extract data from a female singing voice, specifically the micro/macro evolution-in-time of vibrato, tremolo and their extended-techniques variations, both off-line and in real time.
The acquisition of data coming from an off-line analysis, and the vibrato and tremolo re-synthesis were developed within the Analysis-Synthesis Team. The extended-techniques, in particular the distortion, were developed within the Analysis-Synthesis/CREAM Teams. The audio-stream segmentation to identify vocal gestures and to generate a controlled re-composition of the segmented vocal material in ImproteK were developed within the REPMUS Team.
The final results of the Residency has been presented at the Ircam Forum in March 2018 and the Manifeste Festival 2018.

Between 2018 and 2020, the research was the starting point for the composition of two new pieces, Canzoniere Part I and Canzoniere Part II, commissioned by Ircam and Neuen Vocalsolisten with the support of the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study Harvard University.
The pieces were premiered at the Manifeste Festival 2020 and were part of the ECLAT Festival 2021.
The creative proces was captured in a short film by Vivianne Perelmuter and Isabelle Ingold: Images d'une œuvre n°27.