melatonin_concept

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M e l a t o n i n

Maria Jardardottir - voice and electronics

Melatonin is my electro acoustic live based solo project where the predominant aim is to explore the immense variety of possibilities when using the voice as the only sound source. I started investigating the introductory ideas for this particular solo concept through my music studies in 2002 after playing with the thought for some time. (In fact I see it as springing out of the source and essence of my early solo explorations in the mid-nineties). And, during the last couple of years I have through consistent development managed to mould and form it into an audible product.

The musical product quite fluently speaks its own self-sufficient language; however, I have made the decision to share some of my ideas behind it and add some of my interpretations of the tracks in retrospect. You will find my thoughts added to each individual track's page.

I would nevertheless recommend you to listen through the tracks and create your own opinion before reading my interpretations on them.

The solo format in itself offers a tremendous challenge, but to me the security in being out there totally on your own is in a curious way balancing the risk of it. What I particularly enjoy within this solo concept is the fully absorbing freedom I find when I through the improvisation glide into a spiritual and almost unconscious state of mind. The title of the initial release of the project, [Monotonine Meditasjoner - Monotonine Meditations], is meant to reflect the experience of this meditative and mesmerizing condition. When I enter this emotion is when I feel the true magic of improvisation. And after experiencing one of those moments my inner batteries are recharged and I am anew ready to rejoin the buzzing everyday life.

To me music is rooted in my being. It is part of the process of digesting life and canalising emotions. And, it is just as much working as a component of my intellectual approach to life. It is operating within both fields of comprehension in an overlapping way: the verbal and the non verbal, the concrete and the abstract - the "rational" reason and the "irrational" emotion. (I am using scare marks here, for: In recent years, cognitive psychologists have finally started acknowledging and seeing emotion crucial to the process of reasoning - a notion that flies in the face of traditional ideas of emotion as "irrational". And a notion that I by all means would submit to). I am continuously trying to capture the characteristics of these contrasting and intertwining elements in my music.

The pieces that were picked out for the collection named [Monotonine Meditasjoner - Monotonine Meditations] were recorded through the first six months of the year 2004 and they are, as all Melatonin music, based around different appearances of improvisation. Some are more structured and anticipated than others and can thus perhaps even be categorized as compositions or maybe rather, loosely guided compositions. Yet, because the elements of freedom and impulse are so strongly ruling the process of creating this music I personally view the pieces under the umbrella of improvisation.

An allegory I find suiting my idea of improvisation is the conversation: you can never fully predict what the person you are talking to will say, even though you might have known her/him all your life - meaning you will have to generate answers to questions you yet not know: instant response, being present and conscious. During a conversation there is a tension that drives it forwards and brings up new choices of direction. You bounce, reflect, contradict and confirm the opponent conversation partner. It is a real time process of creating something unique which carries some level of meaning, being it founded in the concrete reason or in the abstract emotion, or in the intertwinement of them both. Or, in other occurrences, there is solely a lack of tension which eventually kills the conversation and separates the people involved, but the remains of it, the unbalanced energy concealed by the inner emotions, still exist within the humans that were occupied in it. The force is still there, transformed into another shape, colour, temper or element. And, however strange it may sound; even in a solo project, as this is, the depending on conversation and communication is inevitable. You always need to be chasing that tension in order to create interweaving or contrasting lines and to transform your source into a new set of frames (or sentences if you like), and furthermore, to do so at the appropriate time.

As a musician (and as a human being) I am constantly and actively in progress and in a flow of self examination. Melatonin is a project where my development becomes very apparent, at least to me, because there are no limits or fixed directions of where I want or intend the musical creation Melatonin to go. In other ensembles and constellations I often find there to be more given path-ways wherein the musicians involved consciously or unconsciously may lead the musical product.

A point that I have worked very much on through the last couple of years (and more and more intensively so) is to make my (immediate) ideas work, regardless of where they are coming from or what they are bringing. Almost to force them to work no matter what. (I will leave it up to each individual listener to make their opinion on if I have succeeded or not). I believe this is very important when you are moving within the nature of improvised music. That is as I see it one of the most difficult problems to solve when improvising, and what it implicates is never giving up on your idea, but to really trace it, search within it and reveal it as best you can within the context or framework you are developing it in.

This is also why I have chosen to call the second selection ‘Intimate Imperfections’. In each of these individual tracks there are, as I hear them, both weaknesses and strengths. Just like in all human relations and in all aspects of the human existence. Although I am striving for an expression of something complete, this does not for me entail striving for perfection. In my work my main goal is to attain and project honesty, being true to myself, to the ideas and to where they lead me. Therefore it is important to know when to let go, or when to acknowledge that the attempt and the product is at its potential peak, and then conclude with satisfaction when there still is evidence of the alive and human essence within the music; thus not to spoil or kill the energy by ‘correcting errors’.

Much of my music can only ‘happen once’. Because it is so strongly anchored in the moment of improvisation it is never possible to recreate a piece in its true, instant appearance. This again confirms the above stated; that how it happens, with its weaknesses and strengths solely can be the complete experience of it and therefore how I want to present it to you.

To listen to Melatonin go to tracks. To have a look at Melatonin’s line-up go to agenda.