Meryll Hardt

P001 → reseach by practice.

Dedicated to artificial voices and synthetic vocal ensembles, my current research by practice revolves around a long term interest into the aesthetic expressions of the post-human. While analyzing pioneering works by, Homer Dudley, Max Matthews, Lev Termen, John Chowning, as well as Kraftwerk, Laurie Anderson and Lyra Pramuk, I attempted to sketch my own way to re-design and play the sound of the voice. From artificialised human voice to humanised synthetic voice, my research draws a spectrum of artificiality, with, on the one hand, the human voice powered by breath and, on the other, the electronic wave powered by energy.

Manipulating sound contactless, with Leap choir, a self-built interface, I created with Ultraleap* and Maxmsp, I weave and question the changing morphology of the form of voice. As a versatile sound object (1) the voice and other sound objects is dispatched on each of my fingers, allowing me to play a vocal ensemble like a polyphonic theremin. Alternately human, animal, instrumental or electronic, the identity of the voice remain fluid and polymorphic. Further afield, this plastic research tends to question interconnections within the porosity between the actual and the virtual.

The ultra Leap hand-tracking technology initialy dedicated to VR, detect the movement of the fingers. Those signals are sent to a Max Msp patch consisting of a motion capture linked to transposers which can be applied to live voice, locked-grooves of vocal samples (Schaeffer leapchoir), as well as oscillators. Leapchoir is an augmented voice solo that allows one person to sing in several voices, but also to create a new space and time for the voice using live spatialisation tools that can also be applied in the process, such as decorrelation or delay.

(1) SCHAEFFER Pierre, La musique concrète, 1967. p.3.
*Leapmotion Inc

Past presentations :

05.29.24 : Ames captives 20 min 8.1 augmented solo. Univ. Gustave Eiffel (Champ sur Marne). World 1ère.
07.19.24 : Quadrille’phonie, quadriphonic 4.1 augmented solo 30 min, Le Sport National, Café de Paris, (Paris).
10.05.24 : The time of the voice, augmented solo, 30’, stéréo, at Le Nonjazz, Olympique Café, (Paris)

The time of the voice, rehearsal / creation (c) Meryll Hardt 2024.

Various spectrograms of Corps perdus (13’), sound piece, stereo by Meryll Hardt (2024).
Premiered on Ina Grm acousmonium on April the 12th 2024.

Spectrogram of Phoné by John CHOWNING (1982, Ircam).

Ralf Hütter, (c) Kraftwerk. The Ritz in New York City in 1981. (Photo by Laura Levine/Corbis via Getty Images)

Nudité impossible, (c) Meryll Hardt, 2008. Bruxelles.