Mad maple

If trees could give their point of view on the state of the world, what would they say?

Perhaps we’d realize that they’d gone mad… Inspired by the work of Baptiste Morizot, Philippe Descola and Vinciane Despret, Séverine Morfin’s Mad Maple questions our relationship with nature and sounds – from the sounds of nature to the nature of sounds.

Blending writing and improvisation, Mad Maple takes the form of three suites for viola, guitar, clarinet, monotron and soundtrack. Composed as a fourth voice, the tapes include a montage of forest, glacier and storm sounds, as well as viola and monotron, in an approach inspired by both field recording and musique concrète. Fascinated by sounds and archives (she has a Master’s degree in History), Séverine Morfin has long been interested in the sound side of the world. Her viola solo Chorèmes (2015), which in geography refers to the schematic representation of a space, already mobilized recordings. Here, the tapes are played by Céline Grangey using INA’s GRM Tools. Manipulated, modulated and spatialized (deferred on the album; in real time and immersively multi-broadcast in concert), they come to life in the same way as the instruments.

Mad Maple’s music is joyful and intensely poetic, even if it is inhabited by concern for the state of the earth (the glacier we hear collapsing in “glacés” has already disappeared). The wind blows with the viola, the birds of the forest sing along with the clarinet, a glacier converses with the guitar… Thanks to the overlapping of timbres, we no longer know which sound belongs to which. At the end of “glacés”, the guitar begins to sound like a viola played pizzicato; “dans la forêt”, the clarinet soars high and flirts with its own limits. This multiplication and indistinction of sources lends the music a thickness, a gentle density, and, paradoxically, a simplicity and obviousness. In Mad Maple, the sounds are all welcomed in the same way, and the four voices merge into a single moving, living body.

“Maple” is also the material from which Séverine Morfin’s viola is made. It was made especially for her by luthier Patrick Charton, to whom the piece “Les murmures” is dedicated. From the wood of the instrument to the wood of the forest, Mad Maple reconnects us with the natural elements – wind, water, trees. We are part of the whole, these imaginary landscapes seem to say. By reactivating a vibratory relationship with our environment, Mad Maple gives birth to a new world.