/Image Schema/ is music to a video created by pianist Johan Fröst. The visual material is a processed video recording of himself playing a short piano piece by Debussy. Fröst has used unsual angles and extreme close-ups as a technique for shooting the film and the video has been edited from the point of view of the structure of the music primarily. I approached the video only, not knowing what the underlying piano music was, in an attempt to test the hypothesis that aspects of the structure of the original music can be communicated through the visuals in the way the video was edited. Hence, in my composition process I have focused on the visual arrangement and organized the music accordingly. The material for the music are piano samples that have been gathere in a way that is similar to how the video is created: putting microphones at strange and unusual places and at odd angles. The sounds have been processed primarily using spectral techniques whith which the timbral qualities of the samples were adapted to work with the dynamics of the visual material.
The reference for the title of this piece is the way it is explained by Mark Johnson in his book /The Body in the Mind/. The image schema at play here is the generalized idea that this system of images has anything to say about the music hidden behind them. It may serve as an identifying pattern that allows me, as well as the listener, to access a complex system of relationships of experiences and percepts. The setup is particular in this piece, but a video can always have this effect to the listener, as a distraction or as a vehicle for deep listening.
/Image Schema/ was premiered in Engelbrektskyrkan in Stockholm on Nowember 24, 2019.
Music: Henrik Frisk Video: Johan Fröst