Embrace by Rianne Wilbers
During the corona-lockdowns, Rianne Wilbers had the brilliant idea of presenting a 1-on-1 program. She wanted to sing intimately to her listeners, as a kind of musical embrace during that period of seclusion. She asked me if I would make music for that program.
For the lyrics, we asked our followers on social media what they thought of when they heard the word "embrace," the theme of Rianne's concert. We got a lot of beautiful, heartwarming and intense responses that I translated into lyrics.
Rianne allowed me to use a loop station, an electronic device that records her voice live and can play it back in layers. This makes it seem like there are multiple Rianne's singing.
In Embrace, Rianne's voice floats above slowly changing (and pre-recorded) chords. She sings a vocal line over that on the spot, still floating above that pitch when she finally overlays the second and final melody over it. This creates a fabric of voices that hopefully offers the listener comfort and an embrace.
Dutch-Italian composer Anthony Fiumara creates contemporary classical and electronic music marked by immediacy, tactile sound, and bold contrasts, often shaped like a rock song. He is also a member of Poulson Sq., Black on Maroon, and Lunar Control.