Music Reviews : ‘Night’: Avant-Garde Vocals at Sonic Series

A refreshing addition to the madcap, low-budget world of avant-garde vocalizing took place Saturday at LACE when French countertenor Frank Royon le Mee and local composer/electronic music wizard Barry Schrader performed their well-planned opus “Night,” a musical collaboration written for voice, electric piano, synthesizer and computer, with some minor theatrical elements included.

Nine separately titled sections proceed without pause, each inventively exploring different worlds of improvisation and computerized sound, as well as more conventional, through-composed parts. The multistyled whole alternates between virtuosic solos from one or the other performers as well as transcendental, more Romantic parts where they perform together.

Royon le Mee’s clownish use of extended vocal techniques and nonsense syllables is most effectively displayed when used to intone the mystically provocative Latin text in the neo-Medieval “Night Prayer.” In “Night Chimes,” his use of a small chiming toy, as well as a digital watch alarm, adds some degree of silliness, though never crossing the threshold of tastelessness.

In Schrader’s masterful electronic settings, rudimentary keyboard noodlings become exquisite landscapes of timbres and rhythmic elements. His stoic delivery in works such as in the mesmerizing parallel organum of “Night Dreams” complements Royon le Mee’s wackier antics aptly.

Of four movements in which the duo performed together, the finale--”La Grande Nuit du Silence”--offers the most variety. The longest of the nine movements, it includes a recitation by Royon le Mee of his own French text, as well as a carefully blended mix of zaniness and seriousness.