Page 137 - Composing Processes and Artistic Agency

126 Musicological perspectives on composing
Marko Ciciliani, “LipsEarsAssNoseBoobs (Gloomy Sunday)”

“LipsEarsAssNoseBoobs (Gloomy Sunday)” is a piece for electric violin,
th
organ, drum set, electronics and voices. (This piece is the 5 part of the cycle
“Suicidal Self Portraits”:1. “Crash” (2007); 2. “Going to Hell” (2009); 3.
“Screaming my Simian Line” (2010); 4. “All of Yesterday’s Parties” (2010); 5.
“LipsEarsAssNoseBoobs” (2014).) Commissioned by the Deutschlandfunk
radio station. World premiere on 6 April 2014. During a performance of the
first four pieces, which had not initially been conceived as a cycle (although
“Screaming my Simian Line” was created as a continuation of “Going to
Hell”), Ciciliani had the idea of adding something complementary.
September 2013: Ciciliani reviews the first four pieces and decides he does
not want to tie up their “loose ends” in the fifth, as Luciano Berio had done
in his “Sinfonia”. Starts thinking about themes to do with the media and pop
culture; wants to include videos as well. As usual, he begins his work with
conceptual thinking. During research on the Internet, he chances across the
1930s Hungarian hit song “Gloomy Sunday”, which is so depressing that it
allegedly brought about suicides and thus the destruction of identities. Wonders
whether to do a “very free, elaborate cover version”.
October 2013: Preoccupied with cosmetic surgery as a means of changing
one’s identity. Continues the idea of layering already existing cover versions of
the song “Gloomy Sunday”. Searches for another theme that could “enrich”
the piece.
November 2013: Organises the layered cover versions by keys in a circle of
fifths. The texture this creates will serve as background for the whole piece.
Works on the background texture using variants of resonances. Watches a
documentary on plastic surgery and a DVD on video art in Germany.
December 2013: Buys an organ module as his third synthesizer. This
enables transfers from a software program called Mainstage, which he finds
indispensable but prone to errors. Finds the variants of resonances too intru-
sive; uses spectral freezes to “blur [the background texture] a bit”. Has the
idea of integrating the sounds of different car doors being slammed shut into
the piece.
January 2014: Develops the violin voice based on the melody of “Gloomy
Sunday”. Sections of the wave-like melodics are repeatedly layered using a
loop player. Integrates physical activities: clapping of hands and slapping
against cheek at same time as articulating vowels i, e, a, o, u. Makes up the
title from text fragments taken from pop songs, which replicate the descending
formant sounds of the vowel series: “LipsEarsAssNoseBoobs”. Considers
carrying out “cosmetic surgery” on a computer model of a car. Establishes
the technical sequence.
February 2014: Works on the video of the mutating car. Senses that the
piece is conceptually saturated. Fine-tunes the musical details, especially the
drum rhythm, consolidation processes and virtuoso violin figures. Integrates
texts or rather text fragments from pop songs. Works on the ending of the