By Eyal Hareuveni

la vallée de l’étrange (the valley of unusual) is a double bass
set up greater than a double bass solo album, or as Pascal
Niggenkemper calls it, “a head to head between a double bassist and an
autonomous augmented double bass in spatialized octophonic setting”.
Niggenkemper is enjoying in a middle of a stage, surrounded by a circle
of eight loudspeakers. On 3 items the double bass is seated on his lap
– basso horizontale as he calls it. Subsequent to Niggenkemper, there may be an
augmented double bass (referred to as, cobonore, a assemble between cobot and
& sonore) outfitted with eight motors in eight time zones, every with
a piezo. These zones are animated by the levers of the motors and
projected to at least one or a number of loudspeakers. The viewers is seated in
circles between Niggenkemper and the loudspeakers to introduce and
share with the viewers the sonic expertise of being contained in the
augmented double bass. The album was recorded at la Grange de Floyrac
in France in July and October 2022.

Niggenkemper calls this sound set up “a recreation of opposition and an
encounter between the human and the imaginary”. Clearly, he presents an
experimental, formidable and fairly eccentric method to invent and replicate
the sonic potentialities of the double bass, from a radical and
insightful perspective, true to the seminal imaginative and prescient of John Cage.
Niggenkemper was impressed by Japanese robotics pioneer Masahiro Mori’s
visionary essay “The Uncanny Valley”, suggesting the speculation that as
robots turn out to be extra humanlike, they seem extra acquainted till a degree
is reached at which delicate imperfections of look make them look
unusual.

la vallée de l’étrange does sound unusual, otherworldly, even
outrageous and solely hardly ever playful, far past the recognized acoustic or
electronics-enhanced prolonged methods (although Niggenkemper attaches
completely different objects to the bass strings and physique), however it’s completely
participating with its distinctive and stunning sounds and sonic spells as effectively
as its nuanced dynamics. Solely the primary piece, “Doppelgänger”, employs
the acquainted darkish and buzzing vibrations of a bowed double bass however the
random sounds of the augmented double bass quickly create a cacophonic and
chaotic storm. Within the basso horizontale items, Niggenkemper performs the
double bass together with his mouth – breaths and whispers into the f-hole and
the endpin entrance, or with assorted objects. On “selection processes
frailty” he locations small bridges between the fingerboard and the
strings and brings the double bass to a Japanese koto territory.

A real work of a double bass poet, sonic explorer and adventurer (and
mad scientist), who revisits and reinvents his – and ours –
relationship to the bull fiddle.