Philippe Petit :: The Acoustic Cornet, an hommage to Leonora Carrington (Mahorka)

After first encountering Philippe Petit through The Haunting Triptych (2010), The Acoustic Cornet—released by Mahorka as a tribute to Leonora Carrington—emerges as a radical electro-acoustic work of abstract, collage-driven experimentation that fuses manipulated objects, elastic electronics, and avant-garde improvisation into a richly unpredictable sonic experience.

Parametric ruptures in sound

I discovered the sonic sound paintings and conceptually engaged electro-acoustic research of Philippe Petit quite some time ago through the excellent The Haunting Triptych (2010), recorded in collaboration with Pietro Riparbelli and K11. After that—and because of the sheer amount of music I had the chance to explore—I did not devote much time to following his sound production over the years.

What I knew of his work was largely illustrative of formal experimentation with tone color, slowly evolving shapes of rumbling frequencies, and micro-signals that generate moments of both musical bliss and uneasiness. At times, his work ventures into the sphere of soothing minimal ambient music (in this regard, one may consider his album released by Glacial Movements). His musical trajectory also includes a vast collection of collaborations with distinctive sound artists such as Porya Hatami.

The Acoustic Cornet, an hommage to Leonora Carrington leads the listener toward the most abstract and experimental components of Philippe Petit’s sound art universe. It is released by the highly productive and adventurous indie label Mahorka and draws inspiration from the surreal and astonishing artwork of Leonora Carrington.

Collage, sscillation, controlled accidents ::

The album follows a radical, sensorial, parametric, and ambitious stylistic path, employing manipulated sound objects, molecular oscillations, and playful collages reminiscent of the early pioneering works of the GRM (Groupe de Recherches Musicales) in electro-acoustic music and the BBC Radiophonic Workshop. It explores the morphology of sound through elastic electronic waves combined with percussive acoustic elements in a neo-Cagean field of experimentation. There is also a Fluxus-like tendency in the performative practice, with the use of objects, mechanisms of rupture, intentional micro-accidents, and a semi-improvised approach.

All in all, this is a complex corpus of sound art that may appeal to admirers of conceptual art, contemporary avant-garde, and electro-acoustic improvisation—from past to present (Luc Ferrari, Jos Smolders, Mika Vainio, Nicolas Bernier, Joris de Laet, among others). The Acoustic Cornet presents astonishing electronic sound materials and processed acoustic textures filled with unpredictable events.

The Acoustic Cornet, an hommage to Leonora Carrington is available on Mahorka. [Bandcamp]