Masashi Yamamoto “Real Time -The Elf in Big f-” 

Program note

This piece focuses on the sounds heard in "real time" and the gestures of the performers. There are various combinations of discrepancies between appearance and performance: Sounds that should not be heard are heard, sounds that should be heard are heard with a delay, and so on.

What if the sound you hear is not the sound the player is making?

The starting point was this idea; What if the "sound” not made from the player is an imaginary being living inside the double bass? I thought it would be interesting to create a setting where the "sound not emitted by the player" was an imaginary being living inside the double bass, so I proceeded with the production. One day, a scene came to me: "When I woke up, I saw a wooden pole (soul post) in front of me, and when I tried to hang on to it, I saw a light in the distance in the shape of the letter 'f,' and beyond it, a vague shadow (the bow) was moving from side to side.

The piece begins with a harmonic pizzicato with both hands, a technique peculiar to the contrabass, and soon the sounds of someone or something living inside the body of the instrument can be heard. In response, the player also plays, and they come close together, but the inhabitant inside the f-hole begins to rampage and the player tries to

drive it out, then the battle between the two begins. What will happen to this whereabouts? And is it really the performer or some elf playing the instrument?