“The mind is like a parachute, it only works when it is open.”

La vie de l’esprit (The Life Of The Mind) is an allegory on the workings of the mind, the ideas and the imagination that I designed and created in collaboration with Manon De Pauw. The work focuses around three distinct elements which intertwine throughout the piece:

• Influx, such as data bandwidths;

• Synapses, demonstrating connections that create cerebral electricity and the transmission of information in the brain;

• The mind, where form, imagination and the network of thought appear.

To the live video score I juxtaposed fluid and electrifying music which is at times chaotic and at times airy, like the billowing of a parachute. In so doing I proposed to the musicians of Ensemble SuperMusique an environment in which they thrive, one of creativity and freedom. Manon De Pauw, for her part, used minimal means to create the live video score. Using only water, a few paint brushes and water-colour paint, her pictorial gestures on the surface of a light table evoke retinal, cellular and neural images.

— Joane Hétu [English translation: Elizabeth Millar]

Joane Hétu thanks the Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec (CALQ) for its support in the research and creation of this work.

Premiere

• November 27, 2019, Sonne l’image, Amphithéâtre — Le Gesù, Montréal (Québec)

Recording

• November 27, 2019, Maxime Audet-Halde • Amphithéâtre – Le Gesù, Montréal (Québec)

Mixing

• June 17 – July 6, 2021, Robert Langlois, Joane Hétu • Studio 270, Montréal (Québec)

Mastering

• September 16 – 21, 2021, Ross Murray • Happyrock International, Chelsea (Québec)

Performers

• Ensemble SuperMusique (ESM) (Cléo Palacio-Quintin, flutes; Jean Derome, alto saxophone, flute, objects; Joane Hétu, alto saxophone, voice, objects; Elizabeth Millar, clarinet; Guido Del Fabbro, violin, synthesizer; Rémy Bélanger de Beauport, cello; Olivier St-Pierre, piano; Vergil Sharkya’, synthesizer; Anne-F Jacques, mechanical objects; Émilie Payeur, no-input, electronic gizmos, mini lo-fi synth; Isaiah Ceccarelli, drum kit; Danielle Palardy Roger, percussion)