The inspiration for Bouffée came from an intense personal experience: childbirth. I wanted to translate into sounds the sensations of contractions, concentration, holding one’s breath, and the trance state of labour.

Most of the sound material came from the Babel Table, an instrument invented by Totem contemporain’s Jean-François Laporte, who invites artists to compose for his unusual instruments. That is how I ended up in Montréal (Québec) in 2023 for a composer’s residency. The original mixed version of Bouffée was premiered in concert on November 2, 2023. In 2024, I revisited this work to turn it into an acousmatic piece.

The Babel Table is powered by an air compressor that pushes air in its various pipes and onto membranes. This mechanism produces sustained sounds (among other things), not unlike a pipe organ or bagpipes. Sound duration is freed from the limits of the human breath. These unusual sonic properties were crucial to portray what I felt while giving birth. To be able to sustain some sounds infinitely scrambles the listener’s sense of time, which is how I felt during childbirth, with minutes seeming to stretch or disappear completely. I feel a form of sweetness buried within the intense and at times noisy passages that give this piece its shape. I hope you will be able to perceive it too.

— Sophie Delafontaine [English translation: François Couture, vi-26]

Bouffée [Puff] was realized in 2023 at the composer’s studio in Brussels (Belgium) and at Productions Totem contemporain’s workshop in Montréal (Québec). The original mixed version for Babel Table and fixed media was premiered on November 2, 2023 by Jean-François Laporte as part of the concert Totem électrique XVI at Salle bleue of Édifice Wilder — Espace danse in Montréal. The work was revised in an acousmatic form in 2024 at the composer’s studio. That version of Bouffée was premiered on November 29, 2024 as part of the Autumn Waves festival presented by the Belgian Federation for Electroacoustic Music (FeBeME-BeFEM) at the Projection Room in Brussels. Bouffée was composed with the support of Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles — Service des musiques.

Composition

• 2023, Personal studio, Brussels (Belgium)
• October 25 – November 2, 2023, Productions Totem contemporain, Montréal (Québec)

Revision

• 2024, Personal studio, Brussels (Belgium)

Premiere

• November 29, 2024, Autumn Waves: Concert 2, Project(ion) Room, Brussels (Belgium)

Awards

• Finalist, Totem électroacoustique 2025, Montréal (Québec)