Alessandro Perini – “Epilogue. Reindeers” (2024)
for electric guitar and tape

☞ Click here to download full score ☜

This is the final movement in the Kilpisjärvi Sessions cycle, based on field recordings made during the BIOART residency in 2018 at the biological research station of Kilpisjärvi, Finland.

At a certain point of my hike, I came across a multitude of reindeers, clustered on the slope like a large wall made of small sound sources, producing sounds from their bells and low moans, audible here and there in the accompanying tape. The tape part is also composed of electric guitar fragments taken from the previous movement (“Geology. Earth Data Collector“): I recorded them onto cassettes, and hacked a cassette player so that its playback speed could be controlled via software and Arduino.

By playing this “instrument” I layered three different improvisations and used them as a harmonic basis for the live electric guitar part, which sort of comments it. The analog sound of this last piece is intended for making it sound almost as a found, damaged document of a lost memory.

The electronic track was built by recording snippets of the guitar part from “Geology. Earth Data Collector” on a cassette. A tape player was hacked and controlled by Max/MSP via Arduino. The result was mixed with the reindeers’ sounds.

Electric guitar: Giulia Pastorino

Recorded at Casa Della Musica San Michele, Montaldeo

Part of “Kilpisjärvi Sessions”, a cycle of seven pieces written for Collettivo_21.

See also, from the same series: “Ornithology II. Stereophonics“
“Kilpisjärvi Sessions” playlist on Soundcloud

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Premiered by Collettivo_21 / Giulia Pastorino at Cantiere Internazionale D’Arte di Montepulciano 2025 (Italy).