Hovering between different musical genres and therefore creating hybrid pieces has always been a particularity of Montreal duet Milliseconde topographie. The Musiques fossiles are a series of short electroacoustic pieces exploring the ancient intruments potential while using very actual tools of creation. For example, the basic material of Fossile No1 – Orgue has been generated as much with the different air pressure in the instrument bellows than with its transformation in a home-made software.

The choice of the material is triggered by a persistent curiosity for the old and the obsolete, the reminiscent elements of a bygone music all part of the same collective memory.

The harpsichord, the organ and the dulcimer are here blended with electronic and contemporary instrumentation.

The Musiques fossiles are exploiting the narrative power of the identifiable object, by the choice of the material, but also by an economy of treatment and effects. The sound object is often left very close to its raw form.

Alongside the constant evolution of the technological art possibilities is also evolving a certain quest for naturalness. With these growing means, the choice has also been made to work on simplicity and fragility. In the creating process has been integrated casual improvisation and deliberate infiltration of imperfections. This mysterious attraction for impurity and inaccuracy, in those fossil musics, gives the first role to an out-of-tune dulcimer and to an air deprived hissing organ.

To compose in duet also requires to redefine the working process. The basic material is generated conjointly. It then passes through the stages of solitary work, file exchanges and mutual confidence. The pieces, sent back and forth between the two musicians, then slowly take form as would do an exquisite corpse.