What inspired your new听composition听Six Lethargies?
Keaton Henson听 听 听Sad songs are something we all understand. I wondered if, instead of bringing people to tears, which can be quite cathartic, I could give them a direct musical experience of my anxiety disorder. When I used to perform live, I would distract myself from my anxiety by watching my audience 鈥� this group of 3000 strangers 鈥� and how they reacted to certain chord changes and certain inflections in my voice. You can really feel this happening. I became fascinated by the mechanisms of empathy.
And music is one of those mechanisms?
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KH听 听 听For sure. Every culture we know of dances around a fire. Our heartbeats sync up, we all follow this one rhythm, and we feel the tribe unite. If I explain my break-up in words, say, you will be able to understand to a degree what I鈥檓 going through. But if I write a piece of music and play it to you, you might just start crying, and that鈥檚 totally incredible because I鈥檓 not giving you any framework. I鈥檓 not necessarily reminding you of something from your past. It鈥檚 purely those patterns that are bringing you to tears.
What can we expect from the performance?
KH听 听 听The Britten Sinfonia听are performing a piece in six movements, and five of these movements simply explain how I feel. But there鈥檚 also a movement that鈥檚 designed to elicit those feelings in the Barbican Hall audience, which is where Brendan comes in.
Brendan Walker 听 听I鈥檓 best known for my work helping design roller-coasters. More generally, I鈥檓 playing with the synergies between bodily rhythms and patterns in nature that have an emotional impact. Think, for example, about breathing rhythm, heartbeat, and why we find calm in the sound of waves crashing on a beach. For Six Lethargies we鈥檙e gathering electrodermal activity data from a portion of the audience. The electrical conductivity of the skin is the physiological trait most closely associated with the state of anxiety and the one that鈥檚 most easily decoded.
KH听 听 听Brendan鈥檚 kit is set up so that a tiny pore on someone鈥檚 fingertip will control the hall鈥檚 huge lighting rig, in real time. It鈥檚 an amazing thing, and very beautiful. It can be a very uniting and comforting thing to be surrounded by people. At the same time, being surrounded by people you don鈥檛 know is a perfect breeding ground for anxiety. The more anxious you become, the more you feel, 鈥淥h God, I鈥檓 anxious again, and everyone will notice!鈥� Well, we鈥檙e going to be projecting people鈥檚 anxiety through the entire lighting rig of the Barbican Hall. This perfectly represents what anxiety is like.
And the more anxious the audience is, the more anxious you鈥檙e going to make them鈥�
BW听 听 听Yes. In the movement I鈥檓 working on, we鈥檙e not just trying to communicate. We鈥檙e trying to actually elicit a state of anxiety. We鈥檙e talking about having quiet rooms and ways to extract people if they feel panicked at any stage.
KH听 听听 I鈥檓 hoping that Friday鈥檚 performance at the Barbican will be the first of many. We鈥檙e interested in trying different things for each show, including varying the type of data we gather, and who we choose to gather data from.
How much research went into this piece?
KH听 听 听In particular I went to Canada to meet with a cognitive neuroscientist called Jessica Grant who studies the relationship between music, rhythm and emotion. But I鈥檓 a massive science nerd, and I鈥檓 wary of crossing too far into the realm of research. I wanted to use scientific thought and theory to help express what I鈥檓 feeling. I didn鈥檛 want *Six Lethargies* to become manipulative or sterile.
How did you go about composing Six Lethargies?
KH听 听 听I kept asking myself, what鈥檚 the exact opposite of what I鈥檓 trying to achieve? It鈥檚 probably baroque music, because that鈥檚 all about resolving tension, again and again. It delivers these constant hits of relief. I don鈥檛 want to give too much away about the show, but a lot of it is going to be about what people think they鈥檙e going to get next 鈥� and what I can do to stop them getting it.
You could simply not turn up鈥�
KH听 听听 I鈥檝e given myself certain limitations! For instance, I鈥檓 composing purely for string orchestra 鈥� believe me, you can do some really weird stuff with strings. And听Six Lethargies is a tonal composition. Atonal music is everyone鈥檚 go-to method for inducing anxiety. But I鈥檓 a singer-songwriter. I write pop songs. I work with intervals and scales. I decided I would try to make an anxious piece while hitting all the proper notes.
鈥淧roper鈥� for whom?
KH听 听听 Music is built out of the melody of speech, and the way our speech patterns convey emotion. We assume Western music is a sort of universally understood music that can convey emotion intuitively to all cultures, and as it turns out we鈥檙e not altogether wrong. Pretty much everyone around the world will hear the Moonlight Sonata and think, Wow, Beethoven must have been really sad when he wrote that.
Do people expect anxiety to sound a certain way?
KH听 听 听A lot of people have been talking to me about Bernard Herrmann鈥檚 theme music for the film Psycho. And, naturally, I鈥檝e avoided any suggestion of that in this project. I want to avoid anything that people might expect to hear. Anxiety is all about not knowing what is going to happen next.
Is that what it鈥檚 like to have your anxiety disorder?
KH听 听听 In horror movies, when the terrifying thing bursts out of the door, you鈥檙e given this horrible fright which lasts a millisecond and is immediately followed by听a sigh of relief. You鈥檙e pulling on a string and then releasing it. For me, that tension is never released. It鈥檚 like an infinite rollercoaster, just building up, and up, and the higher it gets, the more you realise the drop is going to be very steep indeed鈥�
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- The Britten Sinfonia premieres听 at 8pm on 20 July 2018 at the Barbican Hall in London
