Saylor/Lane Duo:
Evelyn Saylor & Rebecca Lane
Change Patterns No. 1
for two voices (2018)
Change Patterns No. 2
for two voices (2018)
Unearthly Bioacoustics
for voices, flute, organ pipes & quadraphonic live electronics (2022)
Supported by INM
Having met as performers of microtonal music, Evelyn Saylor with the voice and Rebecca Lane with the flute and microtonal bass flute, Saylor and Lane began working compositionally together in 2018. They composed and performed two pieces for their own a cappella voices based on the English tradition of change ringing patterns, entitled “Change Patterns No. 1” and “Change Patterns No. 2”
During this time they also began their research into summation and difference tones, otoacoustic emissions, and the relationship of these combination tones to ratio-based tunings. They pursued this research working with the voice, the flute and piccolo, synthesizer, and laptop via software created by Saylor using the program Max/MSP.
In 2022 they picked up this research again, and developed and premiered “Unearthly Bioacoustics”, a cycle of works for voices, flute, organ pipes & quadraphonic live electronics. In it, Saylor and Lane use their voices, instruments, live electronic processing and four-channel spatialization to project the hypothetical language of imagined creatures. Inspired by such terrestrial examples as the high-pitched microtonal pings of the Australian bellbirds, the bioluminescence of anglerfish, and the wing-beating frequencies of bees, they seek to depict the sounds, interactions, and communication patterns of imagined sci-fi species. Their musical vocabulary includes combination and difference tones, otoacoustic emissions, and their relationship to ratio-based microtonal tunings.
Evelyn Saylor 