An Auditory Survey of the Last Days of the Holocene

Great recording – Tom Allen, CBC Music About Time

His most ambitious project to date… – Robert Rowat, CBC Music

…latest masterpiece. This musical experience is a much-needed reminder of the healthy world we’re all working toward. – Zenith Wolfe, La Scena Musicale ★★★★★


This new composition/album presents a radical catalogue of our created world’s sounds. The audience is faced with the echoes of our human-made environment, stripped bare of visual distractions.
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An Auditory Survey of the Last Days of the Holocene is a fearless work. It focuses on the environment from an auditory perspective, presenting a catalogue of our created world’s sounds by tallying the noises, echoes, reverberations and refrains associated with environmental degradation that leads to climate change. The sequential recordings of traffic, machinery, drilling, fracking and more serve as a backdrop for musical responses and reflections from the piano and percussion instruments, that simultaneously respond, reflect and develop the soundscape journey from one of hostile discord to one of reconciliation and peace. The audience is faced with the sounds of our man-made environment, stripped bare of visual distractions, and taken on a journey of action and possibility. We see this as a way to reach people on a whole new, visceral level. As humans, we get to decide what sounds we take forward with us into a new era and which ones we resolve to leave behind.

Frank Horvat has been successfully exploring states of the human condition in contemporary times…This prolific composer keeps surprising us with diversity and an extent of musical expression, language and themes…his message is clear: music is an important tool in raising the level of positivity and hope on this planet as well as in our individual lives. Change is possible. – Ivana Popovic, WholeNote Magazine


Recording funded in part thanks to generous support from:

Canada Council for the Arts

Recording funded in part thanks to FACTOR

An Auditory Survey Of The Last Days Of The Holocene - composed by Frank Horvat, performed by SHHH!! Ensemble

Type

Electro-Chamber

Album Art

View booklet

Musicians

SHHH!! Ensemble
Edana Higham (piano), Zac Pulak (percussion)

Composed By

Frank Horvat

Produced By

Carl Talbot

Recorded At

Le Domaine Forget by Carl Talbot,
May 2023

Mastered By

Marc Theriault (Le Lab Mastering)

Cover Graphic

Brad Cherwin

Release Date

20 October 2023

Frank Horvat has carved a niche for himself among today’s composers, wearing his fragile heart on his sleeve and writing music that emphasizes the emotional over the intellectual.
– Robert Rowat, CBC Classical

Horvat is known for distilling complex analyses into avant-garde, yet digestible experiences. Each sample is used sparingly, so as not to overshadow the instruments; they never sound tacky or appended to the music for the sake of melodrama. – Zenith Wolfe, La Scena Musicale

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