Tom Green and John Rixon join us to present their ‘music for MRI scanners’.
John Rixon is best known as the Big Chill’s resident VJ (aka Amukidi) and visual programming manager. Tom Green is a musician and composer and was commissioned by the Royal Children’s hospital in Bristol UK to produce music designed to induce feelings of calm and security in children under going the scanning procedure in their new Magnetic Resonance Imaging Scanner.

Word of this project spread amongst the music fraternity and friends – and Tom was keen to get feedback as to how adults would respond to this primarily child-friendly music. Many of them who practice yoga, meditation reported extremely positive results when using the music as musical accompaniment, achieving states of calm unusual in their clarity and tranquillity. Massage practitioners have found that their clients report especially effective relief from treatment given while this music is playing.

Tom’s compositions are deliberately ambient, avoiding obviously melody and rhythm, since the best scanner results come from very still children! In adults the lack of obvious rhythm allow the yoga or tai-chi practitioner to find their own pace among the many ‘time-layers’ that are incorporated in the deep structure of each piece. Careful attention has been paid to find the right balance of frequencies likely to resonate with the listener’s innate memories of positive spaces in natural surroundings, while avoiding the somewhat saccharin quality of music so-called ‘new age music’. These pieces are more related to the minimalist structures of La Monte Young, Phil Niblock, and Gavin Bryars, and the ambient work of Brian Eno.

John Rixon has created the visuals for the piece with the clear intention of mirroring the light, textures and space of the music. It was felt to be important to conjure up a sense of space, created in form, colour and texture, where the music and imagery would sit together, each comfortable in each other’s space. All of the work was created with six still images – two for each of the three 20 minute pieces. These stills were, ironically, of fast, chaotic scenes, a firework display and lighting rigs in full flow at the Big Chill Festival. Careful cropping and manipulation turned them into ethereal ‘light drawings’.  These were then animated and layered together to form the final motion paintings

Digiville is our monthly event for digital and moving image artists. Each event incorporates a diverse cross-section of the digital arts community, from installation artists to animators and VJs, and involves an initial presentation of work, either by individual artists or artist groups, followed by a Q&A/discussion session. The artists invited to present their work or perform are a careful mix of well-known names and less established artists.

Watch this space for news of our next Digiville event or contact us to join our mailing list and receive regular updates.