Nick Brooke

12 Transcendental Etudes weaves together sound collages with physical theater. Performers imitate a maquette of recordings, creating a gestural vocabulary in lock-step with samples. The piece riffs on etudes, piano pieces intended for learners, but sometimes only playable by virtuosi, and looks at listeners’ ability to transcend the technologies—microphones and ubiquitous recordings—that envelop them, while using familiar pop and recorded sources.