AUDITORIUM
a collaboration with Yann Novak
12 channel audio installation/performance, 2006 + 2007

"On par with similar past performances in the same setting by Angel and Alva Noto (both back in ‘04), these gentlemen were at peak level as the a/v experience was fully immersive, wrapping and slithering around me like a wild amphibian. One of the major highlights this year by far. A duo to watch." - TJ Norris

"One of the most dramatic experimental pieces presented at Mutek, and quite beautiful" - Grooves Magazine

"Artists Jamie Drouin and Yann Novak presented their breakthrough project Auditorium, an experimental sound cycle that uses performance space as the meeting point for a medley of static, field, and found sounds. The result is an interactive sound journey shared by a dazzled audience." - Concordia University's The Link

Version 1 was performed at The Henry Art Gallery (Seattle) on Novenber 18, 2006
Version 2 was performed at Mutek 2007, Society for Art and Technology (Montreal) on June 1st 2007

Auditorium is a live sound collaboration between Yann Novak and Jamie Drouin. The two artists first met on a panel discussion hosted by Seattle’s 2006 Decibel Festival at the Henry Art Gallery, and both immediately recognized a connection between their two bodies of soundwork; using altered field recordings and sharing a mutual interest in exploring the ability of sound to alter the atmosphere of spaces we inhabit—physically and emotionally.

Two months later, the two artists met once again at the Henry Art Gallery to perform Auditorium, which uses the performance space itself as a sonic point of departure. Recordings made by Novak of the empty space were amplified and layered to create a singular, modulating drone which enhanced the particular ‘fingerprint’ of the space. Drouin’s approach was to define the space with a more scalpel-like hand, inserting sonic pings and rhythms which called attention to the depth and scale of the auditorium, and to interject more textural sounds which would occassionally push the listeners attention outside of the building, reminding them of the thin membrane between the inside/outside worlds.

A revised version of Auditorium was presented at Montreal's Mutek in 2007 in La Société des arts technologiques.