the light comes in the name of the voice

by Corey Smith

supported by

jacobhleveton Breathtaking sonic atmospheres and provocative poetics at the level of the spoken word. I can't recommend this highly enough. Favorite track: Joan Sees Atlas From the Moon (1/3).

	/

Streaming + Download

Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.

Purchasable with gift card

$5 USD or more

1.	Overture 27:00	buy track
2.	Edward Gordon Craig’s The Steps 1 & 2 08:36	buy track
3.	Heu Me Domine 11:48	buy track
4.	Joan Sees Atlas From the Moon (1/3) 25:21	buy track
5.	Joan Sees Atlas From the Moon (2/3) 25:21	buy track
6.	Joan Sees Atlas From the Moon (3/3) 26:29	buy track
7.	Nothing Left of Me (Day’s End Aria) 20:12	buy track
8.	The Ghost in Hamlet Dines With the Commendatore 19:20	buy track
9.	A Chorus of Ghosts Celebrate the New Year 24:56	buy track
10.	( ) 30:01	buy track
11.	Moth Analemma 11:13	buy track
12.	Joan’s Brass Band Abruptly Casts Electric Light 26:05	buy track
13.	Empty Staircase Recitative 10:56	buy track
14.	A Solitary Ghost Celebrates the New Year (BWV 614) 09:59	buy track
15.	Near the Riverside Park Shelter in Detroit 04:21	buy track
16.	A Pipe Organ Catches 09:43	buy track
17.	And Then Falls (1/2) 19:47	buy track
18.	And Then Falls (2/2) 18:10	buy track
19.	Joan Sits With Herself (1/2) 26:04	buy track
20.	Joan Sits With Herself (2/2) 21:24	buy track
21.	Edward Gordon Craig’s The Steps 3 & 4 07:12	buy track
22.	Night Shift Vespers 12:24	buy track
23.	Helen Hartness Flanders Ballad Collection Cassette Digitization 02:51	buy track
24.	A Train Passes in Matfield Green, Kansas 10:54	buy track

about

Music from THE LIGHT COMES IN THE NAME OF THE VOICE, a 7-hour opera for an emptied theater, theatrical lighting, and sheer fabric forms. Premiered at the 280 SITE Gallery, School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Fall 2020.

Video Documentation: youtu.be/6_3FmHJdLXY

🪑

When the English captured Joan of Arc in 1430, they must have known that this person would be significant. So when they put her on trial, they went out of their way to document everything. The minutes of the trial, compiled in French, were translated into Latin 5 years later.

They are written in a peculiar style. It’s not written as a set of dialogues as we might think of transcription today, but rather as a set of statements. When asked X, she responded Y. When asked Z, she did not understand.

Joan was illiterate and only spoke French, the transcripts are in Latin. I don’t read either of those languages — the transcript that I’m consulting was translated into English in 2005. The text has been filtered through time and multiple languages —

"Asked whether her counsel revealed to her that she would escape from prison, she answered: 'Do I have to tell you?'
Asked whether that night the voice counseled and advised her what to answer, she said that if the voice revealed anything to her, she did not understand it.
Asked whether any light appeared on the last two days she heard voices, she said that the light comes in the name of the voice."

🪑

When Thomas Edison invented the phonograph in 1877, something entirely new happened. For the first time in human history, you could hear music separated from a human body. Music became placeless, timeless. Edison went on from music, of course, to electric light.

🪑

In the same way that recorded music is a record of sound that once happened, so too the mesh fabric forms of this opera are a record of light. We can’t see the movement of light, we can only see the demonstration of it striking something. When light strikes and passes through these nets, we can see them. This is a record of where light has been.

🪑

It’s spinning around absence. It’s spinning around things that are too big or too small to see. It’s spinning around God, although everything else is, too. It’s spinning around invisibility, imperceptibility. It’s spinning around light, the particle and the wave, completely vital and completely invisible in its motion. It’s spinning around unembodiment. It’s spinning around empty

credits

released December 24, 2022

license

about

Corey Smith Chicago, Illinois

composer, writer, performer, midwest enthusiast, aspiring ghost

contact / help

Contact Corey Smith

Streaming and
Download help

Redeem code

Report this album or account

If you like Corey Smith, you may also like:

Spänningar
by Huvudbry

Improvisational pieces that blossom into moments of melody and cover topics such as “voltage & how certain apples will keep you young.” Bandcamp New & Notable Sep 18, 2023
go to album
The Clearing
by The Twilite Tone

featured on Bandcamp Radio Aug 25, 2020
go to album
Age of Execution
by Brian Wenner

Brian Wenner unleashes another batch of sizzling experimental electronic music, alternately dissonant and tuneful. Bandcamp New & Notable Nov 14, 2023
go to album
bivouac of the avant-garde: contemporary minimal, electronic and experimental music, vol.2
by Difficult Art And Music

The 17 mindbending songs on this compilation represent minimalist experimental music at its best, a collage of blips and static. Bandcamp New & Notable Dec 3, 2022
go to album
Darkness Visible - EP
by Stephen Roddy

An experimental composer from Ireland, Stephen Roddy proves equally adept at crushing soundscapes as he does mysterious melodies. Bandcamp New & Notable Mar 13, 2022
go to album
Good Spirit Inner Station [DEL-023]
by Del Stephen

A beautiful minimalist electronic record that captures the feel and sound of nature in each humming song. Bandcamp New & Notable Jun 14, 2021
go to album
42 Days 四十二天
by Southeast of Rain 东南有雨

This stunning, beautiful project from Fujian duo Southeast of Rain 东南有雨 blends field recordings with rippling notes from the pipa. Bandcamp New & Notable Feb 8, 2021
go to album