Symphony of Construction 2023

All the way back in February 2021, Ian Spacek began assembling a team of builders and composers to begin a new round of Symphony of Construction, a two-medium game of artistic telephone originally conceived in 2014. A builder would send a photo of a Lego creation to a composer who would write and produce a piece of music based on the build. The composer would then send that piece of music to another Lego builder to interpret, and so on.

The result was a two-year excursion of construction and composition with eleven artists:

Builders

Paul Vermeesch
Markus Rollbühler
Eli Willsea
Bart De Dobbelaer
Tim Schwalfenberg
John Snyder

So get comfy, crank up your volume, and experience the journey below!

“Must they battle? This was the first question that came to mind as I studied Paul’s narratively enticing build. There was a clear invitation to score a fight scene, but I decided to musically linger in the tension of the standoff. Who are these figures and do they have an intertwined history? I imagined them as a Jacob and an Esau perhaps. Does the elder brother return for vengeance or reconciliation? Do they recognize each other among these ancient ruins? How many years has it been since they last saw each other and under what conditions? Is it a brutal world they inhabit? I sought to evoke hope and fear, the uncertainty surrounding these characters and the instability of their stage—Paul’s beautifully apocalyptic ruins.

Few settings intrigue me more than a return to the dark ages in a world riddled with the remnants of a forgotten technology. The curved pipes running along the ceiling of Paul’s creation immediately caught my eye, offering a portal into a potentially futuristic world. That said, one of my first musical decisions was whether or not to use electronic sounds. I knew synthesizers might scream “Sci-Fi” to the next builder, but I opted to blend in a few (layered with acoustic instruments) with the hope that they’d help create a somewhat genre defying soundscape. Sans a rhythmic treble synth and a few electric cello layers, the predominant synthesizers show up like a beastly roar in the middle of the track. I imagined these as the dragon-like creature crouched above the horizon. 

To paint the crumbling walls and dangling vines, I tried to create musical asymmetry with various percussive swells and rattlings. In the same vein, I also implemented percussive elements that felt visually relevant. The piece opens and closes with a heavy wooden tapping, like the prodigal’s staff echoing across the ruins as, with each step, it hits the stone floor. I used ringing metal bowls and sheets to represent the character's swords. Additionally, I gave a nod to ye old western standoffs with the airy flutes and wind chimes. I also featured a duduk (a beautiful ancient Armenian double reed woodwind made of apricot wood!) and I would like to go on record and say that I composed this track in April of 2021 before Hans Zimmer made the duduk cool with his Dune score in September 2021. Lastly, for you theory nerds out there, I wanted to end the piece with a question mark surrounding these figure’s fate, so the final chord contains both the major and minor versions of itself. The major chord hovers in the higher register, while the minor iteration muddies the lower register, creating a ghostly dissonance that’s almost elusive. Will they fight?” 

- Ian

“To me, the most beautiful part of composing music from an image is that it allows me to complete it with motion through imagination. As a composer, I want to describe as much as possible, and with my imagination, I can transfer myself into that world, visualizing it in depth and expressing it with music.

Markus’s fantastic LEGO creation easily allowed my mind to wander that world.

After a long, torrid journey, just when all seemed lost, the protagonist finally discovers the city; the legend exists. The majestic white-marbled towers and the shining golden roofs, the sun being their completion. A great work of craftsmanship, a great architectural masterpiece. To introduce the city and the moment of discovery, I used horns for the main theme followed by strings and flutes to describe its beauty. A bold percussion passage follows, which hints at the tall towers and their splendor.

As we continue our journey through the city, I imagined our protagonist hearing a choir singing from a cathedral nearby. For this scene, I completed the choral passage with some crescendos, gongs, chimes, metals, and some various orchestral effects to create a fitting atmosphere.

The city streets are busy and prosperous, people are going to their daily activities, and their lives have purpose. Exhausted from his long journey, the protagonist is taking a breath and covers from the sun for a moment. As he looks up, he sees a small flock of birds flying from roof to roof. This is represented by airy, quiet, strings and the scratching sounds of the instruments. In my opinion, this part is a testament to the brilliance of orchestral music, and why I love it so much.

The composition continues with the reprise of the main theme, but this time performed with a powerful and confident cello passage to represent the protagonist rejuvenated and ready to continue his mission as he approaches the king’s court.”

- Mihai

“When composing this piece, I wanted to capture the mesmerizing vision of light’s reflection through water and gemstone. A series of chimes representing the image are prominent in the music as the orchestral bed illuminates the fantastic world around it. Finding the right chime was difficult and I finally combined several to create a certain tasteful dissonance representing the shimmering quality of the reflections. The sound of elegant chisels gently shaping the gems out of which the light flows opens and closes the piece.

In my initial designs, the orchestra played a much bolder part in representing those grandiose places we sometimes see in dreams. However, just as we dream and take these surreal places for granted, I decided to let the orchestra fade into the background as the piece progresses, eclipsed by the beautiful light which illuminates it. This is the music between sleeping and waking when images of places beyond reality shimmer into life and then fade away. Enjoy!”

- Josiah

“My process will vary from project to project, but for this project, I came up with a dramatic backstory for the build, and I wrote music to accompany my journey as I let my imagination guide me.

Backstory:
The build I received shows a single character alone on a planet full of exotic plants and vegetation, sitting on what I imagined to be a long-forgotten but incredibly advanced piece of technology. What does the technology do? Destroy worlds? Create portals for transportation? Who knows! But it is extremely powerful, and it COULD HAVE CHANGED THE WAR! That was many years ago. Now our main character might be the only one in the universe who still believes that her great great great great great grandfather developed a technology powerful enough to overthrow the empire, and not only has she finally discovered the technology on an unknown and unregistered planet, but she also plans to turn it on!

Part 1: Loss and the Forgotten Planet
Part 1 focuses on the world and the history of the main character's people from the main character's perspective. It builds on and off, bringing up themes that remind me of the empire that has now been ruling the universe for generations as well as the incredibly powerful square structure our main character seeks. I imagine the main character actively searching the planet for the square structure in this scene, and at the end of part 1, she finally finds it! I use dancing orchestral instruments to depict the planet's unique wildlife. I  use choirs in the orchestration because I imagined the world and technology to be ancient, with lots of history surrounding both. I contrast this traditional orchestration with a lead synth and dark synth textures to add a digital feel and reveal the loss the main character feels from her experiences with the empire. The darker orchestration makes me think of the corruption of the empire. The subtle doubling of woodwind parts with synths makes me think of a loss of innocence, the innocence that had once existed everywhere before the war but now seems only to exist in remote places like this distant forgotten planet.

Part 2: Destiny
After the main character discovers the structure, there is a pause of silence before part 2 introduces a very different mood. In part 2, I explore the main character's thoughts as she musters up the courage to turn on the device. She is scared because she doesn't know exactly what will happen to her when she turns on the structure and walks through the portal it creates, but her journey to get here has been very, very long, and she won't give up now! I picture her in a sort of trance speaking to the different people she believes she is doing it for, her family and friends who are ruled by the empire, her great great great great great grandfather. This scene is about her in a trance, building up the courage to activate the structure and enter the portal. The more intimate orchestration is her talking with her family, and the more intense moments are her believing more and more that this is her destiny. Finally, she works up enough boldness to activate the device. The structure comes to life, and after giving one last look back at the world, she walks through the portal.”

- Josh

“I was really quite excited when I saw Tim’s build for the first time! The unique texture of foliage and machines immediately had me thinking of an abandoned spaceship where the machines had become a living organism. When Ian and I sat down for our initial planning session we envisioned a story for the character of the space explorer. I wanted the piece to tell the story of the adventurer's journey through this strange abandoned ship, approaching the glowing heart in the center of the cavern. 

The beginning sets the tone of the room mixing organic and mechanical sounds like water pops with hard metallic beats. Underneath, deep choir chords breathe a consistent repeating sigh as if the whole room is breathing. Ian did an excellent job finding strange sounds and mixing them to get the perfect living metal feel. I then composed the main theme of the explorer as he takes his steps through this strange world to reach the heart. The music builds as the adventurer reaches the core and stretches out his hand to touch the shimmering heart. I particularly like Ian’s inclusion of the bending horns and gut strings in the build which give a complex and exciting tone to the moment our adventurer makes contact with the heart. 

A blinding flash of light blots out our view of the adventure as he is transported through an otherworldly portal. The cacophony of strange sounds and sights that greet the explorer will never be quite understood as we end with a last garbled transmission!

It was a blast to create this score and while it took some time to complete it was wonderful to be able to collaborate with Ian once more.”

- Lee