In 2023 Dutch DJ and electronic music producer, upsammy, aka Thessa Torsing was offered a prestigious commission by the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam to create new audio work for an upcoming exhibition showing major pieces from the collection of the Boijmans van Beuningen museum in Rotterdam, including paintings by Monet, Yayoi Kusama, Dalí, Picasso, Mondrian, Rubens, Kiefer and others.
Instead of responding to any particular work, Torsing brought in Italian drummer Valentina Magaletti, working with her percussion, recording with different microphones, manipulating and augmenting her playing in the vast galleries and acoustic spaces of the museum. They navigated the rooms and responded to the elemental presences – to water in the fountains, to the light.
Originally, the suggestion had been made that Torsing collaborate with a harpist, but “this felt very obvious and safe,” she explains, “not really in line with the identity of Boijmans, which is modern art”. Instead, she took a more challenging route, inviting Magaletti to ‘shake up the space’, by using the architecture as another instrument, in a way that pushed usual limits – in part because it made noise in spaces where sound levels were usually controlled and policed.
The piece was called Breathe, Walk, Die and it was installed as an immersive walkthrough of the exhibition, blurring the boundaries between the digital and the percussive – there are struck metals, effervescent electronics, the muffled clap of hit skins, mallet-stroked marimba and glittering metals that might have been made in the box or in the gallery. It is subtle work, which unfurls without you really noticing, until in front of you appears a chrysanthemum of connected elements, while explosive snares echo into the distance behind petals of fizz and bleeps.
This project is the first time Torsing has worked with a drummer. In the past she has collaborated on a film project with Sjoerd Martens, with artist and designer Jonathan Castro, and has released on Dekmantel AD93, Nous’klaer Audio and Die Orakel. She regularly DJs and is currently touring her recent ambient album Strange Meridians as an AV show with software designed by Tharim Cornelisse to remix her own photos and videos.
In the past she has talked about her music as being about getting “more curious about your surroundings,” bringing back in details that might have been forgotten or taken for granted. The way the duo have worked primarily with the echoes and acoustic responses of the museum, re-sounding its halls and galleries, seems to be doing just this, using a range of different mics to play with scale and space: contact mics, moving binaural mics, even hydrophones. The result is less painterly than tactile. “It’s exciting to play with Valentina because her approach is very intuitive and comes from a certain flow state, and it’s also a very bodily experience,” Torsing says. This is different from her own approach, which is often very much ‘in the box’, and where she says she is interested in “meticulously shaping every sound” in her carefully crafted electronica.
“I wanted really not to consider this as a commission,” says Magaletti, despite the prestige and PowerPoints that went along with the invitation, “because somehow my creativity stops when I feel that it’s a commodity. It was good to be able to play around with loads of reverbs, different reactions from these rooms. Because I’m always fascinated by the sonics of things, especially in really big or small spaces. We got different responses to the percussions and had a few days just to experiment and have fun. I took it as playfully as possible, because that, to me, is what creativity entails.”
The pairing worked so well they had a glut of material to work with – far too much for just a single installation. “We ended up with so many hours of recording, and we just knew that at some point there would be something left for at least the length of an album,” explains Magaletti. They also began to take the material out to play live together, the next iteration of which will be at MUTEK festival later this month on 20 August. “People really started liking it [when we played live] so we knew we should definitely do something with it,” says Magaletti.
For the live iteration, Torsing uses loops and resamples recordings through a granular synth to duet with Magaletti’s percussions, who plays her usual setup of vibraphone and drum kit, as well as various toys and metals. Torsing describes the live performance as “a balance, between pleasurable turbulence and clarity. Some moments, many different textures overlap, where you cannot really differentiate what comes from the computer and what Valentina is playing. Sort of a rhythmic blanket,” she explains. “But then there are also moments where there is a clearer song structure with melodies from my side and where Valentina plays the vibraphone. I enjoy this shift between the turbulent, more grounding moments and more floating, inner moments.”
The album uses the Rijksmuseum recordings, but also adds entirely new elements, which they finished in a studio in London. It will be out on PAN, Magaletti hopes later this year to sync with her curatorial turn at Le Guess Who? in autumn, although nothing is yet set in stone.
For Magaletti, the collaboration is one in a string of many, which currently include an album with Osaka musician YPY, out on 22 August, as well as upcoming theatre collaboration, touring with Moin, and trying to get a venue off the ground with a collective of queer collaborators in London, along with existing group Holy Tongue. Magaletti says she liked working with Torsing – “I wouldn’t, you know, just embark on another collaboration if I didn’t like it!” she jokes.
“Valentina and I both have our separate domains so there is not so much discussion on how one should do their part,” says Torsing. “Ideally a collaboration is not only a merging of two sound worlds but really something new that comes into being.”
“There’s so much to be said about the exchange of energies [in collaboration] but also where the ego of a collaborator is placed,” says Magaletti. “What’s important is that it sounds good, whatever happens. Some people are more alpha or insecure, but what we’re doing is just an exchange of something fluid, it’s energy isn’t it? It’s not just about you or the other person. It’s about what’s coming out. I love people that are not seeking validation in their career, people that are vectors. We have this beautiful gift, so we try to channel it.”
upsammy and Valentina Magaletti perform at this year’s MUTEK festival in Montréal, which takes place from 19 to 24 August. For tickets, the lineup, and full information, click here.
