End.> Vacuum: Realization in IX Movements by Michael Einziger of Incubus
TechZulu recently had the pleasure of catching exclusive, behind the scenes footage of End.>Vacuum, an original orchestral composition debuted by Michael Einziger, guitarist for rock band Incubus. A sixty-piece orchestra, conducted by Suzie Katayama, performed the composition. The musicians were a mix of professional philharmonic players and friends of Einziger that he called “The Graviton Modern Ensemble.” He describes it as a realization in nine movements and as an “insomnia-induced orchestral anxiety attack.”
The inspiration for End Vacuum came to Einziger largely in part from his love of science. It is only fitting then that the 45-minute composition opened with a phenomenal presentation by Dr. Brian Cox, a world-renowned British physicist and BBC correspondent. Cox discussed particle physics and experiments being conducted at the Large Hadron Collider at CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research. The Large Hadron Collider is a huge scientific instrument that studies the smallest known particles in order to understand where the universe came from and where it is going. It is the largest, most powerful, expensive machine ever built by humans.
The show was at UCLA’s Royce Hall and also featured a 3D visualization component, created by Andrew Schwartz. Schwartz and his team used a process called chromadepth for the 3D visuals. They used 3D glasses with prisms inside the lenses, which separates color channels. All of this allows the brain to see red in front of green in front of blue, which then creates 3D content. They also used a process called 3D video mapping, which modeled the inside of the venue and created a 3D space to project into. The visual effects coordinated with movements of the music.
Einziger will be studying music theory at Harvard in the fall. He purposely wanted this to be a one time only, live, unedited show. If you missed it, hope for the DVD release, we’ll keep our fingers crossed.
