Toulouse: Laurent Bernadac’s music, indexed on the curve of global warming
In his latest video, which can be viewed on Youtube, Facebook and Instagram for a week, Laurent Bernadac offers music called “Climax”, the chords of which are indexed on the curve of global warming. An original clip from this Toulouse engineer, who lives between Toulouse and Béziers and five years ago created the company 3DVarius (which produces three-dimensional violins), for whom music and physics have a lot to teach us. Maintenance.
Comment did you get the idea of composing music indexed on the curve of global warming?
As an engineer, I try to get the most upcoming data on a topic. In this specific case, it was the readings of average ground temperatures, from 1885 (start of the industrial revolution) to the present day, which really convinced me of the reality of global warming. These are past data, not future projections, which have been obtained and correlated globally by several independent sources. From my point of view, it is the information that I consider the most reliable, the most direct. On this curve, I was pointed out to note a clear and regular rise in temperatures from 1885 with a second more pronounced acceleration from the 1970s. It is this phenomenon that I wanted to highlight.
Is there a real environmental message emanating from this music, as more than 120 heads of state will give speeches at the COP26 in Glasgow?
Like everyone else, I am concerned by this problem and these issues. In fact, I feel more confident than when I physically searched for the right data. I needed to go to the source of the information, in particular that of the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Editor’s note), and others. But beyond the conclusions, it is the data that does not interest me. I used the raw data to translate into sensations.
How to translate scientific data into music?
It’s a bit complicated to explain… Beyond the production of electric violins, we have also created effects for electric violins, and also pulse response, that is to say the audio translation of a sound that is different from one instrument to another. With for example the sound of the sea, which contains all the audible frequencies, I was able to extract a note from it, then a chord and so on. I then decided to index this sound to the global warming curve. I finally noticed that this increase, which is linear throughout the song – I start from a tempo of 80 to end at 160 -, you only feel it from the second part of the song. that means that things are physically there, but they are only felt when they understand a certain threshold.
What are the reactions after uploading your clip “Climax”?
We have 400 views on Youtube, 5,000 on Facebook and 1,000 on Instagram. I have already started to have contact with climate activists who ask me for interviews.
What message do you want to convey through this clip, some images of which clearly denounce the company and its excesses?
A simple message: if one is not convinced by global warming, this music, which is an emotional transformation of raw data that has been around since 1885, can make it possible to feel them physically. Little by little, the acceleration of progress is almost exponential. Capitalism, financial and digital exchanges, and the explosion of all debts. We are exceeding money that we do not have and that we will not be able to repay and we have encountered on the heads of future generations these debts that we will not be able to assume. It is, to say the least, thoughtless. Music has the possibility of conveying a message, of speaking to as many people as possible. Affect in any case the people who must know this evolution. This is my small contribution to global warming.