Experiment: BIG ORCHESTRA.

Rémi Mignot

In this experiment, some recordings of the same piece are re-aligned on a reference recording, and mixed all together to get an (hopefully) impressive effect.
We test on:

• 10 recordings of "The Miraculous Mandarin" of Béla Bartók (VI. Allegro: The Girl Sinks Down to Embrace Him),
• 4 recordings of the 3rd "Leçon de Ténèbres" of François Couperin (Caph).

The alignment is based on the method of: “Invariant Audio Prints for Music Indexing and Alignment”, see https://anasynth.papers.ircam.fr/2024/CBMI/ .

"The Miraculous Mandarin" - Béla Bartók

Here is an interpretation of a movement of "The Miraculous Mandarin" of Béla Bartók (VI. Allegro: The Girl Sinks Down to Embrace Him) with 10 orchestra playing simultaneously. Using one recording as reference, the 9 others are realigned in time to the reference, and all are mixed together.

The recordings are from:

• 1) Pierre Boulez and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra (yt-link).
      This recording is used as reference, and all others are aligned in time with it.
• 2) Pierre Boulez and the New York Philharmonic Orchestra (yt-link),
• 3) Charles Dutoit and the "Orchestre symphonique de Montréal" (yt-link),
• 4) Iván Fischer and Budapest Festival Orchestra (yt-link),
• 5) Zubin Mehta and the Berliner Philharmoniker (yt-link),
• 6) Georg Solti and Sinfonie-Orchester des Hessischen Rundfunks (yt-link),
• 7) Thomas Dausgaard and Scottish Symphony Orchestra (yt-link),
• 8) Esa-Pekka Salonen and the Philharmonia Voices (yt-link),
• 9) Leonard Slatkin and the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra (yt-link),
• 10) Susanna Mälkki and the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra (yt-link),

First the two recordings of Pierre Boulez are played together (1 and 2). The Chicago's recording on the left (reference) and the New York's version on the right. Then 4 others (3-6) comes gradually from 0:10 to 0:28, and at 0:29, the 4 last (7-10) comes suddenly.

"3rd Leçon de Ténèbres" - François Couperin

For the 3rd "Leçon de ténèbres" of François Couperin, we got 4 recordings of the movement: Caph.
As previously, using one recording as reference, the 3 others are realigned in time to the reference, and all are mixed together.
This sublime piece is a liturgical larmento on the topic of the thursday of the Easter week.
It is initially written for 2 soprano voices and accompagnment, but mixing 4 recordings together (pre-aligned in time) we get a chorus with 8 voices (4 x 2 voices actually).

Unfortunately, I got cuts at the ends. So I used a brutal fade out to avoid this cut... You can listen to the original track on youtube to ear the end if you want (Caph).
Otherwise the following piece is also beautiful (Lamed), or I advise you to listen all the 3 "Leçons de Ténèbres" from HERE.

The recordings (Caph) are from:

• 1) Carolyn Sampson and Marianne Beate Kielland (yt-link).
      This recording is used as reference, and all others are aligned in time with it.
• 2) Katherine Watson and Anna Dennis (yt-link),
• 3) Lucy Crowe and Elizabeth Watts (yt-link),
• 4) Claire Lefilliâtre and Isabelle Druet (yt-link).