Composite

Composite is not just playing together simultaneously.
A composite is something else. Something more.
But simultaneity is required to constitute a composite.

Where is the composite constituted?
Who is the constitutor?
The musician? Me? The fellow musicians? The audience?

Composites may result from both monophonic and polyphonic material. For me, an important success criterion of an interesting composite is when I am uncertain if what I am playing is part of the composite or not – when I am confused whether what I do is audible or not; if it is me who makes that sound or if it is, let’s say, the clarinet, or the drum, or what ever; when the composite components are detached from the instruments, even if they are the ones generating them.

We perceive composites differently.
We focus on different aspects.
Details in my own playing are more noticeable to me,
details in the bass are more noticeable to the bass player.
Individual audience members also choose where to focus their attention.
A composite is not an absolute; no fixed and identifiable object. 
It appears differently depending on who is observing it, and from which angle it is being observed.
Perhaps it is the process of creating composites that is most significant to how we work?

A compelling composite offers something new, something more than the sum of its components, something alluring and unexpected. Unexpected, even if it is a result of combinations of well-known components. It is almost like some kind of chemical reaction when two or more rhythmic components fuse into a composite. Unexpected amalgams emerge.

Usage

1. From Dans les arbres' “L'Immatériel” on Canopée:  (00:10)

2. From Dans les arbres' “La Transparence” on Canopée:  (00:06)

3. Recordings of Dans les arbres, cut up and re-organized into isolated musical events, and new composites:  (01:03). Elements of the above clip appears in new combinations. 

4. The double-exposed and slightly off layered videos are composites, and thus a visual derivate from the ensembles’ use of composite sounds: