Pendular is an interactive musical system that explores the physical motion of hanging objects as a method for manipulating synthesized music. Using wind and light, we work in tandem to control the environment in which these objects react. As the objects swing and spin through the air, their movements are interpreted as sonic transformations ranging from calm and predictable to chaotic and random. It is a collaborative project with Elias Jarzombek.
We are naturally drawn to observing movements such as a balloon flying into the sky, or a pendulum swinging for eternity. These motions give us a glimpse into the infinite interconnected variables that make up our reality and provide us with a moment of meditative peace and contemplation. We use geometric primitives — a circle and a square — to highlight how the interaction between these fundamental physical building blocks appeals to that sensibility, and hope to inspire people’s imagination and memory through movement and sound. Our lyrics draw from scientific laws such as Newton’s Laws of Motion the Law of Conservation of Energy. We each speak in a different language, blending our voices into a soundscape controlled by the objects’ movements.
