Sonic Bites: La salle des fêtes // Them! There! Eyes? // Rachamaid

Since launching in 2020, Sonic Bites has supported 40 artists, including five commissions alongside rare content from Cryptic’s archive. Each piece was created originally for screen – pushing beyond traditional performance recordings to explore fresh, imaginative ways of experiencing music and visual art in the digital space.

The three works on display in the CCA gallery are:

La salle des fêtes // Ela Orleans

La salle des fêtes transports us to the ethereal realms of the Musée d’Orsay’s salle des fêtes. This piece weaves together classical orchestration, AI elements, and the surreal lyricism of Giorgio de Chirico’s novel Hebdomeros. Through a fusion of sound and imagery, viewers embark on a transcendent exploration of travel, movement, and the enduring power of preservation. Crafted during a time of personal introspection, La salle des fêtes represents the artist’s journey through grief and longing. Orleans employs a quasi-archival approach, merging sketches, photographs, and film to create a kaleidoscopic tapestry that invites viewers to lose themselves in its depths.

A Cryptic Commission

Music by Ela Orleans

Archival materials from Rick Prelinger Archives

Text, drawings and paintings by Giorgio de Chirico

Translated by John Ashbery

Them! There! Eyes? // Sonia Killmann

Sonia Killmann’s highly stylised audiovisual work Them! There! Eyes? addresses the concept of eye contact as a powerful element in creating emotional bonds. Consisting of broken-up and heavily processed samples of Ella Fitzgerald’s recording of Them There Eyes, merged with synthesizer sounds and field recordings, the singer’s voice becomes unrecognisable as it accompanies extracts of Fritz Lang’s pioneering sci-fi epic, Metropolis.

Rachamaid // Hammy Sgìth

Rachamaid is a Detroit House-inspired take on Scottish traditional music, Raverig, mas do thoile. With chilled beats, spectacular scenery, some familiar sights and Highland humour, it offers you a chance to relax and reflect on what it means to come ‘from Scotland’. It is sure to bring a smile to your face.

Shot by Paul Barnes

Mixed and mastered by Konchis

Everything else by Hammy Sgìt

Cryptic: Established in 1994, Cryptic is Scotland’s award-winning international
renowned home of experimental music and audiovisual art. Based in Glasgow
but with a global reach, Cryptic presents and promotes the most dynamic
talents of today and tomorrow, exploring new dimensions in live music, visual
and sonic arts.