• On the eve of the COP26 in Glasgow, a Toulouse resident posted

    Climax

    , a melody composed only of real ambient noise.

  • The violinist and engineer Laurent Bernadac wanted to translate global warming into the universal language of music.

  • He assumes the discomfort caused by

    Climax

    .

He crossed forests, cell phone in hand, to catch the creaking of branches in a breath of wind, drew a note from the “white noise” of the sea. It is believed to be electronic, it is in fact raw. Laurent Bernadac is not an environmental activist, let alone a climate specialist. He is an engineer and a violinist. But it could well be that he will play the little music of his modest "green fiber" until the COP 26 in Glasgow.

His melody

Climax

, posted opportunely a week ago, is new and yet made of familiar noises, "only sounds of nature", cries of whales, "ploc ploc" of drops of water, mixed with others. more human sounds like rustling of banknotes or beating of the heart.

The track is ultimately quite scary and this is not surprising since it is intended to translate global warming into "the universal language of music".

New video: ClimaX (Music inspired by the Global Warming temperature Curve) #globalwarming #climatechange #environment #savetheplanet #nature #ClimateAction https://t.co/Xj3d7EBd79

- Laurent Bernadac (@BernadacViolin) October 28, 2021

Grief spirits could boast of doing the same when they return from a walk in the woods with a good synth and a little software.

But it is bad to know the work and the sweet madness of this 34-year-old Toulousain, already inventor of the 3D Varius, an electric and transparent violin out of a 3D printer or of his flashing little brother which are all the rage in the United States.

A tempo modeled on the temperature curve

Since his first recording of the sea in September 2019, Laurent Bernadac has not contented himself with compiling the sounds of the nature that surrounds him or drawing them from the Net.

He documented himself.

“I am passionate about techniques, but I have one flaw, I always find it hard to believe what people tell me,” he admits.

So to cure his climate skepticism, he delved into the various expert reports.

And he found that in this matter, the most telling - and the most worrying - data was quite simply "the average temperature readings from 1885, at the start of the Industrial Revolution, to the present day".

The curve is jerky but its ascent is inexorable.

The violinist smoothed it out a bit, just to avoid the sensation of seasickness to the listener, but the tempo of

Climax

follows its contours.

“A traditional pop song usually always has the same tempo.

Mine starts at 81 beats per minute and ends at 160, which is what creates this feeling of unease, ”explains the composer.

Even urgently, take the test.

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