UNSEEN images from the 1969 Moon mission will feature in the world premiere of a new work by a Glasgow-based composer.
Ela Orleans had unlimited access to around 20,000 hours of footage from Nasa’s Apollo 11 archive to develp Night Voyager, an audio-visual piece which will make its debut next week at sound art festival Sonica.
The singer and multiinstrumentalist will weave an atmospheric live soundtrack around images of Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and pilot Michael Collins 50 years on from the historic voyage.
The mission has long interested Orleans, who was given access to the images via Stephen Slater, the archivist who worked on Todd Douglas Miller’s award-winning documentary Apollo 11.
In May 2017 Slater was contacted by the US National Archives who told him of 165 reels of mission footage left in cold storage. In contrast to the grainy pictures we’re used to, the 70 millimetre film shows the astronauts as clear as movie stars.
Night Voyager’s co-director/producer Stuart MacLean met Slater at Glasgow Film Theatre, where Orleans had performed.
“Stuart called me from the GFT bar, saying he was sitting with Stephen Slater who has all the Moon landing data,” says Orleans.
There has always been a strong visual element to the work of the Polish musician. Inspired by Bernard Herrmann’s film scores, classic pop and underground electronica, Orleans describes her compositions as “movies for ears”.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
READ MORE: These are the Sonic arts shows worth tuning into
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
During their meeting MacLean told Slater about Orleans. A project by her, MacLean said, would be unlike anything else.
“Stephen said yes, that he would help me have access,” says Orleans. “He liked the idea of an audio-visual composition/film.”
Rather than a linear retelling, Orleans’s show focuses on the astronauts’ emotional journey and the wider meaning of the lunar trip.
“It’s about the feelings rather than facts,” she says. “I’m not interested in repeating what other people have said. People are suddenly interested in the Moon because of the anniversary. I’m not so interested in anniversaries but I’ve always been fascinated by the Moon, Mars, sci-fi, the night and space.”
Orleans developed Night Voyager by using elements of Edward Young’s Night-Thoughts, an 1740s epic poem published in nine parts. The show matches images from the lunar mission to fragments of the poem, in which the English theologian muses on mortality, time and human folly.
“He was supposed to be the biggest genius that the poetry world had ever produced but he was a bit too religious for the time,” explains Orleans. “As the world began to be more enlightened about science he was swept under the table. But a lot of people at the time were interested in the poems, which are very esoteric and beautiful and kind of insane.
They’re all about insomnia, procrastination, selfaggrandisement – pretty much how humans are. How they are either trying to prove the existence of God or that they are better than him, that they have some superpowers.”
Having broken her ankle days ago, she hopes to be mobile enough to incorporate into Night Voyager the new Moog synthesizer and Theremini (a re-imagining of the theremin) the legendary company is shipping to her this week.
If not, the instruments will be built into further iterations of the project, whether as an expanded stage show with other performers or as a planned cinema release.
“We will make it into a film, definitely,” Orleans says. “We realised, as we were working on it, that the material is too great for just one date. I’m more drawn to creating something which is more art than performance, more tangible and sustainable and which could reach more people.”
Working with Slater, MacLean and Sonica organisers Cryptic, who commissioned Night Voyager, has been a positive experience for the composer. “I’m extremely lucky to have these people on my side,” Orleans says. “Cryptic have been amazing and very supportive. Sonica is probably the biggest thing I have done. And though unfortunately I’m going to be in a wheelchair, that will just add to it because I can’t stop thinking how great it would be to be somewhere where there is no gravity.”
November 7, Tramway, Glasgow, 8.30pm, £9, £5 concs. Tel: 0141 353 8000. sonic-a.co.uk elaorleans.com www.ticketsglasgow.com
Why are you making commenting on The National only available to subscribers?
We know there are thousands of National readers who want to debate, argue and go back and forth in the comments section of our stories. We’ve got the most informed readers in Scotland, asking each other the big questions about the future of our country.
Unfortunately, though, these important debates are being spoiled by a vocal minority of trolls who aren’t really interested in the issues, try to derail the conversations, register under fake names, and post vile abuse.
So that’s why we’ve decided to make the ability to comment only available to our paying subscribers. That way, all the trolls who post abuse on our website will have to pay if they want to join the debate – and risk a permanent ban from the account that they subscribe with.
The conversation will go back to what it should be about – people who care passionately about the issues, but disagree constructively on what we should do about them. Let’s get that debate started!
Callum Baird, Editor of The National
Comments: Our rules
We want our comments to be a lively and valuable part of our community - a place where readers can debate and engage with the most important local issues. The ability to comment on our stories is a privilege, not a right, however, and that privilege may be withdrawn if it is abused or misused.
Please report any comments that break our rules.
Read the rules here