Use of Technology
Heap is an advocate of using technology to interact and collaborate with her fans. In August 2009 she used Vokle, an online auditorium, to take questions from listeners over video chat.
Imogen also teamed up with Vokle to hold open cello auditions for her North American tour. She provided sheet music for "Aha" on her website and encouraged local fans to learn the part and audition live via Vokle. Imogen would then pick the cellist to accompany her for that particular city - sometimes with the help of viewers and her puppet Lion, Harold.
In 2010 Imogen opened her online auditions to singers and choirs and invited them to audition via submitted YouTube videos to accompany her on stage as she performed the song "Earth" from Ellipse. The winner of each local show was also invited to do a 15 minute gig of their own. In the studio, the official album recording of "Earth" was made up entirely of numerous tracks of vocals.
July 2011 saw Imogen unveil a pair of in development, high-tech musical gloves at the TEDGlobal conference in Edinburgh, Scotland. Inspired by the VAMP system developed by Elly Jessop at MIT’s media lab, Imogen set out to develop the musical gloves in collaboration with Thomas Mitchell, a lecturer in music systems at the University of the West of England, Bristol. The gloves combine sensors developed by 5DT, x-io Technologies with Shure microphones.
Using nothing but hand gestures, Imogen is currently able to amplify/record/loop acoustic instruments and her voice, play virtual instruments and manipulate these sounds live. Imogen has for many years been working toward a less constricting live set up which enables her to be mobile while performing live multiple musical production tasks, songs and improvising spontaneously without the need 'to go back to basecamp'. The gloves enable the audience to instinctively understand and connect with the process of what's going on on stage - the 'hidden' 50% of her performance. This is part of a larger audio/visual performance project Imogen has been working towards for a couple of years with the aim of touring in 2013.
Read more about this topic: Imogen Heap
Famous quotes containing the word technology:
“If the technology cannot shoulder the entire burden of strategic change, it nevertheless can set into motion a series of dynamics that present an important challenge to imperative control and the industrial division of labor. The more blurred the distinction between what workers know and what managers know, the more fragile and pointless any traditional relationships of domination and subordination between them will become.”
—Shoshana Zuboff (b. 1951)