Let’s take a look at one of the most forward-thinking ongoing series in the world of contemporary classical
How much sleep do you think you average every night per week?
It’s an important question. One that, for many of us, we probably don’t give enough thought to the answer to.
There’s no judgment here. We don’t want to tread into the realm of insufferable self-help influencers, but given that we have sleep on the brain, we wanted to draw your attention to the work of German-English composer Max Richter.
Richter is one of the most renowned creative forces in contemporary classical music. The German-English artist is a composer, producer, pianist, and collaborator, equally as comfortable on a synthesizer as he is on a grand piano.
Richter’s material covers a broad spectrum of style and form. From his debut LP Memory House in 2002, to his work composing for screen on Waltz with Bashir in 2008, and beyond.
When discussing his own creative ethos with AnOther, particularly that surrounding the earliest parts of his oeuvre, Richter asked himself “How can I tell stories in a way that makes sense to me? And how can I build a language?”.
So, narrative – particularly in the context of effective communication and ‘language’, is key.
This is most obvious in the body of work which Richter is perhaps his ongoing Sleep project.
Beginning with the release of the 8-hour odyssey Sleep, continuing with a feature-length documentary, live performances, and even an app–Richter’s most recent installment in the series SLEEP: Tranquility Base, an electronic, and largely collaborative reimaging of his original work made for the recent world sleep day 2023.
So where did the project begin?
In the composer’s own words, Sleep began as a “personal lullaby for a frenetic world…a manifesto for a slower pace of existence.”
The original installment is widely regarded as a state-of-the-art contemporary classical art project. In fact, it’s been credited as the most streamed classical music album.
Released in 2015, this eight-hour-long epic piece was composed by Max Richter to provide a listening experience unlike any other. By pairing soothing melodies with ambient noise, Max has created a work capable of inducing states of deep relaxation and meditation.
The album is divided into twelve distinct tracks – each one consisting of gently undulating drone-based harmonies and ambient soundscapes. These range from the delicate strings of ‘Path 1’ to the dreamlike piano sounds of ‘Path 2’ and beyond. Throughout, Max creates an atmosphere that encourages listeners to drift away, taking them on a journey through their own imaginations and emotions.
Sleep has gone beyond becoming just an album; it has become an extended musical experience designed to evoke emotion in its audience and even help people get a more restful nights sleep.
Indeed, Richter was fascinated with and influenced by neuroscience studies into the science of sleep while composing the project. Focusing in on the different sleep stages, Richter spoke with RBMA and said “There’s a sleep stage called “slow wave,” where all your neurons go into a roughly 10 Hz kind of phase – this is when memory happens and learning and structuring and all this stuff. That’s the beneficial part of sleeping for our brains. People have been experimenting by trying to induce this sleep stage with repetitive sounds that are not too loud, not too bright, sounds that have recognizable architecture or structure… That’s my music.”
In 2020, Richter released Max Richter’s Sleep a film he made in collaboration with his creative partner, artist, and BAFTA-winning filmmaker Yulia Mahr. The film follows the pair as they prepare and perform an open-air, full rendition of the 8-hour piece in its entirety. The film premiered at Sundance 2020.
A Sleep app is also available, which aims to help users keep track of their sleep schedule, plus providing some meditation and mindfulness exercises.
SLEEP: Tranquility Base is out now.
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