Back to Research

SOUFFLE

Air and Breath as Compositional Material

2017–2022

PhD in Composition

University of Leeds

Souffle investigates air, breath and friction as a porous continuum of compositional material. Moving beyond breath as an isolated effect or extended technique, the research follows how contact, resonance, spatialisation and multiplicity can transform souffle into an organising principle for gesture, time, perception and musical form.

Explore the Research

Read the PhD Thesis

Abstract black, white and earth-toned artwork evoking air, friction, resonance and material movement.
Abstract black, white and earth-toned artwork evoking air, friction, resonance and material movement.

RESEARCH PREMISE

The Idea of Souffle

Beyond air and breath

“Souffle” has no exact equivalent in English. It may mean breath, air, wind, or an air-like sound, allowing physical cause and sonic result, human and instrumental sources to remain deliberately unresolved. This ambiguity becomes the starting point of the research.

Rather than a collection of extended techniques, souffle is approached as a porous, polymorphic metamaterial: a continuum of air, breath and friction whose states can merge, filter and transform one another. Across the nine-work corpus, it progressively acts as a meta-parameter, connecting timbre, gesture, resonance, space, musical time and form.

RESEARCH STRUCTURE

Three Axes, Three Compositional Expansions

Across nine works, souffle develops through three cumulative expansions. Tactility detaches breath from respiration through contact and friction. Resonance extends it across bodies, instruments, spaces and traces. Energy & Multiplicity transforms this expanded continuum into orchestral mass, temporal organisation and perception.

01 — TACTILITY

Touching Air

Air as contact, friction and instrumental matter.

Here, souffle is approached through contact and friction rather than respiration alone. Instrumental surfaces become filters: material, pressure, speed and contact transform friction into air-like sound, extending breath beyond its physiological duration. From near-silence to vibration, grain and overpressure, tactile souffle forms a continuous pathway between contrasting states of matter.

Score excerpt from Un eco di soffio showing circular bowing, bariolage and friction techniques for two cellos.
Un eco di soffio
Quietness, friction and shared air

RELATED CORPUS

Circle(s) — Mapping contact

Un eco di soffio — Revealing air within instrumental sound

Ra’ash — Transforming through matter

RESEARCH CONTRIBUTION

Tactile Souffle

Friction turns instrumental contact into an independent source and filtration system for souffle. By releasing breath-like sound from the limits of respiration, tactile interactions can move continuously between air, vibration, grain and saturation, making material transformation itself a generator of musical time and form.

Formal diagram of Atma(n), tracing a progression from instrumental air to human breath through hybridisation, resonance and spatialisation.
Tracer le souffle
Breath, resonance and persistent sonic traces

02 — RESONANCE

Hybrid Traces

Breath between bodies, instruments and resonant space.

Resonance extends souffle beyond the action that produces it. Human breath, instrumental air and friction are mirrored and transformed through sympathetic vibration, spatialisation and electronic traces. As sound passes between bodies, instruments and spaces, its origin becomes increasingly unstable, allowing breath to persist and reappear through new resonant forms.

RELATED CORPUS

Ātma(n) — Hybridising and organising

Un eco di soffio II — Performing resonance

Tracer le souffle — Storing and proliferating traces

RESEARCH CONTRIBUTION

Resonant Equivalence

Resonance turns souffle into a relation between bodies, instruments, spaces and technologies. Human breath, instrumental air and friction can trigger, mirror and prolong one another through sympathetic vibration and spatial or electronic traces, blurring their origins and extending breath beyond its initial action.

Formal diagram of Atma(n), tracing a progression from instrumental air to human breath through hybridisation, resonance and spatialisation.
Tracer le souffle
Breath, resonance and persistent sonic traces

02 — RESONANCE

Hybrid Traces

Breath between bodies, instruments and resonant space.

Resonance extends souffle beyond the action that produces it. Human breath, instrumental air and friction are mirrored and transformed through sympathetic vibration, spatialisation and electronic traces. As sound passes between bodies, instruments and spaces, its origin becomes increasingly unstable, allowing breath to persist and reappear through new resonant forms.

RELATED CORPUS

Ātma(n) — Hybridising and organising

Un eco di soffio II — Performing resonance

Tracer le souffle — Storing and proliferating traces

RESEARCH CONTRIBUTION

Resonant Equivalence

Resonance turns souffle into a relation between bodies, instruments, spaces and technologies. Human breath, instrumental air and friction can trigger, mirror and prolong one another through sympathetic vibration and spatial or electronic traces, blurring their origins and extending breath beyond its initial action.

03 — ENERGY & MULTIPLICITY

Multiplier le souffle

From fragile air to orchestral mass, energy and perception.

At large scale, souffle becomes an orchestration principle rather than a collection of air sounds. Friction, resonance and breath combine through density, spatialisation and instrumental mass, while the inhalation–exhalation cycle shapes expectation, tension and release. Moving between compact blocks, circulating fluxes, saturation and apnoea, the system organises collective energy and perception.

Ensemble score excerpt from Hólo(s), combining air, vocal, friction and percussive techniques across multiple instruments.
Ensemble score excerpt from Hólo(s), combining air, vocal, friction and percussive techniques across multiple instruments.
Hólo(s)
Collective breath, density and orchestral energy

RELATED CORPUS

Hólo(s) — Constructing the system

Concerto pour piano et ensemble — Testing the system through virtuosity

Sha’aph — Radicalising orchestral mass

RESEARCH CONTRIBUTION

The Souffle Orchestration System

The air–friction–resonance continuum becomes a framework for organising collective sound and perception. Instrumental functions, density, spatialisation and respiration move souffle between individual gesture, circulating flux, compact mass, saturation and diluted horizons, structuring musical time, expectation, presence and absence.

03 — ENERGY & MULTIPLICITY

Multiplier le souffle

From fragile air to orchestral mass, energy and perception.

At large scale, souffle becomes an orchestration principle rather than a collection of air sounds. Friction, resonance and breath combine through density, spatialisation and instrumental mass, while the inhalation–exhalation cycle shapes expectation, tension and release. Moving between compact blocks, circulating fluxes, saturation and apnoea, the system organises collective energy and perception.

Ensemble score excerpt from Hólo(s), combining air, vocal, friction and percussive techniques across multiple instruments.
Hólo(s)
Collective breath, density and orchestral energy

RELATED CORPUS

Hólo(s) — Constructing the system

Concerto pour piano et ensemble — Testing the system through virtuosity

Sha’aph — Radicalising orchestral mass

RESEARCH CONTRIBUTION

The Souffle Orchestration System

The air–friction–resonance continuum becomes a framework for organising collective sound and perception. Instrumental functions, density, spatialisation and respiration move souffle between individual gesture, circulating flux, compact mass, saturation and diluted horizons, structuring musical time, expectation, presence and absence.

CORPUS & METHOD

Nine Works, One Compositional System

The nine compositions do not simply illustrate the three research axes. Together they constitute the research method, allowing materials, processes and findings to develop within each axis while migrating across the wider corpus.

Souffle research matrix. Nine works arranged across three research axes—tactility, resonance, and energy and multiplicity—and three stages of development. Hover or focus an axis, stage, or work to reveal its relationships.(extension 1)Toucher le souffleTouching AirFriction/contact(hybridities 1)Corps en résonanceHybrid TracesBreath/resonanceMultiplier le souffleSouffle Orchestration System(Large) ForcesTOWARDS A SYSTEMnew definition(extension 2)POROSITYFragility(hybridities 2)EXTREME UTILISATIONRadicality(perspectives)Souffle — Air and Breath as Compositional Material | Martin LoridanCircle(s)Cello:Air/friction topologySouffle — Air and Breath as Compositional Material | Martin LoridanĀtma(n)Resonance(s):Human, instrumentSouffle — Air and Breath as Compositional Material | Martin LoridanHólo(s)Air as a force:an orchestration systemSouffle — Air and Breath as Compositional Material | Martin LoridanUn eco di soffioQuietness and echoes:The share of airSouffle — Air and Breath as Compositional Material | Martin LoridanUn eco di soffio IIDeep resonance(s):Breath catacousticsSouffle — Air and Breath as Compositional Material | Martin LoridanConcerto pour pianoAir virtuosity:Until breathlessnessSouffle — Air and Breath as Compositional Material | Martin LoridanRa’ash(Deeper) into matter:Granulation - saturationSouffle — Air and Breath as Compositional Material | Martin LoridanTracer le souffleResonance(s) extended:Composing the tracesSouffle — Air and Breath as Compositional Material | Martin LoridanSha’aphPulse and stasis:Dynamic/mass extremes
READING THE MATRIX
The matrix can be read vertically through the three research axes and horizontally through three stages of development: towards a system, porosity and fragility, then extreme utilisation and radicality. Each work advances its own axis while transferring materials, processes and findings across the wider corpus.

OVERALL RESEARCH CONTRIBUTION

Souffle as a Meta-Parameter

Across the nine works, souffle evolves from a family of air and breath sounds into a transversal compositional framework. Its porous and polymorphic states connect matter, gesture, resonance, space, musical time, perception and orchestral energy, allowing souffle to operate across — rather than within — individual compositional parameters.

BEYOND THE CORPUS

Deux souffles enlacés

TUNISIA · VILLA SALAMMBÔ

Breath across instrumental traditions and hybrid lutherie.

Developed in Tunisia, Deux souffles enlacés extends the Souffle paradigm into a North African instrumental and modal context. The work brings together the nay and the Naylute — a recent hybrid instrument connecting characteristics of the Arabic nay and Western flute — through breath, whistle, air leakage, voice and near-silence. Guided and free improvisation open the material towards maqām-related colours and modes of interaction beyond the original doctoral corpus.

Beyond the original corpus, the work tests how souffle can migrate across instrumental morphologies, performance practices and cultural contexts.

Explore Deux souffles enlacés →

CONTINUING RESEARCH

From Souffle to Instrumental Transformation

The research developed beyond the original corpus along two interconnected paths. Spatialisation expanded souffle into architectural space in works such as Composer l’espace, while the sympathetic resonance explored in Un eco di soffio II led to the Extended Pedal — shifting the research from the transformation of sound towards the transformation of the instrument itself.

RESEARCH CONTINUATIONS

Related Research

Extended Pedal

RESONANCE AS INSTRUMENTAL CONTROL

An external mechanism makes the resonance of the grand piano directly performable, extending questions first developed through Un eco di soffio II.

Explore Extended Pedal

Organic Augmented Instruments

FROM EXTENSION TO ACTIVE INSTRUMENTS

The research expands from resonance control towards non-invasive active augmentation, transforming acoustic instruments into resonating bodies for amplified and electronic sound.

Explore Organic Augmented Instruments

RESEARCH

Explore the complete research landscape.

Return to the Research index to discover the connections between Souffle, instrumental resonance and active acoustic instruments.

Back to All Research