Peter Machajdík: The Healing Heating
At the core of this roughly nineteen-minute composition are sounds based on the currently burning issue of environmental pollution and global warming. The gloomy sounds of the sinister, monolithically crescendoing audio contrast sharply with the carefree, unsuspecting and oblivious everyday voices.
Despite its apparent social engagement, "The Healing Heating" is not a political work. The piece is based on Cage's reduction of dramatic expressiveness. You will be hard-pressed to find any plot, logical explanation or answers to questions which might arise while listening to the composition. Many things are merely hinted at or hidden behind metaphors. Over the course of the composition, the artist inserts text passages about entirely different subjects containing elements of symbolism, which often communicate with the contradicting sounds and meanings in some parts of the work: for instance, the inconspicuous combination of the sound of an airplane polluting the air amidst natural scenery and the innocent voices of children playing with a model train, symbolizing an alternative to airplane travel. The listener can also hear a mixture of quotations such as "ihnen wird die welt gehören" ("the world will be theirs"), "misstrauen" ("distrust") and "missverständnis" ("misunderstanding") in connection with a sound collage of the voices of American environmentalists played backwards.
Within the composition, I rely on "raw" and "harsh" sounds - for the most part unaltered - which were created by recording everyday situations in nature, towns or household interiors. At certain places, I consciously attempt not to tone down the sometimes excessive background noise in order to let all the sounds retain their authentic audio atmosphere.