Flo Wilson

Prelude to a Requiem
2018 - 2022

Prelude to a Requiem is a 20 minute composition written to offer space during times of loss and adversity. It was originally commissioned by multi-disciplinary artist Rainbow Chan for Verge Gallery (Sydney, Australia) in 2018 as a quadraphonic audio-visual work. It was then exhibited at Audio Foundation (Auckland, New Zealand) in 2019. The composition in all iterations and formats is an offering to their community, a designated space for listeners to sit with their grief for as long as they need. As such it examines the extent of care we receive during traumatic times from our communities.

“In my experience having grown up in New Zealand (specifically as a Pākeha/ New Zealand European), there are not many ways people speak openly with each other about grief, unless they have experienced grief themselves.”

As well as a restorative space, Prelude to a Requiem is a journal of Flo's experiences in coping and processing anticipatory grief. At the end of 2017, their life was significantly and suddenly affected when a loved one was given three months to live. As Flo moved cities to be closer to this person, they took field recordings of their environment as a kind of diary, eventually working them into the composition.

Prelude to a Requiem has been re-cast using the worldizing technique pioneered by Orson Welles, in a collaboration between Flo Wilson and Saplings Records. To this end, microphones were placed in a food forest in Ōtautahi (Christchurch). The work was then played through the Eyes Down Soundsystem into the forest while binaural microphones captured this moment. That recording and the original composition have been mixed for this release. The food forest is a restorative ecosystem, and inspired the feeling of a physical parallel to Flo’s composition.

This rendition of this work is being released on Saplings Records on May 17 2022, alongside a stereo version of the original composition and a radio edit.
Details here.