Félicia Atkinson - Space As An Instrument

A Closer Listen

Standing but not facing completely what’s in front of me…Félicia Atkinson soflty utters in the opening track “The Healing” off the aptly titled Space as an Instrument. Piano and subtle field recordings accompany Atkinson’s deeply poetic words, her enchanting exchanges with the world around her. A sort of wake-up call against forgetfulness.

The work of an artist is not for the faint hearted. In a world abundant with violence, an artist needs to stand still and reflect, react and reinsert an empathetic flow of emotion back to the world. Even if not “facing completely”, an artist often draws from the small, inarticulate beauties that still surround us and serves them back to us to remind us that we are still here, together. 

Space as an Instrument is a testimony and an invitation to “explore the phantasmic landscapes created in such transformative encounters, when the mind is open and receptive to its environment.”The seven compositions offer a soothing, emotionally-transparent journey through Atkinson’s meditation on Earth, how its elemental presence vibrates through her mind, body and memory.

Soft synths and electronics merge with passages of piano, guitar, and environmental sounds in dialogue with  Atkinson’s own voice, as in “Thinking Iceberg”, inspired by and reflecting on Olivier Remaud’s book Thinking Like An Iceberg. The majestic presence of nature’s influence on the composer is also highlighted in pieces like “La Pluie”. “I am with you” repetitively emerges from an axis of sustained string and synth tones. “I am with you in the rain” invites us to feel, to be (t)here with her in the rain and to shake off all that is holding us away from experiencing the marvels of our world. 

The slow pace of the album is continued throughout the set. We are following Atkinson on her journeys through the landscapes and the spaces that fascinated her during the time of composition. “Sorry” lets us listen in to one of Atkinson’s walks through the wind, we hear her footsteps as she walks. In “Shall I return to you?” sparse synth textures, piano and wind instrument notes merge with whispering voices and lay a mesmerizing path to a place of return.

The album closes with the magical “Pensées Magiques,” where night-time environmental sounds merge with sounds of running water, birds and self-noise, piano ruminations and electro-acoustic sculpting. Reminiscent of the work of Harold Budd, Atkinson’s magical thinking offers a moment of clarity and reflection on the journey taken. In a way we are back to the starting point, inside Atkinson’s studio, listening back to the earth while the rain slowly and patiently falls at night.

Space as an instrument  is an album that is worth many repeated plays as it offers a soothing antidote to a lot of the unnecessary noise of today’s world. It is designed to fill our own private spaces with solace, reflection and magic, to inhabit our everyday lives and routines by taking us “on the verge of understanding and not understanding.” Some things are better to be unsaid, unresolved, a mystery. (Maria Papadomanolaki)