Berlin-based Chinese-born
music producer and performance artist Pan Daijing (1991) debuted with the
seven-song cassette Sex & Disease (2015), a collection of
voice-less electronic music.
If Encounter builds a cryptic cosmic atmosphere that is still
undeciphered, Stillborn leaves no doubt: horror ambient music
for free-form noise. Overdose is a massive distortion that fills
the entire acoustic space.
The EP A Satin Sight (2017) continued in that vein with
Tenderloin Tanz and its violent frenzy of distorted electronics
and the ugly noise of Nomenklatura,
while the suspenseful industrial dance A Season In Hell
veered towards the dancefloor.
Lack (2017) debuted
her operatic word-less singing in a context of
electroacoustic chamber lieder (such as Phenomenon)
while retaining
the horror ambience of the early EPs in Act Of The Empress.
Lucid Morto is a more extroverted piece of electronic soundpainting.
For a few years she was busier as an installation artist, including
large-scale pieces "Tissues" (2019), "The Absent Hour" (2019), "Dead Time Blue" (2020), "Done Due" (2021) and "One Hundred Nine Minus" (2021).
She also staged the
full-scale operas
Tissues (London, 2019) and
Dead Time Blue (Berlin, 2020).
Jade (2021) documents this stage of her career via
the chamber lament Dictee,
the funeral chant Dust,
the spooky spoken-word pieces Let and Moema Forever,
and especially
Metal, the most disorienting moment, where the electronic distortion sounds like a swarm of wasps and the chanting sounds like a madwoman's screams carried by the wind.
The electronic opera Tissues (2022) premiered in 2019,
scored, written and conducted by Daijing and performed by Daijing herself with twelve dancers and opera singers.
Part One - A Raving Still opens with a female contralto crooning alone in a bed of brittle electronics, followed by a male baritone in the style of a praying Buddhist monk over droning keyboards while in the background a woman's shrieks probe infernal depths, followed by a choir of women while the distant shrieks continue.
The female voices of Part Two - A Found Lament float in a vortex of foaming electronics for 13 minutes.
Eight minutes of strident distortions lay waste in
Part Three - A Tender Accent before the dialogue of female voices which becomes increasingly surreal, with some chirping to demystify the
austere convent-like chanting.
The tragedy of Part Four - A Deafening Hum takes place over
violent staccato piano notes. Eventually the piano stops and we witness
four final minutes of feverish a-cappella madness.
