Premiered on September 17, 1988 at the New Langton Arts, San Francisco. ARP 2500 synthesizer on magnetic tape. Produced at the artist’s studio in Paris.

“Intermediate states...
to my son, Yves Arman

First part of the Trilogie de la Mort.
Inspired by the root text of the Bardo Thödol (Tibetan Book of the Dead), this piece refers to the six intermediate states of consciousness that constitute the existential continuity of being:

1. Kyene - Naissance (Birth)
2. Milam - Rêve (Dream)
3. Samten - Contemplation-Méditation (Contemplation-Meditation)
4. Chikaï - Mort (Death)
5. Chönye - Claire lumière (Bright Light)
6. Sippaï - Traversée et retour (Crossing and Return”
- Éliane Radigue

From her Parisian childhood Éliane Radigue (1932 - 2026, FR) kept a secret initiation to music, through the complicity of her piano teacher. Then came the harp, singing and composition. But it was through contact with musique concrète, with Pierre Schaeffer and then Pierre Henry, that Éliane Radigue's music found its true path.

Over a span of more than 50 years, three distinct periods are articulated, each marking a break but each evoking in its own way an inspired exploration of thresholds, of the spaces that open up in the intervals, and of a dialogue between listening experience and inner experience, personal history and sensitive evocation.

The first period (1968-1971) was the period of work on feedback, an embryonic phase that already signalled an extreme meticulousness and a work on thresholds and fragile equilibriums.

The second phase, that of maturity, and spanning thirty years (1971-2001), was marked by a fertile production of electronic compositions, indelibly linking her music to the unique sounds of her ARP 2500 synthesizer. This period also initiated the development of long forms with subtle variations that blossom and resonate between the history carried by the music and the test of time necessary for its deployment.

The third time was that of her acoustic works created in close collaboration with musician-accomplices from all horizons, bringing an additional relational dimension to a music that had been built up until then in solitary.

Throughout her life, Éliane Radigue has developed a probing, demanding and inspiring body of work which today influences a whole new generation of musicians.
- François J. Bonnet