Bloom: A Conversation with Ellen Fullman and Theresa Wong

Western music is built around concepts of melody and harmony – the idea that one form of sonic expression should come to the fore and the other to sit behind in support. But what if those concepts are not as important as we are led to believe? What if, instead, there is a dynamically evolving sound field where sounds transpire and interact into a more cohesive whole without concepts of dominance or subservience? These ideas lie at the crux of ’Soundless,’ the latest collaboration between Guggenheim Fellows Ellen Fullman and Theresa Wong, which will be presented at Roulette, on January 30 and 31, 2025.

A key concept of ‘Soundless’ is what the duo refers to as ‘bloom,’ a system through which both instruments become a unified whole. This is done primarily by fostering spaces that evoke overtones or subtones to allow new sounds to emerge, effectively forging a new sonic language. Assisting with the surveyance of new sonic terrain is how both Wong and Fullman step outside Western concepts of equal temperament.

For the former, this means putting aside her classical training and the common tunings of her cello – and sometimes electric guitar – in favor of Just Intonation’s reliance on whole-number ratios between frequencies. In using this background, along with electronics, Wong has been able to originate an idiosyncratic language on her instruments.

While Fullman also uses Just Intonation, her approach is perhaps even more revolutionary. There are no conventional standards to apply to her performance as her instrument itself has distinctly little precedent. Since 1980, she has imagined, built, developed, and mastered the Long String Instrument, her creative assemblage of dozens of tuned strings, each over fifty feet long. By rubbing her rosined fingers or placing another of her inventions – the ‘shoveler,’ an item similar to a massive guitar pick – against its strings, Fullman produces distinctive drone-like tones that reverberate throughout the room.

In escaping most strictures of Western conventions, the two artists produce a space where they can better communicate even while engaging in open exploration. The fact Fullman and Wong have a long working relationship of almost twenty years provides a further basis upon which they can rely less on pre-established conventions and more on the contours of their unique expressions. We sat down with both artists to discuss ‘Soundless’ and their work together.

PostGenre: The two of you started playing together in 2006. How do you feel the way you communicate with each other musically has changed the most over the past almost twenty years?

Ellen Fullman: For one thing, we felt that to give the cello a unique voice, Theresa needed to decide on different timbral approaches. So, she’s invented and developed an incredible vocabulary of sounds you might not recognize as being from a cello. 

My instrument sounds a bit like a cello to begin with. The instruments mesh together to create a composite sound. But there was a period when we were a little unsatisfied with how we sounded together until things started to click in terms of the role that each instrument played. 

We also got into Just Intonation tuning. After being classically trained, Theresa had to do a lot of research to develop her vocabulary in Just Intonation on the cello.

Theresa Wong: I feel how we communicate musically has greatly deepened, allowing us to expand the breadth and variety of different ways of exploring string resonances, techniques, and different ways of playing the strings. 

EF: I’d like to add that something very special that we work on is a phenomenon called ‘bloom’, where frequencies are played either on my instrument or Theresa’s instrument to jump into a different timbre.

It allows for specific harmonics to emerge. It’s an amazing feeling when we are making something greater than just our individual parts. Something special happens. It doesn’t happen all the time, but that is something we keep in mind. We aim for this kind of synergy between the instruments. 

PG: In terms of balancing your sounds, Theresa, given the uniqueness of Ellen’s instrument, is playing with her similar to playing duo with another string instrument, or is it an entirely different experience? 

TW: It’s similar in the fact that you’re always listening. At times, you are merging with another player. And at others, you provide very distinct contributions sonically. But playing with Ellen is also very different just because her sound is unique and incredibly dense and has complex harmonic content. In that sense, playing together is incredibly unique.

PG: Ellen mentioned Just Intonation earlier. Her Long String Instrument is built around Just Intonation but Theresa, your cello is traditionally tied to equal temperament. What is it that interested you in exploring Just Intonation? An ability to reach different harmonies? 

TW: Definitely. I have composed in both systems over the last twenty years. I still compose in equal temperament sometimes. But I feel there is a certain wall that I would run up against in composing with equal temperament because the resources of that harmony have been depleted. That may be an arrogant thing to say, but the free jazz of Ornette Coleman and Miles Davis, twelve-tone music, musique concrete, field recordings, noise, and extended techniques all seem to be built around trying to find new harmonies when you keep running up against the wall. 

When I started to learn about it, Just Intonation made so much sense. The theory behind the music makes more sense with Just Intonation. I always felt that the theory behind equal temperament in traditional Western harmony was somewhat subjective. When I learned about Just Intonation –  because it’s mathematically based- understandings of harmony and dissonance clicked. I feel Just Intonation opens up so many possibilities. It opens the door to so much more diversity and variation in what we can do harmonically with sound. 

PG: Does using Just Intonation make it more difficult to compose for your duo works since Western music is so heavily focused on equal temperament? 

TW: Well, when we first started working together, I had not had any experience playing in Just Intonation. Since then, I’ve been studying that tuning system. I’ve been mapping the harmonics of the cello out in diagrams so I could understand what was happening harmonically. When we compose, we do notate everything in Just Intonation, and that has greatly changed over the last twenty years as a result of working together more and more. I’ve also worked on my own compositions in Just Intonation with other musicians. We are constantly deepening our understanding. There are also new systems of tuning and notation. Software and hardware are always developing as new tools to use to communicate this system, and they’re constantly evolving as well. 

PG: You use graphic notation because it is difficult to apply Western notational concepts to Ellen’s Long String Instrument. 

EF: Yes, Theresa does use a little Western notation for her own parts, but, as she said, the technology has been kind of moving in this direction with new tools emerging that have been very helpful for composing.

It is more difficult to compose in Just Intonation because everything is geared around equal temperament. But all the software and tools have been wonderful in recent years. 

PG: Perhaps tied to graphic notation, you both have experience with visual art. Ellen studied sculpture and Theresa studied graphic design. Do you feel your experiences with visual art have influenced how you approach art through sound?

TW: I think that’s true for both of us. I grew up studying classical music and then, for my undergraduate studies,  I ended up studying product design, which is an engineering-based program. I also studied graphic design. I didn’t see myself pursuing a future in classical music. Eventually, I was exposed to experimental music and creative music-making, which I didn’t know about previously. My background in design was very much about conceptually looking at things, questioning things, experimentation, and invention. And that process made sense as a way of making music.

EF: My background as a visual artist has definitely influenced the way I make music. I am also a self-taught graphic designer and worked commercially for about a decade doing that. The experience helped me come up with graphic notation. The graphic design work that I did has played a big role in my work. 

PG: You mentioned the compositional side of your works, but how much of the music you make is tied to the surroundings of where you are performing? There is a very specific environment in which Ellen’s instrument can be performed.

EF: I have to say that I can’t be too particular about where I play. I have so few opportunities to begin with because of the large size of the instrument. So, I’m eager to perform and share my music anywhere it is feasible. I just deal with the circumstances as best I can. That being said, I’ve had the opportunity, because of the large scale of my instrument, to make music in some of the most remarkable places like industrial spaces or cathedrals. The spaces always provide something different which does influence the music. But our music is composed, and I go into a space with a composed sequence. The piece just gets filtered a little bit differently in different spaces. 

TW: Yeah, I wouldn’t say a piece changes radically based on where we perform it because the forms of our pieces are very specified in the studio when we’re composing and creating. I guess what changes is maybe how certain parts would resonate, more or less, in the performance in a specific venue.

PG: At Roulette, you will be performing across two nights. What is the big difference between each night?

EF: Well, we’re going to perform the same composition each night. But every time we perform it, there’s a nuance of difference in that there’s an element of improvisation in our work. We are also always working to realize the piece more fully. It’s a dynamic process. 

TW: It is a little bit like jazz, in a way. I feel that if you went to both nights, you would recognize each section of the piece. But within those sections, there is variation because we’re improvising with certain given parameters. 

PG: And where does electricity fit into ‘Soundless’? For the piece, Theresa will also be playing electric guitar and other times, has used electronics with her cello.

TW: In this piece – as well as on ‘Harbors’, which was our first collaboration using co-composed pieces – I use Ableton Live in a couple of different ways. One is to be able to play a couple – one to four – multiple tracks. I’ve pre-recorded some sounds that get played back, creating textures that loop. That’s primarily what I am doing with the guitar. And then, for both the guitar and the cello at times, but not always, I am using the electronics as a giant harmonizer. I’ve got banks of different overtones, which I can play with any given note on the cello or the guitar, mostly guitar. I can say to add an octave, add a fifth, add the third harmonic, add the 7th harmonic, or any combination of those. I’m essentially creating these chords with Ableton Live.

PG: Since you mentioned ‘Harbors’, what do you think most sets ‘Soundless’ apart from that project?

EF: Well, for one thing, as artists, we have goals. These are both technical goals and aspirational ones. The technical goal for us was to work with more complex harmony. So, we designed some things in the piece to challenge ourselves. With Just Intonation, there is an opportunity to work with more extended partials as components of harmony, itself. When we play a chord with an 11 or A7, these are not fake 11s, as in equal temperament, but the real thing. So, we’re designing new harmonies. It’s very exciting to explore things like this. 

TW: Yeah, definitely the harmonies from using more 11 and 13 overtones add to it. I feel with the addition of the electric guitar, we’re also exploring just more timbral variation. I also feel the way that Ellen has expanded and deepened her sound has developed and changed since making ‘Harbors.’

PG: Ellen, you’ve been working on the Long String Instrument since 1980, almost forty-five years. Since you invented it, what is your process for continuing to develop it? Is there a lot of trial and error, or do you know how things are going to turn out most of the time?

EF: There are adjustments in performance. Of course, there is a bowing technique. I’m using my fingertips on the strings, but the speed and pressure of my fingers change. Any string player works with those factors to articulate the music.  I’m adjusting those kinds of things all the time.

But I would say that my physical instrument itself has become more reliable after all these decades. I’m more reliably able to produce the tone that I’m seeking because I know things about string tension and the instrument really being in tune. I know all the things about the wooden box that I designed or the gauge of string that I use and how much rosin to put on it. I have stabilized all these factors very recently; in the past five years or so. Now, I can achieve the sounds that I wish for, whereas earlier it was more of a wild card. I wasn’t as reliably able to get the results that I wanted. 

PG: As a final question, what do you enjoy most about working together?

EF: I enjoy that as Theresa and I work on pieces over and over again, we can go into a level of nuance that I deeply enjoy. We have a pattern of working where we’ll set up a rehearsal schedule where we listen back as part of our rehearsal. That practice informs so much about what we do. We critique and make changes based on listening to our recordings. We’re recording all the time and that’s truly wonderfully informative. I also enjoy recording with Teresa very much. She has a very detailed and precise ear. We can talk easily with each other and are often in agreement on very nuanced things that make a world of difference in experiencing the music. 

TW: There’s so much that we discover together, and that’s an incredibly satisfying experience because we’re both committed on such a deep level to fully exploring, learning more, inventing more, and uncovering the possibilities. The creation of a piece and the music is deeply satisfying because I know we are always expanding our practice in the potential of our instruments. But the process itself is also always such an incredibly cast learning experience that is great fun.

Ellen Fullman and Theresa Wong will be presenting a workshop at Roulette on January 29, 2025. More information is available here. They will also perform their work ‘Soundless’ at Roulette the two following nights. More information on Ellen Fullman and Theresa Wong can be found on their respective websites.

Photo credit: Andria Lo