Interview with Louis Dufort

by Sebastian Berweck

[Return to the index of interviews by Sebastian Berweck]

Composer and professor at Montréal's Conservatoire de musique. Interviewed at Dufort's home in Montréal, 31 January 2010.

Biography

The music of Montréal composer Louis Dufort ranges from a cathartic form of expressionism, mostly found in his early works, to organicism focusing on the inner structure of sound matter in his latest works. Although he first developed his style through electroacoustic music, he quickly delved into mixed and multimedia music, which drew attention from a number of extremely diverse Montréal-based organizations. Dufort’s international profile has been increasing since the early 2000s: in 2001, he received a mention from Prix Ars Electronica (Austria), in 2005, he collaborated with the German Zentrum für Kunst und Medientechnologie (ZKM) and, two years later, the Recombinant Media Labs (RML) in San Francisco and at Berlin’s Transmediale festival in 2011. Some of Marie Chouinard’s projects have also been acclaimed abroad, including Body_Remix premiered at the Venice Biennial in 2005. Louis Dufort is the new artistic director of RÉSEAUX and Akousma festival in Montréal.