This was going to be Moses Sumney’s summer. The quickly rising star was coming off a sold-out residency in Los Angeles and a stunning TV debut with his performance on Late Night with Stephen Colbert, all while gearing up for a world tour in support of his acclaimed (as in Pitchfork “Best New Music” acclaimed) double album, grae.
Then, coronavirus happened, throwing his well-laid plans for a loop. “My ultimate goal is to have an emotional connection with people—to have people think of things in a way they haven’t before, either musically or just thinking to feel,” says Sumney. But how do you achieve that kind of connection when you can’t physically interact with an audience?
“How can I make compelling art during social distancing about isolation, without being redundant or insensitive?” asks Sumney. “How can I continue to produce live versions of the album and share them with the public?”
To answer those questions, Sumney turned to frequent artistic collaborator Sam Cannon and the Azure Kinect DK. They worked together to create a striking performance piece for his track, “Bless Me.” With no in-person experience possible—no crowds, but also no light show, no fog machine, no multi-channel surround sound that most artists (and fans) use and appreciate—Sumney focused on creating an incredible video, leaning into technology to make this 2D output feel a little more three dimensional.
While he was social distancing in his home in Ashville, North Carolina, Cannon was working from Virginia. The two hashed out a creative treatment and capture strategy over Skype calls and email: They would co-direct the video, with Sumney setting up the Azure Kinect in his living room; Cannon would direct his movements remotely over Skype; and Sumney’s poses would be captured by the Kinect, to be translated into stirring animations by visual artist Luigi Honorat based in Tokyo.
“I’m always interested in the intersection between humans and machines, so I’m looking for the synthesis between art that feels raw, organic, and sincere—and art that exploits technological advancements, often in order to produce a critique of that same technology or modern society … The vision [for this piece] is a live performance that feels elevated beyond a typical live video, employing hyperreal visual effects that take the viewer on a spiritual journey.”
The Azure Kinect helped make this vision possible. “This is the first time I’ve worked with the Azure Kinect and I was very excited to introduce a new way for Moses to manipulate and control what we see,” says Cannon. “The ability to easily capture the skeleton and point-cloud data from his performance opened up a whole new world of possibilities.”
“We are a small team, but with the right tools we can make something really special.”
- Sam Cannon
With just a few weeks to get from ideation to premiere, Cannon was able to export the Kinect’s depth and body-tracking data direct to Honorat to begin animations almost immediately after the shoot. Meanwhile, Sumney recorded himself singing over the track live to create an urgent, powerful piece.
As an artist regularly able to transport audiences through transcendent live performances full of gut-wrenching lyrics, breathtaking vocal runs, and soaring instrumentation, Sumney proves that tech can be a tool in service of that emotional connection and magnetism—even when the audience is hundreds of miles away.
