Hello,
I’m interrupting my period of pause in the production of this podcast to share some very sad news.
A good friend and colleague, Chantal Dumas, passed away on May 17th 2026 after a long struggle with cancer. She was 66 and had much more to live and to give.
I invite you to share a moment of silence.
J’offre mes profondes condoléances à la famille de Chantal et à son cercle d’amis qui ont été si présents et fidèle avec elle ces derniers mois.
My deepest condolences to Chantal’s family and to her circle of friends, who have been so present and in solidarity with her these last few months.
In order to commemorate Chantal’s life and her creative work, with her permission, I’ve prepared an English language translation of our September 13, 2025 conversation on balado conscient épisode 170 chantal dumas - une certaine douceur, recorded in Chantal’s apartment in Montreal.
(field recording of me entering Chantal’s apartment with her ‘big ben’ door chime and a very sonic kiss).
We’ll miss you, Chantal.
A friend once told me that when a loved one passes, one way to honour their memory is to continue the best of their good work.
But I’m not sure how to do this.
What I’ll try to do is keep in mind Chantal’s lived vitality, her kindness, her humour and her unique ability to help us listen to each other and listening to the earth.
I’ve put some links for further information in the episode notes for those who want to know more about Chantal’s life and work.
Thanks to artist Sabrina Mathews for the narration and to all those who helped me with this episode.
But before we listen to the episode, I’d like to play you another recording I made at Chantal’s apartment on September 13th, 2025, after our interview.
In front of us was a componium, which is a kind of music box that plays from a strip of punctured paper. I asked Chantal to explain how the instrument works and to play a composition she made for the instrument, first in forwards mode and then backward. This presentation is not translated into English, but I think you’ll get the gist of it.
I invite you to listen to this bonus episode of conscient podcast, in memoriam - chantal dumas - a certain gentleness.
*
(original episode)
Imagine listening to the heartbeat of the Earth, feeling the rumbling of tectonic plates, and experiencing geological time.
This is the experience offered by the electroacoustic composition ‘Oscillations planétaires’, ‘Planetary Oscillations’, a creation by my guest for this final episode of the sixth season of balado conscient, sound artist and long-time friend Chantal Dumas.
Chantal shares her unique perspectives on capturing the hidden movements of the Earth.
“Planetary Oscillations” is an invitation to listen deeply to the planet beneath our feet, a reminder of the immense timescale of geological processes, and a call for both environmental and spiritual awareness.
You’ll hear Chantal talk about some of her childhood memories, including the soundscapes of the countryside and also the Villeray acoustique project, an initiative by Chantal and Magali Babin, in collaboration with Espace Projet,which offers signage in public spaces where listening, as a sensory experience, is associated with historical, cultural and ecological information specific to that territory.
By the way if you’d like more information on this project, listen, in French, to é171 chantal dumas et magali babin (collectif dB) - villeray acoustique, in French, on balado conscient.
I thank Chantal for our valuable exchange and for everything she is and has done, with love, from us all.
Photo of Chantal Dumas by Claude Schryer (September 14, 2025, Montreal)
This conversation was recorded on September 14, 2025, in Montreal in French and was translated into English by Claude Schryer and narrated by Sabrina Mathews.
Oscillations planétaires© 2017-18, 19, Chantal Dumas (SOCAN) / Ymx média (SOCAN)℗ 2019, Enregistrements i média (SOPROQ) Appears on the album Oscillations planétaires, empreintes DIGITALes, IMED 19163
Thanks to Jean-François Denis.
Thanks also to Magali Babin for use of an excerpt from her field recording 'Marche Pour Andrea 4 juin 2012 Parc Jarry'
LINKS (selection)
Chantal Dumas web site (in French)
The Radio Art Hour 020: R.I.P. Chantal Dumas
é171 chantal dumas et magali babin (collectif dB) - villeray acoustique (in French)
UNE PSYCHOGÉOGRAPHIE SONORE ~ ENTRETIEN AVEC CHANTAL DUMAS (in French)
Hello
I’m interrupting my period of pause in the production of this podcast to share some very sad news.
A good friend and colleague, Chantal Dumas, passed away on May 17th, 2026, after a long struggle with cancer. She was 66 and had much more to live and to give.
I invite you to share a moment of silence.
J’offre mes profondes condoléances à la famille de Chantal et à son cercle d’ami-e-s qui ont été si présents et fidèle auprès elle ces derniers mois.
I offer my deepest condolences to Chantal’s family and to her circle of friends, who have been so present and in solidarity with Chantal these last few months.
In order to commemorate Chantal’s life and her outstanding creative work, I’ve prepared an English language translation of our September 13th, 2025 conversation which appears on balado conscient épisode 170 chantal dumas - une certaine douceur, recorded in Chantal’s apartment in Montreal.
(fade in of a field recording of me entering Chantal’s apartment with her ‘big ben’ door chime and a sonic kiss).
We’ll miss you, Chantal.
A friend once told me that when a loved one passes, one way to honour their memory is to continue the best of their good work.
But I’m not sure how to do this.
What I will try to do is keep in mind Chantal’s lived vitality, her kindness, her humour and her unique ability to help us listen to each other and listen to the earth.
I’ve put some links for further information in the episode notes for those who want to know more about Chantal’s life and work.
Thanks to Sabrina Mathews for the narration.
Thanks also to those who helped me produce this episode from far and near.
But before we listen to the episode, I’d like to play you another recording I made at Chantal’s apartment on September 13th, 2025, after our interview.
In front of us was a componium, which is a kind of music box that plays from a strip of punctured paper. I asked Chantal to explain how the instrument works and to play a composition she made for the instrument, first in forwards mode and then backward. This presentation is not translated into English, but I think you’ll get the gist of it.
Here is a bonus episode of conscient podcast, in memoriam, chantal dumas, a certain gentleness.
*
Chantal Dumas (narrated by Sabrina Mathews)
Welcome to the conscient podcast Chantal Dumas.
Chantal Dumas (CD)
Hello Claude Schryer and thank you for inviting me.
Claude Schryer (CS)
I've been wanting to talk to you for a long time about all sorts of things, including sound ecology, your work, your life, and... Well, let's talk. How long has it been, I don't know, 30, 35 years now?
CD
We've known each other for a really long time. I think we met in the 80s or early 90s.
CS
We worked together on the 7e printemps électroacoustique and on lots of other things.
CD
What year was that?
CS
92.
CD
92? The summer of 92? Yes.
CS
So, let's start at the beginning. You're a sound artist, composer, etc. What was your relationship with sound when you were young?
MUSIC from Oscillations planétaires
CD
It's funny, it's not so much my relationship with sound as my relationship with images.
It's very funny because I have childhood memories that are fading a little, but a lot of childhood memories are coming back to me such as a patch of sunlight on the linoleum in the bedroom, the color of fruit. More visual things, I would say.
Probably the sound. As children, we spent every summer in the countryside, near a river, and so there was a small lake where we swam, and then there was the river, and then there was nature, there were birds that were present. Insects, I remember always being very curious about insects, frogs.
I think that in my memories, if I wanted to bring them back to the surface a little, it would be things related to nature, but very simple things. What surrounded me when I was little… I would run in the fields; I would go swimming. Then in the evening, when night falls, for example, and there are birds that start singing, and you hear frogs croaking or... ouawarons, so chorus of frogs there. So I think that would be a bit like that, childhood memories.
MUSIC from Oscillations planétaires
Oscillation is a slight movement. So like this big piece, because it lasts, I don't know how long, around 50 minutes, it's the movements of the Earth on different scales. So oscillation, it’s what moves.
MUSIC from Oscillations planétaires
CS
Did that inspire you to create a work about geological phenomena, etc.?
CD
Yes, I say terrestrial mechanics, in fact, that's what interested me. Because everything that came before, I did a lot with soundscapes, so I made a lot of recordings, listening to the Earth, because we hear it on the surface and all that. And then, without considering that under our feet, well, a lot is happening. We live on the surface of the Earth.
MUSIC from Oscillations planétaires
So there you go, I wanted something that was completely, truly electroacoustic. It's something I'd never done before. And then I wanted to draw inspiration from different phenomena, from the mechanics of the Earth, and use that inspiration to generate something from a sound perspective.
MUSIC from Oscillations planétaires
And then it's divided into nine parts. But the parts sometimes include some... more than one exercise, more than one movement, in fact. And so, it ranges from... things like... well, we could include tectonic plates, for example. Subduction, which is the movement of plates when they enter, when they dive under each other, so subduction. Then there is mantle convection, which is internal movement. It's not so much an oscillation as an internal movement where when the plate plunges, it melts, which is caused by density and also by heat. You have that movement. Then there were geysers. That's something we see on the Earth's surface, but... well, the action starts underground.
MUSIC from Oscillations planétaires
CD
So, the formation of mountains, how mountains are formed, is interesting. Then there's the crustal tide. Then there's the Earth's magnetism, because in the history of the planet, there was a reversal of the magnetic pole. So north became south and south became north. It happened in history, but it was a long time ago. The last time it happened was about 800,000 years ago. So it doesn't happen that often. But sometimes there are small changes. Then, suddenly, it starts to move and reposition itself.
MUSIC from Oscillations planétaires
CS
Does listening to this piece make us become the planet?
CD
Well, perhaps you're the one who could best answer that question.
CS
It moved me deeply and transported me to an alternate space-time, or perhaps a more real, more concrete one, because we don't feel all those... Oscillations. Oscillations. In other words, we are less conscious. But when we slow down or really listen with an open ear, we can feel them. So I think that's kind of what I felt.
CD
Yes. You mention that, and the element of time was very interesting to me in this work. Of course, it's still 50 minutes long, and each piece has its own temporality. But what it refers to is as much about the birth of mountains, for example. It takes millions of years to create a mountain that is 7 kilometers high, at least the highest mountains.
MUSIC from Oscillations planétaires
And then if we talk about the tides, that's something we witness, so it's on a human scale, in fact. There was this thing that interested me, which was these movements that we don't feel, because they happen on different scales, so the human scale allows us to see the tides and see small things. But we'll never be able to feel what it's like. Magnetic change, for example, we won't be able to experience it because it will happen very, very slowly, which is not on a human scale. And when the movement is completely reversed, there's still a chance we won't be here. So it's this aspect, the temporal aspect, that interests me a lot.
MUSIC from Oscillations planétaires
Then there's also, as I mentioned earlier, my interest in soundscapes, which I've worked with a lot. I wanted to move away from the surface or what is obvious, and move towards something that was really about matter, about the earth we live on, what it's made of, and the movements that are internal to this earth. So I read a lot because I don't know anything about it, actually. And I did meet a scientist with whom I had a bit of an exchange. I read a lot about different phenomena, and that gave me ideas for developing a composition.
MUSIC from Oscillations planétaires
CD
And so what do I think? Is art important? I think it's part of life. I think we can't help but be drawn to art in all its forms, whether it's literature, visual arts, or if it’s music. In terms of design, there is always something in life that brings us back to someone who has thought, designed, and expressed themselves in the form of sensitivity or something else. Let's call it an object, regardless of the form it has taken. So in a period as complicated as ours today, what use can it be? I think we need a bit of gentleness. I find the global situation to be so violent right now. If we just... because we can be absorbed by what's happening, we want to be informed, and then we're also very drawn in by the media, so from the moment we listen to the radio, we talk about it regularly, if we listen to the media, the newspapers, all that, the news, at least internationally, is at the forefront everywhere, it's extremely violent.
MUSIC from Oscillations planétaires
CS
Is there anything else you'd like to tell me before I turn off the microphone?
CD
I think you just said it, I've always had a listening ear, anyway. It's for people who live in Montreal or who are visiting Montreal. There's a project in the neighborhood called Villeray, which is actually a borough, called Villeray acoustique. If you search for it on the Internet, you'll find the Villeray acoustique project with points that are listening points. These listening points allow us to listen to the activity in the neighborhood, but they also refer to memory, for example. There's one that, for those who have experienced it, you show up in an alley, and what do you do in the alley? Well, you play hockey when you're a kid; there's a certain community activity like that. Then also, we can witness domestic life because in the summer, we open the doors and windows, so we suddenly hear the inside outside. So there can be things like that, just as there can be information more on the level of living together or, for example, which is more ecological, the presence of airplanes in Montreal. There is an airport in Dorval. And so there are several neighborhoods, boroughs where aircraft activity has really disrupted people's lives because the planes fly very low, and it's very noisy. Along the way, there are also many references to resistance groups, for example, who want to change the flight paths, among other things, but also another site that refers us to microphones that are placed throughout the city and also in other cities to measure the level of sound intensity, the noise, for example. The measurements are recorded and can be accessed online. They can be accessed on a computer. So there are physical listening points that draw our attention to all kinds of things. There is also a lot of information that complements this at different levels, sometimes more scientific, sometimes more civic-minded. So, I think what's important in all this is to consider that we are not alone on the planet, that we are not alone in life, that we are also producers of sound and noise. So, to be in relationship with others, but in a way that is sensitive on all kinds of levels.
MUSIC from Oscillations planétaires
CS
Thank you very much, Chantal Dumas.
CD
Thank you very much, Claude Schryer.