Musid (20-07-2015)



Ujjaya est un projet dethno ambient mené par Hery Randriambololona depuis une vingtaine dannées. Basé en région parisienne, cet artiste dorigine malgache propose une musique riche, invoquant des sonorités africaines ou asiatiques, fidèle en ce sens à lesprit du concept de « Fourth World » de Jon Hassell. Il se réclame des maîtres Steve Roach et Jorge Reyes et est aussi un être spirituel accompli, purifiant notamment ses instruments après un concert. Son cheminement musical et personnel est tout à fait intéressant et il est depuis lan dernier lorganisateur du festival ambient de Paris (la première édition sest déroulée dans le lieu magique de la Crypte du Martyrium de Saint-Denis à Montmartre). Ce sympathique musicien évoque son attrait pour lAsie, son parcours, sa manière de composer (lui qui se décrit comme un « visionnaire sensitif »), ses influences et sa passion pour lambient, une musique difficile daccès mais néanmoins promue par des artistes de talent dans lHexagone.

http://musid.fr/2015/07/interview-dujjaya/ Continuo's blog (10-01-2008)



Young french musician (real name Hery Randriambololona) with roots in Madagascar. Fond of indian raga and mysticism, he actually made several trips to India to study with a guru and collect local musical instruments. Ujjaya plays rythmic meditative music with acoustic instruments and sound effects, not unlike some ambient techno acts on Extreme, think Pablos Eye or Fetish Park. From tracks 4 to 6, Ujjaya makes extensive use of his electronic effects, especially the one that make a 3 or 5 minutes long delay loop, to create heavily processed drone music. On the last track, the sound of the drum machine is kept bare and the effects reduced to a minimum, and youre left with a mantra-like looped percussion sound for 10mns, with good tripping effects on this listener. This music has been growing on me lately, to the point I now believe Ujjayas music has a secret effect on the listener. Continuo's blog (27-02-2008)



Cant remember the last time I heard an engaging whale singing recording  it seems ages ago. So Ujjaya (real name Héry Randriambololona, see previous post for more info) took me by surprise here with the openner Raksha bandhan incorporating the cetaceans wailing amid a drum-led, repetitive, trance-like track. At first, it sounds like Steve Roach after he watched a documentary on whales on Disney Channel. But, wait: the heavily processed, infectious drum track really kicks off and its hypnotic effect is augmented by warm, enveloping synth swashes. And the whale doesnt sound cliché, just deep and mournful.



After a short slow-motion interlude sounding like Zoviet-France on tranquilizers (The Sentinel tr.2), Arudra Darshan start with an insistent drum track, before getting weird with the addition of a hindu preachers strange devotionnal chanting, and a peacocks singing shrill notes, both field recordings Ujjaya made in Tiruvannamalai, Tamil Nadu area, South India. The Arudhra Darshan festival takes place every year in Tamil Nadu, celebrating the cosmic dance of Shiva. The track ends with cicadas and birds singing at night in a gorgeous several minutes-long fade out. I loved it.



The monumental Trishoulon is an extravagant affair altogether, succeeding in sounding like Lustmords electronic masterpiece The Place Where The Black Stars Hang, while being actually performed on 3 didgeridoos! After 10 mns of heavily processed, multiple didgeridoos thick droning, the drumming starts while your mind was still high from the previous drones, and the effect is truly uplifting.



MASSIVE TOKAFI (15 question à ...) (01-09-2012)



In few genres is the line between the negligible and the miraculous as fine as in ambient. And so, while plenty of instantly pleasing but ultimately shallow soundscapes find their way to the medial surface, far more challenging and rewarding aural adventures remain hidden in the depths. Héry Randriambololona knows all about the loneliness that comes with one's music falling underneath the radar, the constant struggle for attentive ears. For fifteen years, he has been producing under the name of Ujjaya, carving out heavily trance-inducing, minimalist hypnotic mantras with a hallucinatory effect on the listener and releasing self-produced CD-Rs in tiny print runs. The astounding effect of the music on the mind of its audience is a result of a deep understanding of the compositional factors underlying the works of some of his personal heroes: Steve Roach, with whom Randriambololona shares a spatial approach to sound and non-linear perception of time; Brian Eno, whose concept of ambient as a maximally discrete artform is a central pillar for the for soundscapes which develop their true power by plugging into the listener's subconscious; and late Mexican sound artist Jorge Reyes, with whom he shares a mastery of shamanic rhythms. On the other hand, Ujjaya deals with tantric wisdom in a very direct way: In a bid of extending beyond the stereotypical facts gained by textbook analysis, Randriambololona undertook several journey to India, to study with a guru, develop his technique and musical knowledge as well as adding a variety of instruments to his collection. The discrete and all but ephemeral integration of these acoustic sources - in whose timbres resonate many centuries of meditation and deep listening - into organic electronic soundscapes has lead to a style that exercises a confounding and powerful grip on the listener, pulling him or her deeper and deeper into a borderless space. As Randriambololona reveals: "A particularity of my music is that although it may seem to be ecstatic, oneiric and hypnotic, my musical vision always come out from real events of characters that are still living or that I've met in flesh. Sometimes reality can be more amazing than dreams. After having a hard time to achieve a posture (an asana), if the posture have been accomplished to its extreme (i.e with gaining the occult power that come with it), a yogi can whisper the formula "ujjaya" - victory."

suit l'interview sur http://www.tokafi.com/15questions/15-questions-ujjaya/