Tragic Magic finds Julianna Barwick & Mary Lattimore, two of contemporary ambient and experimental music’s most celebrated composers, synthesizing their respective crafts within the walls of Philharmonie de Paris, given access to the extraordinary instrument collection of the Musée de la Musique in partnership with the French label InFiné. The collaborative album features seven immersive, evocative songs guided by the human spirit – intimate, grounded in friendship, earthly yet cosmic, and part of a greater continuum, speaking to the solace of artistry that has lifted us for generations.
Co-produced by Trevor Spencer (Fleet Foxes, Beach House), Tragic Magic came together in just nine days, a testament to the « musical telepathy, » as Barwick puts it, that has developed between the two artists over the years, traveling the world as friends and tourmates.
Arriving in Paris from Los Angeles to record, shortly after the 2025 wildfires, the sessions crossed improvisation with the ideas and emotions they had brought with them on their journey. Still reeling for their community, the two artists embraced a divine setting, feeling deeply cared for by their hosts at the Museum, and overwhelmed by the beauty and history at their fingertips. Lattimore selected three harps tracing the evolution of the instrument from 1728 to 1873, and Barwick chose several analog synthesizers that have shaped decades of exploratory music, including the Roland JUPITER-8 and Sequential Circuits PROPHET-5, among other treasures. Together in free- form dialogue, voice and instrument, they render a meditation on tragedy, wonder, and the restorative power of shared experience.
Throughout Tragic Magic, the artists locate something beyond themselves, a resonant feeling that everything cannot possibly be okay, but we hold on and find the beauty. Their means of processing life through music, of observing moments and working through emotions, of contributing what they can to the world, follow a lineage of creative expression and visionary invention represented by the very tools they used to realize this project.
