"You will live with all sensations, with harmonies of sounds, harmonies of colors, harmonies of perfume!” (Alexander Scriabin)

Photo Joanna Niklas — at Thikse Monastery. Offering my perfume Himalyas to the Monks

 I have been working for 20 years on the concept of multi-sensory performances, including music, video, dance and fragrances and so I was very interested by Alexander Scriabin, the great Russian composer who wrote a lot about “synesthesia” and “total” performance. In the last decade of his life, this mystic composer became increasingly obsessed with planning his “Mysterium Magnum”, a massive ritualized performance that he hoped would transfigure reality… This final opus, was left unfinished, and his bold designs of a seven-day-long, synesthetic concert in a Himalayan monastery sadly had to be abandoned, as he passed away in June 1915.

Jarek Kotomoski at Thiksey Monastery

A century after, at mid-April 2015, I received an Email from Jarek Kotomski in England asking me if I could participate to “Scriabin in the Himalayas”, a century tribute concert taking place on the outdoor terraces of Thiksey Monastery in Ladakh this June 21st for the Summer Solstice.

Michel Roudniska Photo Joanna Niklas — at Thiksey Monastery.

Even if it was a real challenge to prepare such a performance in only 2 months, I immediately accepted to compose an olfactory score of 6 fragrances and a special limited edition perfume for this exceptional event. It was an old dream to discover Ladakh, his mysterious old monasteries, highest passes of the world (5350 m and 6000 m) and gorgeous wild lakes in desert lands… So I planned to stay at least one week in order to acclimate to the altitude (the monastery is at 3600 m high) and to have time to make a large reportage on this wonderful country.

Setting up the Diffusion system with Jose Martin

The big problem was to bring to this quite isolated place all our olfactory equipment (120 kg for the fragrance diffusion system of my friend and collaborator José Martin) and the piano of 400 kg! Much stress until the last minute before the beginning of the concert but everything went perfectly…The multi-sensory performance included three world-class pianists and one tenor, an interactive light show based on Scriabin's color tonal system (but also mandala and geometry of sacred architecture) and Himalayan Cham dance. This program proposed his greatest works for solo piano as well as vocalizes and a unique transcription of “The Divine Poem” for piano four hands.

Program for the Concert

The concert took place on the day of the Summer Solstice, a date rich with meaning. The progress of the Sun throughout the year symbolizes the process of attaining enlightenment, and Summer Solstice is the final climax of this journey, celebrating the triumph of light over darkness and the union of self with the Divine – motifs of paramount importance to Scriabin’s mystical philosophy.I based my olfactory score on this theme: “Through struggle to Light” and on a poem from Scriabin:

“Scatter, bloom,

Take your flight towards the heights,

Celebrate the victory over elements

with a sacred dance,

In the beauty of hierarchies,

In unspeakable beauty.”

José Martin pouring the perfume

So I composed different fragrances about the scents of Earth, Humus, Fire, Water, Air with Jasmine flowers and a Tibetan frankincense for the final part.

Himalya by Michel Roudnitska

The perfume “Himalaya” specially composed for this event and sold in a only 200 bottles collector limited edition was first inspired by this Tibetan Temple composition and then feminized with a lot of Indian Jasmine and Jatamansi flowers. The base notes are woody-amber oriental (Sandalwood, Vetiver, Patchouli, Cedar, Cistus…) completed by the earthy Nagarmotha but with a very few quantity of Vanilla in order to preserve the mystical inspiration of the Frankincense.In order to express the heights of Himalaya and the freshness of the air, I added some ozonic and musky notes which bring lightness to this very rich fragrance.

The Fragrance Diffusion system and Monks at the Concert

As it is rare and precious, it should be used as a degustation or a meditation perfume: just one spray on a little piece of cloth or cotton, smelling and following it for hours, closing your eyes and breathing deeply… letting you travel among the Himalayan sacred mountains and monasteries… This collector fragrance will be soon sold on the website of the event: http://www.scriabininthehimalayas.com/. "Scriabin in the Himalayas" turned out to be the highest-altitude publicly attended piano concert in history…"

all photos from Michel Roudnitska and are copyrighted.

.-Michel Roudnitska, Guest Contributor, Master Perfumer and Creator of Multi Sensorial Performances and Shaman

Christopher Smith et Goady Green dans la Symphonie N°3 de Scriabine

Writer's Note:Scriabin described his projected symphonies of colors, touches, aromas (…) as 'having no roots in the present day arts of our race as we know it.' He told that his ultimate music belonged to those “theurgic arts of lost, ancient, mystic cultures”. He said that man’s psyche needed to be shaken by what he called, 'a hypnosis of apparitional rhythms’.

Sacred Dance of the Monks

Art as magic, in other words. Sound, shifting lights, the play of gestures, triumphal processions, sacerdotal dances, billowing scents, touching caresses, ritualistic and exorcist prayers, light and church lamps, smoking incenses and perfumes, genuflections and kisses, all combined 'to cross the abyss of thousands of centuries', he said to Sabaneeff. Together, they created 'the holy mysticism of all cultism'

Editor’s Note : We thank Michel for this wonderful insightful article and for sharing this multi sensoiral spiritual journey with us. Michel was our very first contributor; please read his March 22nd  2010 article on Ethical Perfumery which was CaFleureBon's first post here

Thanks to Michel Roudnistska we have a 1 ml of the Himalaya fragrance for a registered reader anywhere in the world (you must be registered or your comment doesn't count). To be eligible  please leave a  quality comment with  what moved you about this article, where you live, Draw closes 8/9/2015. There is no spilled perfume