Appropriation is employed in the composition of the last scene of TRAPPIST-1, “Announcement”. This scene deals with the idea of science dissemination and the rapid impact TRAPPIST-1’s research had on society. One of the reasons for this rapid impact is that three of the planets in the system are in the habitable zone. This fact also led to scientific clickbait, which Gavin and I found interesting. To directly engage with this, the scene starts with a borrowed recording from the NASA official announcement of the discovery of the planetary system, triggered at the very end of the previous scene. We then pitched this recording to the harmonic material associated with the planetary system, fragmented it, and sampled it[64]. With this material, we created celebratory music that reflects the moment of euphoria after the discovery and the noise generated by it. Once this euphoric section fades, we then proceed to present the system more calmly, as an extension of the press conference. We borrowed accurate descriptions from the characteristics of the star and the seven planets of TRAPPIST-1, and we delivered them with computer-generated voices that imitate a spokesman and a spokeswoman. These computer-generated voices are pitched accurately to the notes associated with each planet and the star, and they rotate in the electronics according to the orbital periods of each planet. With this technique, we recreate the musical material from the beginning of the piece (Example #8 in 2.1.1.2.1 TRAPPIST-1), but with the explanations behaving sonically as the celestial body that they depict.
Example #17
Use of the appropriated NASA press conference announcing the discovery of the TRAPPIST-1 planetary system, and use of a series of descriptions of the star and the seven planets. The audio from the press conference appears first in its original form [00:00:03], and then remixed [00:00:26]. The description of the planetary system imitates the format of a press conference [00:01:15].