Berichte/Features

Woche 07-12 / 11.2.08 - 23.03.08

Canadian Electroacoustic Composers in the DAAD Programme 1990 –2008
curated by Jef Chippewa (CEC Administrative co-Director)

01. Robin Minard / Ré / 1991 / 11:05
02. Robin Minard / Sutra / 2002 / Part 1 / 5:45 & Part 3 / 4:04
03. Gordon Monohan / Theremin Pendulum (excerpt) / 2008 / 2:35
04. Gordon Monohan / Spontaneously Harmonious in Certain Kinds of Weather (excerpt) / 1996 / 2:28
05. Gordon Monohan / Speaker Swinging (excerpt) / 1982 / 2:07
06. Christian Calon / z|s6 - overdubbing / 2001 / 6:35
07. Christian Calon / 1 - Les Hommes (The Ulysses Project) / 1998–2002 / 5:48
08. Christian Calon / Nord (Atlas) (excerpt, beginning) / 2006 / 5:48
09. Francis Dhomont / Phonurgie (Cycle du son, 4) / 1998 / 12:30
10. Francis Dhomont / À propos de K (excerpt) / 2006 / 7:18
11. Robert Normandeau / Palimpseste / 2005 / 15:00
12. Robert Normandeau / Murmures / 2007 / 9:00
13. Gilles Gobeil / Associations libres / 1990 / 3:01
14. Gilles Gobeil / Le vertige inconnu / 1993 / 8:23
15. Gilles Gobeil / Le miroir triste / 2007 / 13:41


With the start of the new year comes a new batch of DAAD guest artists! The "Deutscher Akademischer Austausch Dienst" (German Academic Exchange Service) has hosted a number of Canadian electroacoustic composers over the years, and this month the CEC proposes a WebRadio programme which features works composed by these past guest artists of the DAAD’s Berliner Künstlerprogramm as well as by the newest Canadian guest, Gilles Gobeil, who began his stay in early January 2008. The composers were invited to submit one work that is somehow related to their stay in Berlin as a DAAD Guest Artist as well as a recent or favourite work of theirs. The WebRadio programme is built chronologically by year of the artist’s stay. The CEC recognizes the generous contributions the DAAD has offered to these Canadian artists and heartily thanks the DAAD’s Music Section Director Ingrid Beirer and the DAAD for the important support they have given to these artists and, vicariously through the artists, to the larger community of Canadian electroacoustics. More information on the Berliner Künstlerprogramme can be found below and at
www.berliner-kuenstlerprogramm.de.

Das Berliner Künstlerprogramm des DAAD ist eines der international renommiertesten Stipendienprogramme für Künstlerinnen und Künstler in den Sparten Bildende Kunst, Literatur, Musik, Film sowie Tanz und Performance. Es verleiht jährlich und weltweit rund 20 Stipendien für einen meist einjährigen Aufenthalt in Berlin sowie mehrere Kurzstipendien. Die Namen der rund 1000 ehemaligen Gäste belegen eindrucksvoll den Qualitätsanspruch des Programms. Von Beginn an definierte sich das Berliner Künstlerprogramm als ein Forum des künstlerischen Dialoges, der die kulturregionalen und allemal die politischen Grenzen überschreitet. Wirksam und lebendig wird dieses Forum durch die Arbeiten und die Präsenz der Künstler in der Stadt, durch die jährlich rund 100 Veranstaltungen, die das Berliner Künstlerprogramm gemeinsam mit seinen Gästen in Berlin und andernorts durchführt, und nicht zuletzt durch die international zusammengesetzten Jurys der vier Sparten, die über die Stipendienvergabe entscheiden. In der Sparte Musik war die Stipendienvergabe von Beginn an darauf ausgerichtet, international bekannte Komponisten einzuladen, die dem früher eher konservativen Musikleben Berlins innovative Anstöße geben konnten. In den 1960er und 1970er Jahren waren dies u.a. John Cage und Morton Feldman, in den 1980er Jahren kamen zunehmend Komponisten hinzu, die die jeweils neuesten Ansätze in der elektroakustischen Musik und im Performance-Bereich vertraten wie der Kanadier Gordon Monahan. Um den Gästen, die durch ihre oft experimentelle Arbeit schwer in das Berliner Konzertleben zu integrieren waren, Aufführungsmöglichkeiten zu geben, wurde 1982 das Festival "Inventionen" gemeinsam mit dem Elektronischen Studio der Technischen Universität gegründet. Schwerpunkte dieses Festivals sind die elektroakustische Musik, multimediale Performances, Klanginstallationen und spartenübergreifende Ausstellungen (Musik/Bildende Kunst). Begleitet werden die Aufführungen von Workshops und Symposien, wissenschaftlichen Beiträgen und Dokumentationen und umfangreichen Programmheften. Anlässlich des 20-jährigen Jubiläums startete der DAAD eine eigene CD-Reihe, die die Highlights der Inventionen-Festivals dokumentiert. Mit der Technischen Universität, an der der DAAD auch die „Edgard-Varèse-Gastprofessur für Computermusik“ unterhält, verbindet das Berliner Künstlerprogramm eine langjährige intensive Zusammenarbeit. Die Komponisten elektronischer Musik des Künstlerprogramms erhalten im Studio der TU hervorragende Arbeitsbedingungen und technische Unterstützung. Auch mit den Festivals „Ultraschall“ der Berliner Rundfunkanstalten und „MaerzMusik“ der Berliner Festspiele ist das Künstlerprogramm bestens vernetzt, die regelmäßig Portraitkonzerte mit aktuellen Gästen durchführen. Die Ausstrahlung des Berliner Künstlerprogramms ist ausdrücklich nicht auf die Hauptstadt beschränkt. Durch die Zusammenarbeit mit verschiedenen Kulturinstitutionen, Museen, Literatur- und Filmfestivals entstehen bundesweite Impulse von großer Nachhaltigkeit: Viele Gäste bleiben nach ihrem Stipendienaufenthalt in Deutschland und bereichern, etwa als Professoren an Kunst- und Musikhochschulen, die kulturelle Szene, wie z.B. Robin Minard, der 1990 auf Einladung des Künstlerprogramms nach Berlin kam. Er wurde 1997 als Kompositionsprofessor an die Hochschule für Musik Franz Liszt und die Bauhaus-Universität in Weimar berufen, wo er das Studio für elektroakustische Musik (SeaM) gründete und leitet. Anliegen des Berliner Künstlerprogramms ist es, einen Freiraum des Schaffens zu bieten und die Vielfalt und Unterschiedlichkeit künstlerischer Positionen zu fördern. Es versteht sich als Plattform für einen über Europa hinausgehenden Kunst- und Kulturaustausch. Das Berliner Künstlerprogramm, 1963 von der Ford Foundation gegründet und 1964 vom Deutschen Akademischen Austauschdienst übernommen, wird überwiegend aus Mitteln des Auswärtigen Amtes und anteilig vom Berliner Senat finanziert.


DAAD 1990 - Robin Minard

/ 1991 / 11:05

Commissioned by Bruno Martinez with the support of the Canada Council of the Arts.
Realized at the Electronic Studio of the TU Berlin at the end of my 1990–91 DAAD residency.
Bruno Martinez, clarinet.

Sutra / 2002 / Part 1 / 5:45 & Part 3 / 4:04
Commissioned by the Friedenskirche Jena with the support of the Stiftung Kulturfonds. Realized at the Electronic Studio of the TU Berlin.

Robin Minard was born in Montréal in 1953. He studied composition and electroacoustic music in Canada and Paris. Since the early 1980s his work has focused in the areas of both electroacoustic composition and sound installation art. His works have been presented in festivals, museums and public spaces worldwide. During his DAAD residency in 1990–91, he worked primarily at the Electronic Studio of the Berlin Technical University where he composed the work Ré for clarinet and tape and created the installation Soundcatchers for the Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin. This installation, which was developed together with programmer Holger Becker, translated the spectra of ambient sounds into data for the control of MIDI-synthesizers. Robin Minard remained in Berlin after his DAAD residency and continued to work at the TU Studio. He composed the work Sutra there in 2002. He was also lecturer at the TU Studio on the subject of electroacoustic music and sound installation art from 1992–96. Since 1997 he has been professor for electroacoustic composition and sound design at the Franz Liszt Academy and the Bauhaus University in Weimar, where he is also director of the Studio for Electroacoustic Music (SeaM Weimar). He moved to Weimar in late 2004.
www.robinminard.com


DAAD 1992 - Gordon Monohan

Theremin Pendulum (excerpt) / 2008 / 2:35
A theremin antenna made of flexible wire is mechanized so that it swings spastically as a chaotic pendulum. This causes the theremin to change pitch according to the swinging motion of the pendulum. The sound produced is multiplied by a delay system so that we hear the sound of 8 theremins at the same time. This is mixed automatically by a computer mixing program, and is then broadcast into the gallery. Also attached to the antenna pendulum is a light that swings with the antenna, causing shadows to be thrown in the darkened gallery that mirrors the frequency wave changes in the theremin.

Spontaneously Harmonious in Certain Kinds of Weather (excerpt) / 1996 / 2:28
In Spontaneously Harmonious, the musical event is determined by natural forces (atmospheric pressure) shaped by architectural and sculptural structures. The musical form is structured according to these indeterminate forces, regardless of human witness to the musical event. The 100% reliance on the weather to activate the sound sculpture means that possibly the most interesting sounds, musically speaking, could happen when no one is there to witness them. This withholding of the musical event is not anti-musical if the visitor waits long enough. Of course no one knows when something will happen. If and when some sound finally happens, hopefully the listener realises what is happening around them. However, this whole experience can be boring if they do not listen to the silences and sounds from outside. […]

Speaker Swinging (excerpt) / 1982 / 2:07
Speaker Swinging is an experiment for three or more swinging loudspeakers and nine audio oscillators. The idea comes from hearing such things as Leslie speakers, moving vehicles with broadcasting sound systems, airplanes, and other moving sound sources. The subsequent acoustical processes of phasing, vibrato, and tremolo are fundamental to the work, as are the elements of sweat, struggle, fear, and seduction. Speaker Swinging grew out of a desire to animate the typical electronic music concert and in effect, to realise the loudspeaker as a valid electronic music instrument in itself. […] The rotary speaker motion and the corresponding Doppler shifts can become metaphors for the molecular movements of electrons that occur within solid state tremolo and vibrato circuits. It mimics these miniature processes that not long ago were modelled on human-scale mechanical-acoustic systems. By making reference to the atomic, it necessarily acknowledges the celestial.

Gordon Monohan creates music, sound sculpture, sound installation, and computer-controlled sound environments that span various genres from avant garde concert music to multi-media installation and sound art. www.gordonmonahan.com


DAAD 1995 - Christian Calon

z|s6 — overdubbing / 2001 / 6:35
Commissioned and produced by DeutschlandRadio Berlin. Live studio improvisation with Ossatura (Italy) and Tim Hodgkinson (UK). Excerpts from z|s, a 52-minute radio essay on time. […]

Les Hommes (The Ulysses Project) / 1998–2002 / 5:48
Commission of DeutschlandRadio Berlin. This part features: Shelley Hirsch, voice and René Lussier, guitar materials.
DVD surround to be released soon by empreintes DIGITALes. Excerpts from The Ulysses Project (54 min). […]

Nord (Atlas) (excerpt, beginning) / 2006 / 5:48
Commissioned by Sonic Arts Network and composed for the Sonic Lab space at SARC (Belfast) in 2006. Beginning of Nord, one of the four regions of Atlas, a spatial sound-visual installation (in progress). […]

Christian Calon’s concert works, sound installation or radio projects have all in common the exploration of the listening experience. The conception of sound shapes projection and the importance of listening contexts are at the heart of his creative research leading to a on-going process of investigation of new technologies. In parallel, he pursues his reflection on the narrative forms through writing and composing for the radio medium. www3.sympatico.ca/klong


DAAD 1997 - Francis Dhomont

Phonurgie (Cycle du son, 4) / 1998 / 12:30
Phonurgie is the fourth part of my acousmatic Cycle du son (Sound Cycle), a celebration of musique concrète, an art which has persevered through a series of incessant mutations and metamorphoses. The title of this last section of the Cycle refers go the importance of the “invention” of sound. Undeniably, musique concrète has created an unprecedented musical upheaval. Although the technological tools have changed and the colour of the sound has evolved, in Phonurgie the morphological thoughts and constructions have remained true to the ideals of the first “concerts de bruits” (noise concerts). Commissioned by the DAAD (Berlin). Premièred during the Inventionen 98 Festival (Berlin). First Prize, III CIMESP 1999, Concurso Internacional de Música Eletroacústica de São Paolo, Brazil; First Prize, 1st International contest of Electroacoustic Music “CiberArt” 1999 (Valencia, Spain).

À propos de K (excerpt) / 2006 / 7:18
À propos de K is a commission of the French State and the INA-GRM, and was realised in the composer’s personal studio in Avignon, France. This excerpt is the 3rd and final section of the 22 min. work. À propos de K, which obviously refers to Kafka, forms the preliminary research for Le cri du Choucas, a long work-in-progress on the universe and personality of the author. Kavka is the Tcheque word for jackdaw, a kind of crow, whose effigy served to mark the shop of Hermann Kafka, father of Franz. The animal symbolism, very present in Kafka’s work, suggested the relation as well as the title. The work is characterised by an impressionist approach to Kafkaesque themes in which the writing is heavily influenced by the mechanisms which contribute to the elaboration of dreams.

Francis Dhomont studied under Ginette Waldmeier, Charles Koechlin and Nadia Boulanger. In the late 40’s, in Paris (France), he intuitively discovered with magnetic wire what Schaeffer would later call “musique concrète” and consequently conducted solitary experiments with the musical possibilities of sound recording. Later, leaving behind instrumental writing, he dedicated himself exclusively to electroacoustic composition. An ardent proponent of acousmatics, his work (since 1963) is comprised exclusively of works for tape bearing witness to his continued interest in morphological interplay and ambiguities between sound and the images it may create. www.electrocd.com/en/bio/dhomont_fr


DAAD 2006 - Robert Normandeau

Palimpseste / 2005 / 15:00
Commissioned by the ZKM. Final mix at the TU studios during my stay in Berlin (January–June 2006). Palimpseste is the fourth and the last part of the cycle Onomatopoeias, begun in 1991 with Éclats de voix, followed by Spleen (1993) and Le renard et la rose (1995). The pieces of the cycle were dedicated to the childhood, the adolescence and adulthood, whereas the fourth one is an homage to old age. […]

Murmures / 2007 / 9:00
Commissioned by Musiques et recherches (Belgium). Composed at the Métamorphoses d'Orphée studio and in the composer’s personal studio. Sound recordings: Marie-Jeanne Wyckmans, a Foley artist and a composer who lent me her sound objects and her magical gestures. I have done my first stay as a professionnal composer in 1987 at the Métamorphoses d’Orphée studio following the invitation by Annette Vande Gorne after a Prize awarded at the Phonurgia-Nova International Competition (France) to compose Rumeurs (Place de Ransbeck). This work was based on the ambiguity of sound-meaning and was part of a “Cinema for the Ear” (Cinéma pour l’oreille) cycle. Today, 20 years later, I wanted to visit again this Place de Ransbeck (where the studio is located) with today’s studio tools. Rumeurs was composed with high quality but simple analog devices: five tape recorders and a mixing board. Since then, digital devices appeared that allow us to reveal a little bit more of the unheard-of. Already at that time, I was concerned to play with it and to present it to my listeners with some delicacy. Today, whereas it seems that there is no possible discourse other than the howl, it appeared to me that it was necessary to found more details in the grain of the sound and to give it to you without emphasis, with an impressionist touch, in half-tones.

Robert Normandeau
After a BMus in Composition (Electroacoustics) from the Université Laval (Québec City, 1984) Robert Normandeau moved to Montréal and completed an MMus in Composition (1988) and the first PhDMus? in Electroacoustic Composition (1992), under Marcelle Deschênes and Francis Dhomont. He is a founding member of the Canadian Electroacoustic Community (CEC, 1987). From 1986 to 1993, he was an active member of the Association pour la création et la recherche électroacoustiques du Québec (ACREQ), where he produced the Clair de terre concert series at the Montréal Planetarium. In 1991, he co-founded Réseaux, an organization for the production of media arts events, notably the acousmatic concert series Rien à voir. www.electrocd.com/bio.e/normandeau_ro.html


DAAD 2008 - Gilles Gobeil

Associations libres / 1990 / 3:01 for electric guitar and tape
René Lussier, electric guitar. Commissioned by René Lussier. Published on empreintes DIGITALes.
This piece was born of the desire after fifteen years, to collaborate with the guitarist René Lussier. Using his talent for improvisation, I have employed the wide variety of timbres and sound matter from his interpretation. The tape consists of a succession of very dense and expressive scenes onto which the guitar’s living and playful gestures are placed.

Le vertige inconnu / 1993 / 8:23
Commissioned by the GMEB. Prize of Stockholm Electronic Arts Award (Sweden, 1994); 2nd prize Prix Ars Electronica (Linz, Austria, 1995). Published on empreintes DIGITALes. “… here, on the roof of the world, I feel a shadow of uneasiness… It’s not at all the height, nor the kind of suction exerted by the abrupt depths and its emptiness which troubles me. It’s an altogether different emptiness which affects an altogether different sense… the essence of solitude…” — Paul Valéry, Le solitaire.

Le miroir triste / 2007 / 13:41
Freely adapted from a few scenes from an unshot scenario by Russian filmmaker Andrey Tarkovksy entitled Hoffmanniana (1975) and picturing the tormented life of Romantic-era German writer/composer E T A Hoffmann. A dialogue between Donna Anna (a character from Don Juan by Mozart) and Hoffmann), taken from Hoffmanniana: — “Have you ever had, if only in a dream, the certitude that everything was possible, that no matter what you could want, it would have to happen? — And that everything would happen if, suddenly, you were to decide to believe that your impression was real?” — “Yes, but only in a dream.” — “But is not the dream as real as reality?” she says, smiling. Then, noticing he is not looking at her but at her reflection in the mirror, she turns around and adds: “You should not be looking into mirrors at night.”

Gilles Gobeil has been focusing his work on acousmatic and mixed music since 1985. His works fall close to what is called “Cinema for the Ear”. Many of his pieces have been inspired by literary works and attempt to let us ‘see’ through sound. www.electrocd.com/en/bio/gobeil_gi


 

              

 

 

  


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