CONCERT SCHEDULES 
Keynote concert
Hosted and sponsored by the Events Office of De Montfort University.
Wednesday 13th June 2007 20.30
Centre for Excellence in Performance Arts - Studio 1dre
Denis Smalley Ringing Down the Sun (2002) + Resounding (2004)
(29’) (acousmatic) -
To be played without a break (or applause).
Ringing Down the Sun was commissioned by the Danish Institute for Electroacoustic Music (DIEM) and first performed in Aarhus in 2002. It was while working on the commission at DIEM in Aarhus that I came across the Danish tradition of “ringing down the sun” – the tolling of church bells, which signals the end of the working day and the descent of the sun through dusk and on into night. The tolling signal, and all it represents, remains part of Danish culture, even if it is now more “abstract”, in that it no longer necessarily has a real function in daily life. This idea seemed metaphorically to coincide with my attitudes towards the sounds, contours and spaces I was emerged in at the time, and thereafter it steered the direction and preoccupations of my composition. There is a number of tolling, resonant sounds which, although they may be set off with striking attacks, draw us inwards, in contemplation; there are circling, pulsed garlands which travel and radiate energy; there is a prevalence of descending contours – drifting, floating, falling – and sometimes descents into sombre hues. But the sun also has to be “rung up”, and so the form of the piece is governed by the progress of wave-like, cyclical contours. Lastly, there is the spatial dimension itself, designed to evoke both the open spaces of the outdoors – sky, landscape, and even coastline – but also the more intimate, enclosing feeling embodied inside resonances.
Resounding was composed as a companion piece for Ringing Down the Sun (2002), and I now prefer both to be heard together as a complementary pair. It is the third in a series of pieces based on metallic resonances, starting with Base Metals (2000). The title refers to the ringing of resonant sounds, the filling of space with sound, and to the notion of sounding again – as heard, for example, in the cyclic rhythms of resonances, prolonged, decaying, or sent travelling through the “orchestrated” listening space. Spatially, two ideas are prevalent – resonance heard as if from the interior of objects of varying dimensions, and the resonance of spaces as experienced, for instance, in a large cathedral. The idea of sounding again is also at the heart of the formal progress of the piece, which focuses on the return of materials in changed surroundings. Furthermore, sounds previously encountered in Ringing Down the Sun, and in Base Metals are given new lives. Thanks to Derek Shiel, whose sound sculptures have provided a never-ending richness of resonant sounds. Resounding was commissioned by Sonorities for the 2004 Festival in Belfast to celebrate the opening of the Sonic Arts Research Centre (SARC). The commission was supported by the National Lottery through the Arts Council of Northern Ireland.
Denis Smalley was born in New Zealand in 1946. He studied music at the University of Canterbury (MusB) and the Victoria University of Wellington and BMus (honours) prior to studying in Paris with Messiaen, and with the Groupe de Recherches Musicales. He then moved to England, where he completed a doctorate in composition at the University of York. From 1976 he was a Lecturer, and then Senior Lecturer and Director of the Electroacoustic Music Studio at the University of East Anglia, Norwich. Since 1994 he has been Professor of Music in the Music Department at City University, London. Denis Smalley been active as a composer of electroacoustic music for thirty years, and his works have been widely acclaimed, including the Prix Ars Electronica in 1988. He has made original contributions to thinking about electroacoustic music, in particular his investigations into the listener's perception of electroacoustic music, and his development of the notion of spectromorphology. His music has appeared on the Wergo Computer Music Currents series, on Effects Input (Groupe de Musique Expérimentale de Marseille) and two solo CDs on Empreintes DIGITALes (Canada).
Interval (10’)
Katharine Norman Islands of One (four short stories about mind and body)
(13.34) (radiophonic) -
1. What is this island?
2. One way or the other
3. Sparkling, gossamer (this was how it seemed)
4. You think you know what you’re doingCreated in 2006–7, the inspiration for these four linked radiophonic pieces came from my experience of becoming seriously ill while living on an island. The stories (like my post-recovery reflection on the peculiar experience of hallucinating wildly) became a consideration of mind and body—not so much traditional notions of duality, but the fragility of whatever thread it is that pulls one towards, or away from, the other. The text is my own (as is the voice), and most other sounds are recordings from my then home, Pender Island, British Columbia. Although the piece can certainly be performed over loudspeakers, Islands of One is perhaps best suited to a more intimate listening. If you’d like to hear it that way, please grab your headphones and visit www.novamara.com/islandsofone.html.
Katharine Norman is a composer, sound artist and writer. Until 2003 she was an academic, after which she absconded to Pender Island, BC and became a freelance reference and non-fiction writer to support the creative habit. Currently living between Canada and Cambridge (UK), and about to start an online Masters degree in Creative Writing and New Media at De Montfort University, she was recently appointed managing editor of the Cambridge Journal of Economics—somewhat to her surprise. Her book, Sounding Art: Eight Literary Excursions through Electronic Music is published by Ashgate (2004) and she has two CDs, London and Transparent things on the NMC and Metier labels respectively. More information on her recordings, writings, and current online work can be found at www.novamara.com, with lots to listen to at sonus.ca. http://www.novamara.com/soundclips/islandsofone.mp3.
Katharine Norman Losing it (Insomnia remix 2004)
(10.28) (programmatic) -
This is a piece about losing sleep, and longing for it. Insomnia—a disordered and half-way state of consciousness, where manic birds and distorted voices rise unbidden and the only release is the dawn.
Katharine Norman is a composer, sound artist and writer. Until 2003 she was an academic, after which she absconded to Pender Island, BC and became a freelance reference and non-fiction writer to support the creative habit. Currently living between Canada and Cambridge (UK), and about to start an online Masters degree in Creative Writing and New Media at De Montfort University, she was recently appointed managing editor of the Cambridge Journal of Economics—somewhat to her surprise. Her book, Sounding Art: Eight Literary Excursions through Electronic Music is published by Ashgate (2004) and she has two CDs, London and Transparent things on the NMC and Metier labels respectively. More information on her recordings, writings, and current online work can be found at www.novamara.com, with lots to listen to at sonus.ca. http://www.novamara.com/soundclips/islandsofone.mp3.
Concert 2
Thursday 14th June 20.00
Centre for Excellence in Performance Arts – Studio 1
‘... All images are a result of the human mind. Although we believe them to be a simple reflection of the outside world, they possess an inner, spiritual principle.
... It is the poet's task to push those images slightly in order to make sure the human mind is working on them humanly, make sure they are human images, images that humanise the forces of the cosmos.
That then takes us to the cosmology of the human mind.
Instead of experiencing an innocent anthropomorphism, man is given up to profound, elementary forces.’
(Gaston Bachelard, L'Air et les Songes)
Two ‘forms’ occupy the auditory space of this work. The first is radically modified to transcend perception, thus creating an illusion-space, a phantasmagorical effect. The second (including the substantial fragments into which it is broken up) is roughly shaken up; the ear can make out the degrees of order and disorder that are intentionally added to it. The transformation of the first ‘form’ (derived from a short sample with a creaking pulley) consists of variously transposed progressive elongation’s and minute descending transitions. An instrument for freezing and mixing, designed by B. Maillard — a machine offering a wide range of serrated morphologies — was used for this process. The same instrument was used to treat the second ‘form’, consisting of samples of song and sounds accompanying the act of raising water by means of an Indian noria. The way the creaking of the pulley is reflected in the singing of the water-drawers already constitutes, I believe, a ‘natural transformation’. In contrast, the treatment of larger sections enabled me to obtain more definite curves and spatial gradations. The fragments of the second ‘form’ also act as motifs in the general composition of the set to which this piece belongs, re-using the material from an earlier movement — Paysage, personnage, nuage (part 2) — and extending the listening with the idea of working on the sound image, in turn an icon (or im-son, ‘im-sound’), a diagram (or di-son, ‘di-sound’), a metaphor (or mé-son, ‘me-sound’). Everything stems from the creaking of a pulley and the humming of a top. Pulley-top, digital treatments, the whole lyre of technology, unprejudiced by the good old ways of concrete music; on tape for greater precision. Naturally, this movement is similar to a lullaby, or a nocturne. First performed 18 November 1983, Palais des Sports, Metz (12th International Contemporary Music Festival).
François Bayle was born in Tamatave, Madagascar, in 1932 and spent the first fourteen years of his life there and in the Comoros. He then moved to Paris, where he taught himself music. In 1958-60, François Bayle joined the Groupe de Recherches Musicales (GRM) and Pierre Schaeffer - Olivier Messiaen and Karlheinz Stockhausen (1959-62). In 1966 he became director of the GRM which became part of the Institut National de l'Audiovisuel (INA) in 1975. He was head of the INA-GRM until 1997. Leaving, he created his own studio and label Magison. To date, he has composed 95 works. François Bayle was at the origin of the conception of the Acousmonium (1974), he established the INA-GRM's record collections, organised concerts and broadcasts and supported the development of musical instruments using advanced technology (SYTER, GRM Tools, Midi Formers, Acousmographe). 1978, Grand Prix des Compositeurs Sacem - 1981, Grand Prix du Disque - 1989, Ars Electronica Prize (Linz) - 1996, Grand Prix de la Ville de Paris - 1997, Tribute from the CIME (Sao Paolo) – 1999, Charles Cros Presidential Grand Prize – 2006, Prize Del Duca de l’Institut de France.
Diana Simpson Anima Machina (2006)
(13’) (acousmatic)
Winner of the Prix SCRIME Bordeaux 2007 -
In a technological age, our lives are becoming more dependent on machines, and those machines are becoming increasingly smaller and more intelligent. This work is heavily influenced by the concept of tiny machines at the atomic level, and their ability to become capable of decision-making and self-replication. It poses the question, when does the human creator lose control over the invention, a miniature but disproportionately powerful machine, and what might the consequences be? The work is underpinned by a changing flux between control, restraint and disorder, implied by the behaviour of the sound material. There are references to metal and machinery, although the original source material is likely to be very far removed from this perceived scale of material. Most source recordings were closely amplified small materials, (various gardening tools, parts of a bicycle mechanism, clocks, and a 'slinky' spring), now given a magnified energy and greater mechanical status through processing. There is a mirroring of the potential qualities of machines at the atomic level, with key ideas being the implications of friction, surface tension and a dark instability or unpredictability which is inherent with current experiments in the creation of molecular machine systems.
Diana Simpson is a composer of electroacoustic music. Born in Glasgow, she studied at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama with Alistair MacDonald, where she was awarded a BA, PGDipMus, and MMus with distinction. She is currently a PhD student at Manchester University, supervised by David Berezan, and funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council and a Dewar Arts Award. Her works have been broadcast and performed throughout the UK and internationally, in Belgium, France, Italy, Brazil, Sweden and the USA. She has worked with sculpture, video, animation and performance artists. She has been a prizewinner in the Insulae Electronicae International Competition of Electroacoustic Music (2004), CIMESP 2005 (International Electroacoustic Contest of Sao Paulo) and the 33rd Bourges Competition of Electroacoustic Music (2006). In 2006 she was selected as one of six Scottish sound artists to be included a CD of audio art from Scotland and Toronto, released on the discparc label. She is currently a workshop leader for the Sonic Postcards project in Aberdeenshire, run by Sonic Arts Network.
Interval (10’)
nerve8 Sound for the Nerves (2007)
(ca.30’) (ensemble) -
nerve8 was a group of musicians/composers who experimented with electronic music and loudspeakers in performance during the mid nineteen-nineties. Unlike the ‘orchestra’ of loudspeakers of the acousmonium, nerve8’s approach was characterised by a ‘community’ of loudspeakers. The typical diffusion system of nerve8 included domestic hi-fi equipment and DIY matrixing boxes that were pooled together from member’s own homes. Despite this relatively ‘lo-fi’ approach, this diffusion system still enabled a dynamic interplay between the acoustic properties of a performance space and recorded sound on a fixed medium. An emphasis on sight-specific performances and working with in direct, reflected sound, helped make diffusing sound on the nerve8 system vital and exciting. The original members of nerve8 met whilst at the University of York. The are Nic Fells, now Senior Lecturer in music at Glasgow University, Gabriel Prokofiev, composer and musician now based in London, Tim Ward, who emigrated to Greece and is active in the Greek electroacoustic community, and John Richards and Dylan Menzies who are now part of the Music, Technology and Innovation Centre at De Montfort University. Tonight’s concert entitled ‘Sound for the Nerves’ looks at nerve8 past and present. A short selection of ‘historic’ pieces will be performed on the community of loudspeakers and interspersed with new works devised for EMS07. For this concert, nerve8 will be joined by Nick Collins and James Kelly, and the musicians will come together to create a new collaborative piece in real-time.
Performers: Dylan Menzies, Nic Fells, Tim Ward, Gabriel Prokofiev, Nick Collins, James Kelly