czwartek, 30 grudnia 2010

ZEITKRATZER plays PRES











Bôłt. Polish Radio Experimental Studio, 2010 (CD)

ZEITKRATZER transitions of

1. Dixi, Eugeniusz Rudnik
2. View from the window, Elżbieta Sikora
3. Low Sounds, Krzysztof Knittel
4. Icon (for tape), Denis Eberhard
5. Norcet, Krzysztof Knittel
6. Episodes, Bohdan Mazurek

Distribution: online by Monotype Records (roughly since mid-January 2010), music stores all over the world by Dux (roughly since mid-February 2010)

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What is musique concrete but a dip into sound data? In an ongoing series of instrumental interpretations of electronic music – an hommage to Polish Experimental Studio – I don’t think we are doing anything else then this. Composers, improvisers, performers and organizers – each one of us starts with careful listening and then flies off with whatever his or her tools are – piece of paper, music instruments or laptop. But I do believe the kickoff point is the same place: „How did music originate? - Pierre Schaeffer asked himself. „Through bricolage, with calabashes, with fibres, as in Africa. […] and this bricolage, which is the development of music, is a process that is shaped by the human, the human ear, and not the machine, the mathematical system”. There is a tendency to think of musique concrete as an art of studio montage. But montage begins in an act of listening; listening to something which was already THERE. As Chris Cutler neatly put it – from a perspective of a tape, there is no difference between recorded train entering a station or a tape composition based on a recording of the train – it is a sensual, structured and fixed form. Concrete. The question is only – what else is THERE? And maybe one more - where to find now musique concrete outside of the studio?

Inviting zeitkratzer to perform pieces created in Polish Radio Experimental Studio was hoping for a completely different process than the one between London and Warsaw in 2009 [see: Bôłt BR ES01]. And a contradiction to my initial feeling that it was almost impossible to play the pieces live; that asking musicians to do that was like inviting them to a „wrong territory” where nothing could go right. With ten virtuoso musicians of zeitkratzer it was almost possible to perform the compositions. And in no way it was a wrong territory for them; they looked easy and confident. In situations like this, one is tempted to start the story of „why” and „how” was that possible. The circulating answers are not difficult to bring up. Electronic music with its entirely new sound world pushed musicians to work on their instruments in search for new sonorities. And not only sonorities – electronic textures turned the function of the instruments upside down: following them could mean that strings deliver groove and percussions make subtle solos on top of it. Finally, electronic music undermined compositional techniques and not only as far as sounds impossible to notate are concerned. It was also about shaping new structures – out of noise textures, for example. To put it short, electronic music made the instrumental one naked again. Which is only half way. Or even less than that. And possible to write down before going to Wigry in August 2010 to meet zeitkratzer.

Seeing them at work was a surprise. First, of course, because of how quick, precise and collectively collaborative they were. Second, because of the fact of a minor relevance maybe – at the very first listening they were already playing along with the pieces. But I do believe it is something more than just tuning in to the originals. Many days after everything was done, Agnieszka Tarasiuk told me about her conversation with Maurice de Martin. He was supposed to say that reworking of the electronic pieces presupposes forgetting them at certain point. That is partly what working by ears could mean, I guess – in contrast to reading the score. But maybe there is also another part to it – the fact that zeitkratzer’s versions are becoming covers in the most literal meaning of the word. This meaning is not playing the same pieces but in a different way. It is placing the originals underneath to forget them – making them mute but letting them shape the surface precisely. This is why an attempt to be as close as possible I find crucial here. For me, it is about trying to confine everything to the cover. Electronic music always takes a risk of having some strings attached; depth accessible only to its author, something to be revealed which is simply a black box of its making. You remember all the “new concepts of music making” and “new sonorities” from the interviews with composers, history books or passage above? With zeitkratzer – a question of the making is gone, despite the fact that you probably have no clue what kind of instrumental techniques were in use. The question disappears, I think, because the music has a live stamp on it; even if does not resemble anything else, it is practice – all handmade, on or rather in the cover, just as it is being done, almost visible or touchable as you hear it. You need no further excuse or insight. It is a truly surface music. And this is how, I guess, instrumental music can make the electronic one naked, again.

Instrumental but not acoustic. This is not an old argument of live VS manipulated. There is a pair of hands at work here which is slightly more difficult to hear. But it is through Ralf Meinz’s hands that you hear brass whispering breaths becoming howling bursts. Or strings bowing on bridge becoming moving rocks. You might get a slight taste of disorientation but given as (almost) natural. A truly acousmatic music? If so, it is because the electronic element – new sonorities, re-functioning of the instruments, bizarre textures – is transparent, with no content of its own. The only content is the surface of the instruments. “What is most deep is the skin”.

PRES REVISITED # IN MEMORIAM JÓZEF PATKOWSKI













Bôłt. Polish Radio Experimental Studio, 2010 (2xCD)

CD1 (Originals):
1. Antiphona, Bogusław Schaeffer
2. Collage, Eugeniusz Rudnik
3. Psalmus, Krzysztof Penderecki
4. Episodes, Bohdan Mazurek
5. Assemblage, Bogusław Schaeffer
6. Esperienza, Bohdan Mazurek
7. Dixi, Eugeniusz Rudnik

CD2 (Covers):
1. Antiphona, Phil Durrant
2. Collage, Mikołaj Pałosz, Maciej Śledziecki
3. Psalmus, John Tilbury
4. Episodes, Phil Durrant, Mikołaj Pałosz, Eddie Prévost
5. Assemblage, Maciej Śledziecki
6. Esperienza, Phil Durrant, Mikołaj Pałosz, Eddie Prévost, Maciej Śledziecki, John Tilbury
7. Dixi, Mikołaj Pałosz
8. Hommage to Bogusław Schaeffer's Symphony, Phil Durrant, Mikołaj Pałosz, Eddie Prévost, Maciej Śledziecki, John Tilbury

Distribution: online by Monotype Records (roughly since mid-January 2010), music stores all over the world by Dux (roughly since mid-February 2010)

---------------------------------------------

What is musique concrete but a dip into sound data? In an ongoing series of instrumental interpretations of electronic music – an hommage to Polish Experimental Studio – I don’t think we are doing anything else than this. Composers, improvisers, performers and organizers – each one of us starts with careful listening and then flies off with whatever his or her tools are – piece of paper, music instruments or laptop. But I do believe the kick-off point is the same: “How did music originate?” was the question Pierre Schaeffer asked himself. “Through bricolage, with calabashes, with fibres, as in Africa. […] and this bricolage, which is the development of music, is a process that is shaped by the human, the human ear, and not the machine, the mathematical system.” There is a tendency to think of musique concrete as an art of studio montage. But montage begins in the act of listening; listening to something, which was already THERE. As Chris Cutler neatly put it – from a perspective of a tape, there is no difference between recorded train entering a station and a tape composition based on a recording of the train – it is a sensual, structured and fixed form. Concrete. The question is only: what else is THERE? And maybe one more - where to find now musique concrete outside of the studio?

“Polish Radio Experimental Studio Revisited” started with Collage by Eugeniusz Rudnik. The first time I have heard it – it was an obvious piece of composed Rock’N’Roll for me. But who would guess that for Denis Kolokol Esperienza by Bohdan Mazurek will turn out to be an aleatoric-conceptual piece for quintet in three movements? Altogether, there were seven people involved in the process of re-working of the pieces. In a blurred but joyful cooperation with Denis Kolokol, I have selected dozen of pieces from Studio’s archive. Some of them I have sent directly to the improvisers who agreed to take part in the project. I asked them to play their own versions of the pieces. The other pieces were scored for duos, trios and a quintet by Denis. Usually, he was keeping it formally close to the originals channelling the electronic textures into instrumental partitions; sometimes – I guess – he could not help making jokes; in one case he was following my suggestion, which I am deeply grateful for. Then the scores were sent to the performers who all met in a shabby but glittering with ageing pastel colours basement called “rehearsal room” to face a Yamaha keyboard (instead of requested grand piano) and a home stereo system with one speaker broken (instead of requested guitar amp). Two days later the pieces were ready to be performed in Cafe Oto in London.

Which means: the idea was to have as many different ears as possible; to have as many different reinterpretations of the existing compositions as possible; so that the end result is as indirect as possible. The art of confusion, you could say. Yes, but this is a central strategy of musique concrete – to blur or cut off the recognition of the existing material; to offer something real, to promise a reference but in the end to leave you alone with no sentiment. What exactly do you expect when you are about to hear an “Etude for One Strike of the Cymbal”? A cymbal strike?

I find this seduction, unrecognizabilty or even untraceabilty of the original material to be the core of musique concrete operations – and in trying to reconfigure this process in a totally different dimension I consider this project to be faithful to these ideas. Different dimension does not only mean a mere transfiguration of electronic pieces to instrumental music. First, it is a different dimension because it is a collaborative process when neither organizers, nor composer and performers fixed anything on tape. What you hear is only one of the interpretations, played live in London, on the 13th of December 2009. Second – it is a different dimension because it was live music, with people enjoying their drinks, cars passing by and coffee machine offering spontaneous insertions; meaning: played in a setting where you could expect a proper “performance” of the compositions. But where are they? If we learned the lesson of musique concrete, we should have zero problems with this.

BOHDAN MAZUREK # SENTINEL HYPOTHESIS













Bôłt. Polish Radio Experimental Studio, 2010 (2xCD)

CD1:
1. Six Electronic Preludes
2. Bozzetti
3. Fom a Notebook
4. Canti
5. Sinfonia Rustica
6. Ballade
7. Pennsylvania Dream

CD2
1. Children’ Dreams
2. Daisy Story
3. Reverie
4. Letter to Friends
5. Epitaph (1st version)

Distribution: online by Monotype Records (roughly since mid-January 2010), music stores all over the world by Dux (roughly since mid-February 2010)

So off we go - the subseries in
Bôłt dedicated to Polish Radio Experimental Studio. Most of the original recordings from 60. and 70. that you will find on the CDs are legally available for the first time in the history! And beautifully remastered by Ewa Guziołek-Tubelewicz and Joanna Szczepańska-Antosik. Sometimes the original recordings will be accompanied by reinterpretations of various kinds. ENJOY!

CORNELIUS CARDEW # THE GREAT LEARNING












B
ôłt. New Music in Eastern Europe, 2010 (4xCD)

CD 1: Paragraph 1, 2
CD 2: Paragraph 3, 4
CD 3: Paragraph 5
CD 4: Paragraph 6, 7

By 64 musicians and non-musicians

Recorded during workshops conducted by Nima Gousheh with assistance of James Bull. Everything was organized and produced in July 2010 by Michał Mendyk of 4.99 and Agnieszka Tarasiuk of Residential Arts Centre Wigry (now taken over by zzzze Church);

Distribution: Monotype Records (roughly since mid-January 2010)

Quite simply..: the first complete release of "The Great Learning" by Cornelius Cardew

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The Great Learning is the becoming of the community. Becoming, which is nothing but its rhythm – or more precisely: its pulse. You are invited to listen to all the tensions, alliances, conflicts, wishedfor leaderships and subversions, which all happen according to a coordinate of synchronization and de-synchronization. Cornelius Cardew is not only the creator but also the participant of this process.

In this sense, I see him as an audio-sociologist and this is not to suggest that he is less a composer. With The Great Learning he designed a milieu for collective processes; a milieu of only few parameters. All of them are sociological and compositional at the same time: the number of people, the space with its acoustics and something Michael Nyman called people processes which allow the performers to move through given or suggested material, each at his own speed. But this is far from a mere “free tempo” – it is rather about individual timing of following others, tuning in with them or isolating from them. Logically speaking, the central point of The Great Learning is a set of basic social relations happening slightly out of synch (not expressed in the score but presupposed by it).

One of the aspects of Paragraph 4 is a steady rhythm executed by striking the sonoruous substance (in Wigry this happened to be pillows). The unambiguous instructions (like dot = beat) are designed to fail during the performance – nobody can expect 60 amateur musicians to enter together. So what is formed is something Iannis Xenakis called sound masses, although “masses” acquire one more dimension here – a sociological one. This is a chaotic, undifferentiated mass of sound and social relations at the same time. These are people trying to get together rather than musicians executing a score. Hence, synchronization is only one aspect or one random moment of de-synchronization – even if your aim (instruction, intention) is clear, you can only lose yourself in a social milieu; You – yourself – is always lost when it becomes the community.

So the becoming of community is not reached here by an intentional unisono. It is happening in and out of de-synchronization. In de-synchronization, randomly, as mentioned above in Paragraph 4, or with tuning in by breath-long expressions (Paragraphs 2,3 and 7). Out of de-synchronization is best expressed in Paragraph 6. In a series of 16 passages people are asked to make (or not make) or hear (or not hear) isolated, synchronized, optional sounds in different constellations. From time to time though one is expected to await long, general pauses. This is a superb excursion into audio-sociology of Cardew. From the very beginning you can’t help being lost in other’s tempo, you are by default desynchronized, even though you need to follow others if you want to make a synchronized sound. The only moment people really get together is the long, general pause – to synchronize yourself with the others you have to stop following your own pace; you need to suspend your intentions and suppress expression. Wait.

But these are Cardew’s intentions as written down in The Great Learning which is also nothing but a score. Even if designed to fail, it fixes a matrix to be followed, like any score. But do people follow?

Now, listening to the recordings from Wigry, I hear that the intended socio-musical milieu of Cardew was not always at work there. Can you hear a long, general pause in Paragraph 6? Mistake number one. Paragraph 7 is based on a mathematical idea. It is intended to gradually become a harmonic unity. Everybody starts with his or her own pitch but from following the instruction of picking the pitches from the others, the reduction of the initial complexity follows so that in the end it is almost a unisono. Can you hear that process? Mistake number two. But the most thrilling one happened during the first (unreleased) performance of Paragraph 4. This one is a canon and in case of the gallery in Wigry where the piece was performed, the most convenient setting of the group was a U-shape line. Everybody was asked to follow his or her predecessor to keep everything in order. In few minutes everything fell into pieces and more literally – got stuck and drawn into hesitant silence: a long, general pause – mostly because nobody broke the jammed silence, which would be equivalent to affirming that the performance of the piece had come to a dead end. Now, what happened was that out of a complete, silent confusion – with no additional cues or verbal instructions – people got back into a canon and completed the piece. How did they organize themselves? You will not find it in the score. And I am sure Cardew wouldn’t know either.

This was the third time I was involved in organizing The Great Learning. And for the third time the piece could not be “properly” completed. First time, in 2007, we did not have enough people to perform all the Paragraphs. Second time, in 2008, it was not even meant to be a complete performance. Now, in 2010, in Wigry, we managed to go through all the Paragraphs but not always the way Cardew put it in the score. It was not fully his milieu. Or to put it differently – you are not listening to a proper performance of a score. In a way this piece always transcends the possibilities of its performers. The intended becoming of the community fails. But can there be anything more rewarding than breaking the piece’s superiority? 60 people getting lost and finding their ways again and again in the course of the performance? How? Why? With Cardew? Or against him? On basis of what? If not the score.