Ensemble Besides 12|13
30.10.2012 New Music Series 2/5
Wegens de grote opkomst van publiek uit het buitenland is het programmaboekje van dit concert in het Engels opgemaakt. De Nederlandse versie van de programmatekst vindt u op onze website.
Practical 17h00 Start concert | concert hall 18h00 Concert end (approx.) There is no break.
ISCM World Music Days 2012 ISCM World Music Days is an international festival of contemporary music. Each year, the festival is organized in a different country by one of the sections of the International Society for Contemporary Music (ISCM). In 2012, Belgium hosts this ‘world expo’ of contemporary music from October 25th to November 4th in its major performing arts centers. During the festival a symphonic orchestra, 22 ensembles and soloists will play 33 concerts in 6 different cities (Brussels, Leuven, Mons, Ghent, Bruges and Antwerp) and will feature works of more than 150 composers from 46 countries. The program for this edition of the WMD is composed in cooperation with the Belgian partner ensembles and concert organizations. Through an international Call for Works, the festival is an invitation to discover a broad spectrum of works and composers. In Ghent the festival is hosted 30 & 31 October by Logos Foundation, Bijloke Music Centre and Handelsbeurs Concert Hall. Handelsbeurs organizes two concerts during the festival: 30.10.2012 (17h00) Ensemble Besides 30.10.2012 (20h15) Het Collectief
Programme Matthew SHLOMOWITZ Avant Muzak (2010) for flute, alto saxophone, violin, cello, percussion, e-guitar, harp and midi-keybord Slow, quite slow, quite fast and fast; with footsteps Starting and stopping; with girl poem Loud and Soft; with construction Scanning Cultural Location Matthias KRANEBITTER Candlelight (2010) for piano solo Matthew SHLOMOWITZ Letter Piece #5 Northern Cities version 2012, for 4 performers Xin-Ming YANG Face-Painting (2010) for piano & flute Fabian COOMANS PUB (2011) for flute, alto saxophone, violin, cello, percussion, e-guitar, harp and electronics
M. Shlomowitz’ Avant Muzak is a commission by Centre Henri Pousseur with the support of the Flemish authorities
30.10.2012 | Ensemble Besides
Taken from the hyperactive life By Hannah Aelvoet
In the presence of composers Matthew Shlomowitz, Xin-Ming Yang, Matthias Kranebitter and their very own pianist Fabian Coomans, Ensemble Besides presents a program that bears a promise of humor and surprises. Every composition has a clear connection with the common everyday life, the trivial, or even almost the vulgar, and most of the times attention is given to the beauty of what is usually ignored. In comments on everyday life, social critisicm is always nearby, and yet, rather than criticizing, tonight’s composers choose for neutral observation, irony, or even amused watching. Variety and contrast are the central ingredient, especially when it comes to human emotions – thus, schizophrenic music in a schizophrenic society.
Die Geburt der Shlomowitz
Imagine that Brian Ferneyhough and Philip Glass would have a musical child together. What would be the sound of that
child? That is exactly how the Australian composer Matthew Shlomowitz (1975) described his own music once. From Glass the child inherits repetitive structures; Ferneyhough, in his turn, is indirectly responsible for the filling of those structures. Basically, the outcome would be a repeated pattern of complex movements. Shlomowitz would systematically fill in the rather ‘neutral’ repetitions of Glass with the (never repetitive) gestures of Ferneyhough. In 2007 Shlomowitz started a project called Letter pieces: a series of short pieces that combine music, text and visual performance. Meanwhile he created ten of them: seven duets, one trio and two quartets. The Letter pieces are so called “open-score pieces”, which means their content is not defined. In every Letter piece Shlomowitz creates a structure, a specific order for things to happen. These ‘things’ are sounds and physical actions that are fully selected by the performers.
The score marks, for instance: ‘A + B + + A + B C’, whereby ‘+’ means a rest, and ‘A’, ‘B’ of ‘C’ stands for a specific action or sound, chosen by the artists. Next to the course of the actions, each piece has its own tempo. Every Letter piece is based on a regular pulse and every action occupies precisely one beat – for example, ‘A’ cannot be longer than ‘B’. Nevertheless the fact remains that performers can sometimes speed up and slow down if it is appropriate at a specific moment. Since the performers can choose the sounds and actions for themselves, two performances of the same Letter piece can be (and should be) completely different. Especially in Letter piece #5: Northern cities the possibilities are virtually unlimited: the performers don’t even have to be musicians; literally everything can be a source of noise. Therefore, it is worthwhile to compare tonight’s performance with the different performances on Youtube. Eventually the performers decide what the general image of the work is, going from bitter severity to slapstick. Thus, every new performance should be a surprise. In Northern cities the opportunity is given to integrate everyday sounds on stage. This aspect is seen more often in Shlomowitz’ work; it is also regularly adopted in his scores and even caught on accompanying tapes. The aim of this tendency is to make the audience listen to these sounds in a critical way, just like they listen to (contemporary) music, in order to make them see the esthetic potential of the everyday life. Further, these everyday sounds include not only the coughing, chattering and noise-making, but also the functional sound that is commonly produced in railway stations, shop-
ping malls and elevators: Avant Muzak (2010) is based on – indeed it is – ‘muzak’. Each of the five parts is based on the same saccharine progression of chords, which is combined with several sounds on tape. The sounds include footsteps, a juvenile and girly love poem, the audience of a football game and a driving car, heard from the inside.
A kaleidoscope of emotions
The Chinese composer Xin-Ming Yang (1950), former student and teacher at the music conservatory of Sichuan, wrote in the past years a variety of commissioned symphonies, concerto’s, chamber music, choir works, film music and electronic music. In Face-painting, a piece of chamber music, three portraits are brought together – or, three faces are painted. Hereby Yang shows his fascination for marginalized human expressions, like desolation, ecstatic delight and chuckle to oneself. The main tendency of the work is the nervous temper, evoked by the agitated rhythm. The difference between the shown expressions is marked by the strong contrasts in dynamics and tonal range. Anyone who expects a Chinese sound, will be disappointed: Yang avoids references to a national or regional style. Instead of oriental music, Face-painting is built upon a free twelve-tone system. Even more emotional contrasts are to be heard in Candlelight music mit rondo (2010) by the young German composer Matthias Kranebitter (1980). He describes this piece of piano music on his website as a “kaleidoscope of logically interleaved, but apparently completely contradictory musical spots.” Basically, the work is a
reaction against the tendency in composition to reduce the musical material to its absolute essence, comparable with the expression “one note is worth a thousand words.” Instead of reducing the used material to that “one note”, Kranebitter explores the whole range of possibilities, leading to a continual alternation between the emotional expressions of the work. Stated that we would associate “music with candlelight” with something soft, creamy, etheric and soapy, in the genre of “romantic dinner party music with relaxing instrumental piano”, we clearly will not get what we expect. Besides, antitheses on existing tendencies occur more frequently in Kranebitter’s work. For instance he is fascinated by tonality and musical clichés, and by anti-music and the fails of dilettantes. This is related to social appearances like reality tv and the success of YouTube. For Kranebitter, these new habits form a crucial esthetic category of the recent past. He does not think of this in a critical manner; the way in which amateurs express themselves is really authentic and therefore hides a great beauty. Less authenticity and beauty is to be found in the commercial industry. Fabian Coomans (1983), the pianist of the Ensemble Besides, wrote as a protest against the ubiquitous engorgement to consumption. He selected several (spoken) advertisements and analyzed the rhythm and intonation of the speaking voice, to transcribe these fragments eventually into an instrumental version. In the collection of transcribed fragments from commercials, a hidden message comes to the surface, which forces the listeners to consummate. At first one individual is influenced, who then contaminates all
others, as a snowball effect. Finally everyone is following blindly what is imposed on them, something they did not choose by themselves. This marching along without independent thinking is represented in the music by a basic structure of verse and chorus. The repetitions of the verses and the chorus show how media hypes work; because people are hearing the same over and over again, the hype is accepted without them realizing. As a master in musicology, Hannah Aelvoet is currently occupied with the heritage of the library of the Royal Conservatory of Antwerp, where she is studying the piano as well.
Biography Nonstandard instrumentation, fresh sounds, contemporary chamber music in a brand new package, humoristic, interdisciplinary, performance art and searching for other ways of presentation. Those are the basic ingredients of Ensemble Besides: an ensemble of nine musicians sharinga passion for the performance of new music in its widest sense. With the tradition of written music as a starting point, an important part is always reserved for live electronics, performance and improvisation when brainstorming for new program concepts.The individual musicians each work in very different fields of the musical spectrum: ranging from rock to electronic music, from sound design to music theatre, composition and even festival
organization. This fact, together with the uncommon combination of harp, saxophone, drums, violin, cello, flute, e-guitar, piano and electronics, gives Besides its unique signature sound. The creation of new repertoire will therefore only be possible through constantly looking for cooperations with composers, sound artists and specialized performers. Since October 2009, Besides is coached by members of Ictus and the Spectra Ensemble within the Advanced Master in Contemporary Music program of the Ghent Conservatory. Besides receives administrative support of COHORT since January 2011. ensemblebesides.be
Romy-Alice Bols (flute) | Marieke Berendsen (violin) | Jasper Braet (electronics) | Toon Callier (e-guitar) | Fabian Coomans (piano) | Sam Faes (cello) | Nele Geubbels (saxophone), |Jeroen Stevens (drums) | Jutta Troch (harp)
More ISCM World Music Days at Handelsbeurs: Het Collectief E. Sammoutis , G. Benjamin , V. Baltakas, S. Reich, O. Paiberdin di 30.10.2012
Handelsbeurs Concertzaal Handelsbeurs Concertzaal is a concert venue in the city center of Ghent. It’s concert program represents a wide variety of styles and genres such as pop, rock, blues, jazz and classical music. The classical music series focuses on chamber music from 1750 till now and includes five to six special concerts
dedicated to contemporary classical music. As a result of their close cooperation since years, the Belgian ensemble for contemporary music Ictus presents each season at Handelsbeurs Concertzaal two projects in which they combine 20th and new music in an original format.
Text Hannah Aelvoet | Photo Het Collectief © Helena | Coordination programme notes Handelsbeurs Concertzaal | V.U.: Stefaan D’haeze © Handelsbeurs Concertzaal, Kouter 29, 9000 Gent