PAGE 41 opera for laptops!”, he says. “A guy I really like called Gino Robair did an improvised opera for really open instrumentation. There were guys performing it with singers and laptops. I also really like things with spoken text. So I thought, what if we did a similarly open opera thing with computers, but with more text”, says Les.
sounds or chatting to each other during the performance”, says Shelly. “So this is a way we could be really communicating. I've got my iPhone, if I move it one way, it controls one piece of sound, if I move it another way, it controls another part of the sound in three dimensions. And then, everybody in the ensemble has a sound that has three things you can control on it. “Then I can say, I'm going to control the pitch on Les's sound, the resonance on Chris's and the density on Julien's. So it's 3 dimensions with the iPhone controlling those things.............................................. “And we're all fighting the whole time to control each other's sounds.”
“WE’RE NOT ABOUT TECHNICAL FETISHES” - CHRIS TARREN
Shelly begins to explain the story behind XYZ, which will also be performed at Network Music Festival. “We wrote that for the New Interfaces for Musical Expression conference in Oslo in May last year.................................................. “The idea was that we'd all be able to control each other's sounds, with an iPhone or using a Wii-mote for example. I wanted to think of a way that wasn't just sharing
“It's like a big sonic battle!”, adds Julien.
“Sonic arm wrestle was the working title!”, says Shelly.
With elements of both art and music within their sound, BiLE fuse together two creative outlets and present their experiments through live performance. “It's very much a musical background that we all come from, and I think that translates into the approach that we take” says Iain. “I was a classical violinist.” Shelly adds, “and I came from writing instrumental music, to doing electronics, to doing BiLE........................................................ “We're more about exploring other avenues alongside the other things that we are doing. But the stuff that we're doing in BiLE is definitely influencing my other compositions. Working with a group of composers with other ideas just opens your eyes to other avenues”, Shelly says.
“We are always trying to create interesting music”, says fellow member Chris. “We're not about technical fetishes or using technology for the sake of it, we are just using technology as a way of enabling us to do interesting and new things. The technology is much more of an enabling factor, rather than a necessity.................................... “It's more about new ways of expression, rather than genre based roots,” he says.