Musikprotokoll


Design

programme (pdf, German) press info (pdf, German) ECAS WP 4 - Stage

Musikprotokoll 2014
im Steirischen Herbst
… feeding the future
09.10. - 12.10.2014 / Graz, Austria

In its last festival edition within the framework of „Networking tomorrow's art for an unknown future“ musikprotokoll celebrated the final phase of this ECAS project with an ECAS Carousel, for which all 8 partner festivals were invited to nominate a musician/musicians collective. Furthermore we presented 3 ECAS commissioned works: The artists and media activists collective π node visited us, the radio piece „Walk that sound“ from Luka Toyboy was broadcasted in ORF Ö1 Kunstradio and we presented the installation „The Enclave“ from Richard Mosse with music by Ben Frost. Additionally we invited the host of the 3rd ECAS Partner Meeting, Andrey Kiritchenko from the music platform Nexsound and the NextSound Festival, to play a concert together with Austria's drummer Martin Brandlmayr.

Introductory text

The musikprotokoll laboratory is opening its doors for the forty-seventh time. Artists, musicians, composers and experimenters from across the globe are coming to Graz to share the current results of their work: Klangforum Wien, the Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Arditti Quartet, Radian & The Necks, Andrey Kiritchenko, Klaus Lang and many more.

“Don’t exploit the past without feeding the future”, was opera director David Pountney’s comment on the online petition rettetdasmusikprotokoll.mur.at. The festival sets out to tackle this task every year anew. The fact that Austria can refer to itself as a nation of music today is thanks not only to this country’s wonderful history of music, but equally has a great deal to do with those contemporaries who so uncompromisingly push the envelope of their art.

These artists must have the opportunity to showcase their works to a national and international audience: at festivals willing to take the risk of the unheard and in front of an audience willing to join them on their journey, to be surprised, touched or challenged by new music. After all, premieres can sometimes go amiss. Or the opposite. musikprotokoll has been taking this risk since 1968. At the same time, this festival was and is in danger – budgets have been axed, its right to exist called into question. But what no-one can take away from us is the conviction that festivals such as musikprotokoll will be needed for at least another 47,000 years to come. Because the future needs nourishment.

Elke Tschaikner

ECAS supported events during the festival:
ECAS Carousel »Let’s merry-go-round!«09. - 12.10.2014
Let’s merry-go-round!
Date 09.10. - 12.10.2014
Action installation, concert
Participants musicians: Callum Higgins, Electric Indigo, Jeroen Uyttendaele, Lars Kynde, Martins Rokis, Maxime Denuc, Mental Overdrive, noid, Pia Palme, Pierce Warnecke, Zenial, Assimilation Process / idea and realisation: Fränk Zimmer / musikprotokoll director: Elke Tschaikner / ECAS coordinator: Susanna Niedermayr / Speakers: Elke Tschaikner and Christian Scheib / Programmer: Thomas Musil / Translations and proof-reading: Friederike Kulcsar and Kimi Lum
LocationKarmeliterplatz
Sponsoring Partners ORF / musikprotokoll im steirischen herbst in cooperation with Skaņu Mežs, Insomnia, Cimatics, The Generator / TodaysArt, Tone / Unsound, FutureEverything, TMA / CYNETART & DISK / CTM Festival.
Print musikprotokoll magazine 2014
Online References http://musikprotokoll.orf.at/en/program/2014
http://musikprotokoll.orf.at/sites/new.musikprotokoll.mur.at/files/presse_pdf/mp14_Magazin_screen.pdf read about and listen to noid: Schwindel – Trugbild – Phantasie [Vertigo – Delusion – Fantasy]
read about and listen to Martins Rokis: Untitled
read about and listen to Callum Higgins: One Man, The Mule – And Another
read about and listen to Assimilation Process: carousel 1-4
read about and listen to Zenial: Carousel Madonnas
read about and listen to Pia Palme & Electric Indigo: Relatively Scary
read about and listen to Lars Kynde & Jeroen Uyttendaele: ear choreography
read about and listen to Maxime Denuc: String Quartett N°1
read about and listen to Per Martinsen: Repeat:Then:Repeat
read about and listen to Pierce Warnecke: Cyclical Entrainment
Videos Video by Gernot Rath / ORF Steiermark (10/2014)
von Herbst Remixed
ORF Kulturjournal Ausschnitt
DescriptionAlthough the musikprotokoll carousel looks like the ones in days of old, every ride takes you to a different acoustic present and, at the same time, to a new world of sound. You can read a long description & single work details here.
 
The Enclave27.09. - 12.10.2014
ECAS Commission : Richard Mosse & Ben Frost : »The Enclave«
Date 27.09. - 12.10.2014
Action installation, discussion
Location Kunsthaus Graz - Space04
Participants direction and production: Richard Mosse / film editing: Trevor Tweeten / sound design: Ben Frost
Sponsoring Partners ORF / musikprotokoll im steirischen herbst, Kunsthaus Graz, DISK / CTM-Festival, Skaņu mežs, Tone / Unsound Festival
Print musikprotokoll magazine 2014, pg. 4f
Audio Discussion - Audiofile (in German language)
Online References http://musikprotokoll.orf.at/de/ecas#
http://musikprotokoll.orf.at/en/program/2014 The Enclave (german) listen to the discussion
Description For two years, the Irish film-maker and photographer Richard Mosse travelled in eastern Congo together with cameraman Trevor Tweeten, trailing rebel groups and visiting places plagued by violence and terror. So far, more than five million people have been killed in a civil war that has been raging since the end of the 90s. “The Enclave” is a film installation that condenses authentic soundscapes and the terrifying, eerily coloured images captured on 16mm infrared film into an uncanny elegy to a nightmare known as war.

When we see tanks driving around and people burying the dead in “The Enclave”, then it is not in the manner of the war reporter’s documentary material, but rather as an artistic, personal approach to this horror. On 9th of October a panel discussion about the casus belli and the traumatas of the war in Kongo took place, moderated by Katrin Bucher Trantow and Kamdem Mou Poh a Hom (Chiala Graz). The participants were Rene Botsili Bosilo, Esperance-Francois Bulayumi and Daniel Diakiese. After the panel discussion there was a concert by Pascal Papy Lopongo.
 
π-node07.10. - 12.10.2014
ECAS Radio Call I : π-node
Date 07.10. - 12.10.2014
Action workshop "Der Zukunft des Radios auf der Spur - In Search of the Future of Radio"
Participants
Location steirischer herbst Festivalzentrum 2014
Sponsoring Partners DISK / CTM Festival, ORF / musikprotokoll im steirischen herbst, Deutschlandradio Kultur, Ö1 Kunstradio, Goethe Institute, esc medien kunst labor, mur.at, Radio Helsinki, pd-graz, realraum
Print musikprotokoll magazine 2014, pg. 25
Online References http://p-node.org/graz/
at musikprotokoll (English language)
at musikprotokoll (German language)
π node Workshops / Open House
π node meets Graz concert
esc medien kunst labor
mur.at
Radio Helsinki
pd-graz
realraum
Description What surprises does radio hold in store for us? The media artist’s group π node joined forces with protagonists of esc medienkunstlabor, mur.at, Radio Helsinki, pd-graz and realraum to examine how the narrative, participatory and imaginary potential of this medium can be realised in the future. For the duration of the festival a temporary social space was open for visitors to give free rein to their creativity. The group of radio activists and artists provided a wide range of cutting-edge and sometimes older technologies with the aim of enabling reflection on the basic historical and societal conditions of radio.

π node see radio as an instrument that anyone can learn quickly and easily. The doors of the radio workshop were open on Tuesday, 7 October, before the festival started. Anyone interested was welcome.

 
Date 09.10.2014
Action performance concert RADIO SCANNER ORCHESTRA
Participants π node, members of esc medien kunst labor, mur.at, Radio Helsinki, pd-graz and realraum / coordination: Reni Hofmüller
Location steirischer herbst Festivalzentrum 2014
Sponsoring Partners DISK / CTM Festival, ORF / musikprotokoll im steirischen herbst, Deutschlandradio Kultur, Ö1 Kunstradio, Goethe Institute, esc medien kunst labor, mur.at, Radio Helsinki, pd-graz, realraum
Print musikprotokoll magazine 2014, pg. 25
Online References http://p-node.org/graz/
at musikprotokoll (English language)
at musikprotokoll (German language)
„Walk that sound“ by Luka Toyboy12.10.2014
ECAS Radio Call I : Luka Ivanović : »Walk that Sound«
Date12.10.2014
Actionradio broadcast
ParticipantsLukatoyboy
LocationORF Ö1 Kunstradio
Sponsoring Partners ORF / musikprotokoll im steirischen herbst, DISK / CTM Festival, Deutschlandradio Kultur, Ö1 Kunstradio, Goethe Institute
Print musikprotokoll magazine 2014, pg. 20
Online References http://kunstradio.at/2014B/12_10_14.html
http://musikprotokoll.orf.at/en/biography/lukatoyboy
DescriptionLukatoyboy aka Luka Ivanovic is a musician, sound designer, and educator from Belgrade, Serbia. His main activities in music and sound include performing electroacoustic improvised music (based on realtime sampling of various objects, toys, voices, and field recordings) using feedback, analogue synthesizers, electromagnetic coils, radio transmitters, walkie talkies, and additional small surprises.

"Walk That Sound" by Lukatoyboy used the commonplace yet often forgotten walkie-talkie to create a moving urban sound portrait based around Kottbusser Tor in Berlin-Kreuzberg. The project played with the array of available and free frequencies, and the almost unlimited amount of users that can interact over these different channels, to capture crackling dialogues ranging from the banal to extremely urgent, as well as the multitude of sounds captured by chance while participants rove around the city as "mobile scouts".

During the CTM festival 2014, anyone and everyone was invited to become a mobile scout by temporarily exchanging their ID for a walkie-talkie at the project base at West Germany in Kreuzberg. Suggested guidelines for use, and daily topics to explore were provided. Speakers of all languages were welcome. Meanwhile, others could listen in on the scouts’ transmissions in West Germany, as Lukatoyboy mixed a selection of the scouted sonic treasures live. For the broadcast, originally produced for Deutschlandradio Kultur and then re-broadcasted on ORF Ö1 Kunstradio, Lukatoyboy composed a selection of the week’s recordings into an eerily mobile radio drama.
 
Masterly Carvers of Sound: Martin Brandlmayr & Andrey Kiritchenko10.10.2014
Date10.10.2014
Actionconcert
ParticipantsAndrey Kiritchenko (UA), Martin Brandlmayr (AT)
LocationHelmut-List-Halle
Sponsoring PartnersORF / musikprotokoll im steirischen herbst
Printmusikprotokoll magazine 2014, pg. 17
Online References http://musikprotokoll.orf.at/en/program/2014
http://musikprotokoll.orf.at/en/biography/martin-brandlmayr
http://musikprotokoll.orf.at/en/biography/andrey-kiritchenko
Interview with Andrey Kiritchenko (german)
Description They are both masters of carving out delicate sound structures. Following their first collaboration for Andrey Kiritchenko’s album „Misterrious“ and an initial concert in France in the summer of 2012, the two musicians are now set to take to the stage together once again. The performance was preceded by several intense days of work in Martin Brandlmayr’s studio in Upper Austria that also laid the foundation for a joint release that had been in the planning for some time.

The duo concert at the musikprotokoll festival was also a return invitation. In May 2013 Andrey Kiritchenko invited the members of ECAS to Kiev to hold the third ECAS Partner Meeting at the NextSound festival, which is organised by the avant label Nexsound. Founded by Kiritchenko in 2000, Nexsound has become the most important label for Ukrainian experimental electronic and related music. The success of the label is to be credited to its director Kiritchenko, who has not only an open but a finely tuned ear for new forms of avant music, whether they be from Ukraine, Russia, France or the USA.
 


ECAS Carousel »Let’s merry-go-round!«

Artists from all over Europe have created works for the ECAS carousel. Five years ago, musikprotokoll started together with eight ECAS partner festivals the project "Networking tomorrow's art for an unknown future". To mark this anniversary of a joint search for tools for an unknown future, the partner institutions invited those artists who then set this carousel in musical motion. A merry-go-round for advanced players.

The carousel – an object of yearning from childhood days. Once in motion, its centrifugal force elicited screams of joy. Although the musikprotokoll carousel looked like the ones in days of old, every ride took the visitors to a different acoustic present and, at the same time, to a new world of sound. The pieces could only be heard and felt while the bodies were rotating.

( - Post Scriptum September 2015: In 2015 four composers from Upper Austria were commissioned by musikprotokoll to compose another four works that until 18th of October can be consumed while spinning around on the carousel at „Höhenrausch 2015“. - )

Single work descriptions

„Schwindel – Trugbild – Phantasie [Vertigo – Delusion – Fantasy]“
by noid

(nominated by musikprotokoll)

When I was a child, I always enjoyed exploring all kinds of apparatuses or activities that challenged my sense of balance. Today I even get sick to my stomach listening to electro-acoustic compositions where sounds move around me. Too old? Too late? I’m glad that with this carousel at least the speakers stand still, providing something steady to hold onto – acoustic handles, so to speak.

read about and listen to noid: Schwindel – Trugbild – Phantasie [Vertigo – Delusion – Fantasy]

„Untitled“
by Martins Rokis

(nominated by Skanu Mezs)

In electro-acoustic music sounds usually are moved around static listeners. The merry-go-round project was a chance to rethink this model of sound/listener relationships. In my piece, each speaker produces 2x repetitive motifs – deconstructed cliché carousel music loops and percussive sine tones. Each element has slight differences in timing and pitch, creating complex interactions between the sounds without having to move them around per se. Spinning listeners can hear the “same but different” motif that, which seems to spin, while actually staying still.

read about and listen to Martins Rokis: Untitled

„One Man, The Mule – And Another“
by Callum Higgins

(nominated by FutureEverything)

This composition was created using recordings of run-out grooves of records. The sounds produced by the run-out grooves are instantly recognisable to any listener of vinyl, the characteristics of which lend themselves to the unique listening experience of the carousel, whilst the motion of the carousel mimics that of the records from which the sounds originated.

read about and listen to Callum Higgins: One Man, The Mule – And Another

„carousel 1-4“
by Assimilation Process

(nominated by TMA's CYNETART Festival)

The carousel starts moving, accelerating gradually, and with each rotation gets faster and faster. Snippets of music fly towards the riders; fragmented sounds that are here one moment and gone the next. Our brain tries to fill in the missing parts. Everything is spinning at such a mind-boggling speed! We fall into a kind of trance … until the ride comes to an end.

The earth revolves, and we revolve with it, while we press the “fast forward” button. We try to perceive and understand everything, but we fail, because everything is going too fast. This is why we can only register fragments. A reflection of our society?

Music is usually consumed head-on or in surround sound, via headphones etc. Here, the listener moves around the sound source: four different channels – four different sounds. There are superimpositions, repetitions, stretches of silence. The challenge here was to find adequate synthetic and natural sounds that work perfectly well together and individually and seem interesting and complex. It required a lot of experimentation to come up with an original work that could fascinate the riders; that at the beginning seems abstract but bit by bit produces a complete picture. Or is it just an illusion?

read about and listen to Assimilation Process: carousel 1-4

„Carousel Madonnas“
by Zenial

(nominated by Unsound)

The current piece Madonnas also contains an idiosyncratic mix of samples drawn from a transformation of text files into sounds. One of them is Carousel with Madonnas, a well-known poem by the famous Polish post-war poet and writer Miron Białoszewski. Inspired by the folk culture in the surroundings of Warsaw, it describes an old dingy carousel at a small town fair and young ladies riding it. The author compares them to Madonnas with child, and soon the scene reminds him of pictures by Rafael and Leonardo da Vinci. The famous music to this poem was created by Zygmunt Konieczny – in his work the music corresponds to the verses of the poem, which symbolize the rhythm of the carousel. For me the poem is just an inspiration – because of its subject as well as the fact that it has been used in popular culture so many times. But for the audience it might just be another random sample and not influence the interpretation of the whole piece. I leave that open.

read about and listen to Zenial: Carousel Madonnas

„Relatively Scary“
by Pia Palme and Electric Indigo

(nominated by musikprotokoll)

Using her specific techniques of playing the contrabass recorder, Pia Palme reflects the dynamic instability sensed by the person on the carousel. Acceleration overcoming gravity is present in her sounds. Electric Indigo contrasts them with industrial noises to accentuate the rotation. Her uncanny pulse increasingly disintegrates as an incisive reminder of the finite nature of the experience.

read about and listen to Pia Palme & Electric Indigo: Relatively Scary

„ear choreography“
by Lars Kynde and Jeroen Uyttendaele

(nominated by TodaysArt)

An audio choreography that expresses speed and the sensation of movement. This piece explores relations between the glissando sounds of a cello and acoustic glissandos produced from fast movements in relation to the sound source.

read about and listen to Lars Kynde & Jeroen Uyttendaele: ear choreography

„String Quartett N°1 (electronic version)“
by Maxime Denuc

(nominated by Cimatics)

When I composed String Quartet N°1, I did some intensive acoustic research and used oscillators to simulate strings. I adapted this concept for the musikprotokoll merry-go-round, so that now each speaker represents an instrument of the quartet. Through the rotation of the carousel, listeners can be inside the compositional process, allowing them to discover how each part is evolving.

read about and listen to Maxime Denuc: String Quartett N°1

„Repeat:Then:Repeat“
by Per Martinsen

(nominated by Insomnia)

When I was presented with the idea of composing a musical piece for a merry-go-round, my initial thoughts were that this was probably the most perfect place for cyclic, repetitive music – something I’ve spent quite a bit of my time on during my years as a producer of electronic music for dark clubs. My hope is that those who already enjoy this type of organization of sound might find the new listening situation a different way to discover small subtleties and “change by repetition”, while those who consider such musical structures “music for goldfish” (and people with similar attention spans) might just enjoy the ride in itself. In any case, I’m looking forward to playing around with these ideas.

read about and listen to Per Martinsen: Repeat:Then:Repeat

„Cyclical Entrainment“
by Pierce Warnecke

(nominated by CTM Festival)

This composition is based on the very simple geometric motion of the carousel: a circular shape with acceleration and deceleration. The circle is translated into sine waves, which undergo transformations of “endless” acceleration (Risset glissandos). These create the illusion of endlessly rising sound, which I hope will give the rider/listener a modified perceptual experience.

read about and listen to Pierce Warnecke: Cyclical Entrainment

2014

ORF
Musikprotokoll

Working Period IV