Art's Birthday 2009
electronic performance & silent disco radio action
with
Brandon LaBelle & BJ Nilsen
Carl Michael von Hausswolff
Friday, January 16, 20:00
at
Maria am Ostbahnhof
Stralauer Platz 34/35 (an der Schillingbrücke)
Berlin
and broadcast live on Deutschland Radio
http://www.dradio.de/dkultur/sendungen/artsbirthday/891892/
http://www.clubmaria.de/
6 euro entrance
Brandon LaBelle & BJ Nilsen
"the music will not be broadcast"
Staged as a silent disco, the performance turns the actions of the dance event into a situational installation. Presented through wireless headphones, an electronic work is performed mixing experimental beats and found sounds, while live microphones amplify the movements of bodies back into the room through a set of speakers. The dance floor is incorporated into the composition, immersing building and body into an extended rhythmical event.
&
Carl Michael von Hausswolff
"Spiricom Transmissions"
The EVP (Electronic Voice Phenomena) technique Spiricom was developed by Metascience Foundation in North Carolina in the early 70s. Thirteen sine wave tones between the frequencies 131 and 701 Hz are developed, combined and performed. Running these sine waves from a radio transmitter to a radio receiver enables people from "the other side" to communicate with the listeners. CMVH has, with good help by technician Jari Lehtinen, developed an instrument that can play thirteen sine wave tones at the same time and by pushing a button the machine randomly selects the tones.
*
Brandon LaBelle is an artist and writer working with sound and the specifics of location. His work has been featured internationally, including exhibitions and festivals Sampling Rage, Podewil Berlin, Sound as Media, ICC Tokyo, Bitstreams, Whitney Museum New York, and Radio Revolten, Halle Germany. His work on radio memory was shown at Casa Vecina, Mexico City this year, and he's currently preparing a project for the MuseumsQuartier in Vienna on the theme of voice and eating.
BJ Nilsen is a sound and recording artist focusing primarily on the sound of nature and its effect on humans, and the perception of time and space as experienced through sound. In addition, he has worked for documentary film, television, and as a sound engineer. Nilsen regularly performs live around the world and in collaboration with Chris Watson, Fennesz, Stilluppsteypa, Hildur Gudnadottir, among others.
Carl Michael von Hausswolff lives and works in Stockholm, Sweden. As an artist, composer and curator, he has shown work in the biennials of Venice, Moscow, Istanbul, Santa Fe and Liverpool as well as in other places. His music has been performed at festivals such as Sonar, Ars Electronica and Stockholm Electronic Music Festival and has been released on LP, CD or DVD by labels such as Ash International, Errant Bodies, Laton and RasterNoton. He is the curator of FREQ_OUT which has been shown in Paris, Berlin, Copenhagen, Chiangmai, Oslo, Budapest and Kortrijk. He is a long time collaborator with Leif Elggren on the project "Elgaland-Vargaland".
Current Activities | Winter 2009
"The music will not be broadcast"
Brandon LaBelle & Benny Nilsen
Live at Maria am Ostbahnhof Club, Berlin, January 16, 20:00, with CM von Hausswolff & live on-air with Deutschland Radio
iDEAL presents CLUSTER and BJNilsen
Friday, February 6
Nefertiti Jazz Club, Göteborg, Sweden
Touch presents...
Saturday 21st February
Tráfo, Budapest, Hungary
with Hildur Gudnadottir, Jon Wozencroft & Mike Harding
Project Gentili
Otto-Suhr-Allee 82 / Berlin / Germany / U8 - Richard-Wagner-Platz
13 December, 17:30 - 20:00 / performances at 18:00
Darri Lorenzen | out of here (performance)
BJ Nilsen | balanced loop (performance)
DISPLACED SOUNDS
BJNilsen [SE]
TARAB [AU]
Stan Brakhage [US]
Friday 12 December 2008, STUK, Leuven, Belgium
Current Activities | Autumn 2008
OCTOBER
China Tour:
Shanghai
Oct. 2
BJ Nilsen (SE)
Lost in Hildurness (IS)
Kemialliset Ystävät (FI)
Hard Queen (CN)
Beijing
Oct. 3
BJ Nilsen (SE)
Lost in Hildurness (IS)
Kemialliset Ystävät (FI)
Guangzhou
Oct. 4
BJ Nilsen (SE)
Lost in Hildurness (IS)
Kemialliset Ystävät (FI)
Future Places, Porto, Portugal
Oct. 9
Reykjavik, Iceland
Oct. 11.10-22.11
The Living Arts Museum,
BJNilsen-Darri Lorenzen-Finnbogi Pétursson-Ingólfur Arnarsson-Bjorn Quiring
www.nylo.is
Interzone festival, Utrecht, Holland
Oct 24.
Touch 25, BJNilsen, Philip Jeck [+ duet]
Bimhuis, Amsterdam, Holland
Oct 25. Amsterdam Dance Event
BJNilsen, Hild Sofie Tafjord, Hildur Gudnadottir, Thomas Ankersmit
NOVEMBER
Les Borealis, Caen, France
Nov. 26
Current Activities | June 2008
To mark the centenary of the birth of Norwegian composer Geirr Tveitt, The Hardingtonar festival has invited Spire to contribute various works based on his compositions.
BJNilsen | Philip Jeck | Charles Matthews | Jana Winderen | Marcus Davidson et al. will take part in a live event at various times on 21st June 2008 in Norheimsund, Norway.
You can read more in Ballade here
A programme in English can be found here
A full programme can be downloaded here and tickets can be bought here
New Projects & Current Activities | April/May 2008
April
25.04.08
S.K.I.F Festival, Modern Art Center, St. Petersburg, Russia
04.04.08
Touch 25 Live in Paris at Qwartz 4
April 4th: Cirque d'Hiver Bouglione: 110 rue Amelot, Paris 75003 (Metro Filles du Calvaire). 1 hour after Blixa Bargeld, Max Mathews, Jean-Claude Risset and Beatriz Feyrrera [Qwartz d’Honneur attributions] from 23h to 1h30, with Radio France [France Musique] direct retransmission, Qwartz's official sponsor.
Chris Watson | Philip Jeck | BJNilsen
Free entrance
May
06.05.08 at Rhiz, Vienna
eMEGO special Curated by Peter Rehberg
09.05.08 Skanu Mesz, Latvia, Riga with Hildur Gudnadottir
New Album from BJNilsen, "The Short Night"
CD - 7 tracks - 48 minutes
Now available from the TouchShop
Using location recordings, weather, birdsong and radio, BJNilsen continues to map and explore uncharted territory.
A follower to 2005's Fade to White [Touch # TO:65], BJNilsen develops his work further, based on field recordings and electronics. This time he adds harsher yet clearer harmonies with musical elements to the compositions, creating a beautifully complex and detailed study. Recorded in 2006-7 with mostly analogue equipment, using up to 50 year-old tapemachines, filters and generators that end up being the soft cushion in these cold location recordings.
Location recordings from Mälaren, Stockholm, Sweden; Coombe Gibbet, Berkshire, England and Landakot, Vatnsleysuströnd, Iceland.
Telefunken M10 and M5, Studer B67, Ferrograph Series 4, Bruel and Kjær Sine-Random Generator and Frequency Analyzers. Also Monowave, Sequential Circuits ProOne, Korg MS20, Esq1, MOTU 828MK2, Ableton Live, Logic Audio 6
Morin khuur on Black Light played by Hildur Ingveldardóttir Gudnadóttir
Tracklist
1. Front
2. Finisterre
3. Pole of Inaccessibility
4. Viking, Cromarty...
5. Black Light
6. Icing Station
7. Viking North
Boomkat review of new album The Short Night
Boomkat (UK):
Touch are a label that always put quality control above all else. They don't release much, but you can guarantee that when they do release something it's of an almost untouchable standard, and their small but perfectly formed group of artists are a testament to that. They first welcomed Swedish experimental artist BJ Nilsen into the fold in the late 90s, when he was writing under the name Hazard, but since then Nilsen has developed and 'The Short Night', his latest full length record, is for me his most coherent and enjoyable album to date. Nilsen has been busy in the last few years, contributing to the incredible 'Storm' album with field recording veteran Chris Watson and also to 'Second Childhood' with cellist Hildur Gudnadóttir and Icelandic trio Stilluppsteypa, but 'The Short Night' feels like the masterwork these records were building up to. Utilising his tuned ear for field recording, Nilsen blends environmental sounds collected in Sweden, Iceland and England and layers them above and beneath some quite stunning electronic parts. Taking vintage equipment (Sequential Circuits Pro-One, old Scandinavian generators, Korg MS20 etc) and recording and mixing using modern computer technology he comes up with a sound that owes as much to early innovators Popol Vuh and Delia Derbyshire as it does more recent ambient-darlings Biosphere and Deathprod. The mood is one of grim, crust-laden darkness, something akin to being trapped in an abandoned building as the Phantom of the Opera plays mercilessly in a sewer below - but while the mood is shadowy the sounds never become oppressive. Maybe it's due to the hypnotic nature of the compositions that draw you in and take hold of you entirely or possibly the actual character of the vintage generators used but the sounds float in and out of your consciousness with a wool-lined ease. Even as the album draws to a tremulous close with the incredible organ-drenched 'Viking North' and the amps reach eleven it is still washed with a veneer of melancholy and a palatable sheen that takes it above and beyond so many albums lumped into the same category. Touch have done it again then and thrown out yet another high water mark for the genre and a shining beacon in a mire of mediocrity. Huge recommendation.
