Programme Overview:

Tuesday 20 November

 

 

8pm – Black Box Theatre

This may not be Music

The opening concert of the Sounds Electric ‘07 festival features some of the finest music for tape and clarinet by Joseph Anderson and Matt Ingalls, members of the San Francisco Tape Music Collective. Programme includes Anderson’s award-winning work Change’s Music and his phonographic studies, études d’image; a set of clarinet improvisations as well as Clarinet Threads, Denis Smalley’s seminal work for clarinet and tape.

Joseph Anderson, live diffusion
Matt Ingalls, clarinet and electronics

Tickets €8 / €12

 

Wednesday 21 November

10am-1pm – Whitaker Lecture Theatre

Sounds Electric Computer Music Conference - Session I

Stefan Bilbao - Numerical Sound Synthesis (extended talk)
A survey of synthesis methods, including physical modelling techniques, will be followed by extensive sound and video demonstrations.

Brian Carty - New Csound Opcodes for Binaural Processing

Jon Aveyard - Introduction to Binaural Composition

Matt Ingalls - Algorithmic Improvisation (extended talk)
Matt Ingalls discusses his computer music work, including algorithmic tape composition, his "virtual improviser" computer programs, and their application/influence on his acoustic music.

Free Admission

2pm – Black Box Theatre

Irish Electroacoustic Music

This afternoon concert promises an eclectic selection of electroacoustic works from Ireland by established and emerging Irish composers. Frank Corcoran's Sweeney’s Vision and Brian Carty's Water Study both deal with vibrant themes and sound material from nature. Victor Lazzarini's Voices Inside & Burial of the Dead and Sean Gaffey's Segue, which feature thematic material of the human voice, along with Eoin Smith's Mneme, evoke dark, atmospheric and alien sound worlds.

Brian Carty, Water Study
Frank Corcoran, Sweeney’s Vision
Sean Gaffey, Segue
Victor Lazzarini, Voices Inside & Burial of the Dead
Eoin Smith, Mneme

Tickets €5 / €8

3pm - Blackbox Theatre

Workshop - Sound Diffusion

Joseph Anderson leads a workshop on the principals of sound diffusion on the festival’s multi-channel surround sound loudspeaker system. Sound diffusion is the performance practice of acousmatic music and can be regarded as the final step in the creation and dissemination of an acousmatic work, where the piece played back from recording is finally shaped and formed in the concert space. Possibilities for performance will be reviewed with hands-on demonstrations. The workshop is participatory with attendees experimenting with and performing excerpts of works on the system.

Free Admission (limited number of hands-on places available. To book, please send us an email: soundselectric@ear.ie)

4pm - Whitaker Lecture Theatre

point . light . sound .

Sounds meet visuals at an abstract junction
First part of audiovisual screenings from international selection

Features audiovisual compositions by Dario Bove, Alan Lambert, Irene Buckley and Mike Hannon, Peter Maybury, Tilman Küntzel, Fran Hartnett, Ceilia Eid & Sebastien Beranger, Denis McArdle, Danny McCarthy, Darran Smyth, Projector Collective and Stom Sogo.

Tickets €5 / €8

8pm - Black Box Theatre

 

Sounds Connected

Featuring Øyvind Brandtsegg (Norway), Matt Ingalls (USA), Lioba Petrie(Ireland), and Subfusc (Northern Ireland)

Interactive music concert promising a unique experience made available by the most innovative technology utilised by composers in contemporary music.
Øyvind Brandtsegg's interest lies in the field of compositional techniques for improvisation, leading to the design of custom musical instruments with computers and sensor technology and his open-source, interactive music software ImproSculpt. Øyvind's performance will be coupled with Matt Ingalls' unique clarinet solo improvisations, often accented by 'glitches' and rhythmic variations achieved through his software, and EAR performer Lioba Petrie's engaging improvisations which utilise and experiment with extended techniques for cello.

Subfusc is comprised of Iain McCurdy and Saul Rayson, presenting "Sonic Kitchen", a melting pot of musical ideas using items found in the kitchen to provide source materials for computer manipulated improvisation. Expect fruit and vegetables fitted with sensors, turned into percussion instruments and, in essence, an organic chamber orchestra celebrating the sonic delights of the kitchen.

Tickets €8 / €12

 

10pm - Black Box Theatre

Sounds Acousmatic - Late night concert

 “The direction I am looking is somehow towards transcendence, as I hope music to be something of a mystical experience.”
- Joseph Anderson

This late night concert is a unique chance to hear Joseph Anderson's acousmatic cycle Epiphanie Sequence in full length. This cycle is composed of three parts;

Part one, Kyai Pranaja [1998] which translates roughly to 'from the heart' or 'from the interior', this section is based on the 'suspension of moments, manifestations of veiled harmonies, the shifting of masses, these are born from the inner spaces and resonances of sounding bodies'.    

Part two, Mpingo [2003] - the name for African Blackwood, the dark wood of piccolos and clarinets, 'there is the awakening of birds, a blackbird or nightingale improvises. And in fleeting moments, wind rushes through reeds- light, colours filtered through air'.

Part three, Pacific Slope [2002] – the region of the North American continent which drains into the Pacific Ocean. This section holds the theme of the wave, the earth, the tree and the bell - an ancient call to transcendence.

According to the composer, “much of the work may be heard as a series of anecdotal periods detailing musical failures and successes, moving between narrative diegesis and musical abstraction”. Epiphanie Sequence will be played in full 3-D Ambisonic surround sound and explores spatial attributes as a compositional dynamic.

Tickets €5 / €8

Thursday 22 November

10am-1pm – Whitaker Lecture Theatre

Sounds Electric Computer Music Conference - Session II

Oeyvind Brandtsegg - Particle Synthesis in Csound (extended talk)
Particle synthesis is a general term for all kinds of granular synthesis, as described e.g. by Curtis Roads in "Microsound". The partikkel opcode in csound was designed as a tool to accommodate all time-based kinds of granular synthesis. By enabling all variants of particle synthesis techniques in one single opcode, interpolation between different types of granular processing becomes possible. The talk will describe technical issues of the partikkel opcode and give practical examples on how to use it.

Iain McCurdy – Cutting Edge Low Technology
This talk will demonstrate possibilities for those keen on entering the world of sensors but whose funds are limited. It will be shown how sensors can be improvised from everyday household objects and how these sensors can interface with music software. The talk will also draw attention to the issue of expressiveness in the design of sensors and their interpretation through software design.

Gordon Delap - Beowulf and Grendel
A discussion of the technical and compositional processes involved in the creation of "Beowulf and Grendel", a work for live narrator and electroacoustic sounds, performed at Sounds Electric 07.

Joseph Anderson - The Epiphanie Sequence
Thoughts on the Reflexive Moment in Acousmatic Music (extended talk)
Joseph Anderson attempts to gather a few thoughts together on Michael Dellaria’s Modes of Recording and the implications for the possibilities of an art of acousmatic music. Observations on the “reflexive moment” in the literature of the practice are made. Without giving too much away, there is also a look at classical Hollywood’s use of reflexivity in disrupting narratives. And somehow, this has something to do with Anderson’s Ambisonic Epiphanie Sequence. “Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain.”

Free Admission

2pm - Black Box Theatre

Sounds Electric ’07 Electroacoustic Music Competition

Concert of finalist compositions from international competition

Peter Batchelor, Kaleidoscope: Fissure
Mirtru Escalona-Mijares, Écoute s'il a plu
João Pedro Oliviera, Áphar
Paul Rudy, November Sycamore Leaf
Pei-Yu Shi, Fall, aus der Zeit...
Pete Stollery, Still Voices

Tickets €5 / €8

4pm – Whitaker Lecture Theatre

point . light . sound .

sounds meet visuals at an abstract junction
Second part of audiovisual screening from international selection

Featues audiovisual compositions by Modulate Collective, David Bickley, Irene Buckley and Mike Hannon, Brian Bridges & Libby Fabricatore, Paul Hearn, Alexis Kirke & Lola Perrin, Mario Radinovic & Iris Garrelfs, Paolo Inverni, Moira Tierney, Tilman Küntzel and Arturo Fuentes.

Tickets €5 / €8

5pm - Whitaker Lecture Theatre

Workshop - ImproSculpt by Oeyvind Brandtsegg

ImproSculpt is a software tool and an instrument for algorithmically assisted improvisation. Live sampling is an essential part of the instrument. The workshop will include a brief demo of ImproSculpt and an introduction to the software modules. We will continue with a guided hands-on session.

Free Admission

7pm – Black Box Theatre

Electric Poetry

Gordon Delap - “Beowulf and Grendel” for narrator and electroacoustic sounds
Hugh Magennis, narrator; Gordon Delap, electroacoustic sounds

Beowulf and Grendel is a work for live narrator and electroacoustic sounds, constructed around a live reading of the first part of the 11th century Anglo-Saxon epic poem Beowulf. The poem, read by Professor Hugh Magennis in the original Anglo-Saxon, is the one of the few survivors of poetry written in the Old English vernacular. Set in 6th century Scandinavia, the poem merges fact and fiction, combining accounts of real battles and historical figures, with accounts of monsters and fantastical events.

The first part of the poem introduces Beowulf, a great warrior. It tells of his duels with sea monsters, and of his battle with the man-eating monster Grendel, an outcast who attacks a mead hall, devouring its inhabitants.

The live reading is performed alongside electroacoustic sounds composed by Gordon Delap. Over the course of the performance, narrator and audience are plunged into an array of electroacoustic sonic environments which draw upon the characters, events, and places described in the text of the poem.

Tickets €8 / €12

9pm – Whitaker Lecture Theatre

Videomusic

Audiovisual concert featuring the work of Canadian composer and video artist Jean Piché, projected on a super wide screen.

www.jeanpiche.com

Programme:
eXpress, Bharat and Spin
for three channel video and stereo sound












Tickets €5 / €8

Friday 23 November

10-1pm – Whitaker Lecture Theatre

Sounds Electric Computer Music Conference

Session III

Jean Piché – Is Sound Worthless? (extended talk)
A Contrarian View of Post-Schaefferian Practices and Aesthetics

In an era where sound is easily and conveniently fabricated, it is becoming increasingly difficult to ascertain its role in determining the aesthetic worthiness of musical discourse. For six decades now, composers of “musique concrète” and electroacoustic music have made the inner qualities of sound the fulcrum of expression and have often done so by relegating the parameters of pitch and rhythm to secondary roles. This sound experimentalism is largely technology driven and discourse is still, partially at least, indebted to the possibilities of the means of production. Worth is identified by novelty. Now that innovative sound is easily attained, practitioners of the form are turning increasingly to the “linguistic” and organisational aspects of sound-based music. The
Schaefferian model of sonic taxonomy, as a rare reference available for organised sound, seriously hampers the quest for a unified theory by ignoring the propulsive and structuring values of harmonic relationships and metered rhythm. An argument is made in favour of a reconciliation of electroacoustics with the more easily shared values of music discourse. 

Alan Cinneade - An Introduction to Speech Synthesis and Voice Modification
For both engineers and linguists, the computer synthesis of natural speech is an objective that would provide many useful applications to human-computer interaction, including the realm of electro-acoustic music. The purpose of this paper is to introduce the area of speech synthesis by providing an overview of the three main methods of computer speech synthesis; namely concatenative, articulatory and formant syntheses.  Some aspects of the current state of the technology are illuminated and the final section will explain the author's motivation and current research approach to the field of voice modification.

Rory Walsh / Martin Brogan – Developing VST plugins with Csound
This talk will look at a new tool-kit for the development of high-end VST plugins using the Csound audio language.

Electroacoustic Music Discussion Forum
An open discussion on current thoughts, trends and practices in new music.

Free Admission

2pm – Carroll’s Building

Music for Percussion and Computer

Pedro Carneiro, percussion

Programme:

Javier Alvarez
Temazcal for maracas and electronics

Paul Wilson
Without Words for marimba and computer

Pedro Rebelo
Music for Prosthetic Congas for skins instruments and live electronics

João Pedro Oliveira
Liquid Bars for marimba and computer

Cort Lippe
Music for Snare Drum and Computer (Irish Première)

Acclaimed by international press as one of the world's leading solo classical percussionists, Pedro Carneiro’s exceptionally wide repertoire ranges from Bach to Stockhausen, performing regularly throughout Europe, USA, Far East, Australia and New Zealand. Now at the age of 32, Carneiro has performed the world première of over 80 works by leading composers worldwide and collaborates regularly with a wide range of acclaimed musicians such as the Tokyo and Arditti Quartets, Christian Lindberg and Steve Reich.

www.pedrocarneiro.com


Tickets €8 / €12

4pm - Whitaker Lecture Theatre

Workshop - Jean Piché - Sound-on-Image-on-Sound

What works, what doesn't and why. An analysis of Spin and eXpress, triple-screen videomusic works.

Free Admission

8pm – Carroll’s Building / Black Box Theatre

Manos Tsangaris - Small Festival Suite

Bitte mit Bild – Please include a photograph

Tafel I – Table I

Music Theatre Miniatures

Live musical performance, like theatre, takes place in a steady middle ground. Without the intervention of the technologies of sound or moving-image reproduction, which allow rapid variations of distance and scale (the filmic long shot or close up, the amplification of faraway noises or intimate whispers in music), theatre and music occupy a narrow spectrum of human perception. Live performance creates the proximity of sociability amongst strangers - not too far, not too close - constructing its audience as part of a similarly sociable group - neither the single individual addressed by a painting or TV, nor the massed crowds of the sporting event or rally.

The German composer Manos Tsangaris is interested in subverting some of these expectations of musical and theatrical performance, creating works in which the experience of music and sound cannot be divorced from spatial location or point of view, all of which are “composed” with equal care by Tsangaris. The particularities of the relationship of the audience to the performance event thereby becomes crucial. [Nicholas Till]

Featuring EAR ensemble with special guests Manos Tsangaris [percussion], Adhi Jacinth [piano], Thomas Meixner [percussion], Stephan Meier [percussion], Sylvia O’Brien [soprano], Pedro Carneiro [percussion], members of Spiral Staircase theatre company, and many more

www.tsangaris.de

Tickets €12 / €15

Saturday 24 November

2pm – Whitaker Lecture Theatre

Workshop - Matt Ingalls - Csound Show and Tell

MacCsound developer Matt Ingalls demonstrates various computer music tools, tricks, and tips created in Csound, including a realization of Steve Reich's Reed Phase (1967).

Free Admission

3pm – Whitaker Lecture Theatre

Workshop - Jon Aveyard - Binaural Composition

Workshop on Electro-Acoustic Composition for Headphone Playback Using Binaural Recordings

Note: This workshop is limited to 10 people

Free Admission - booking essential (contact: soundselectric@ear.ie)

8pm – Carroll’s Building / Black Box Theatre

Manos Tsangaris - Small Festival Suite

Bitte mit Bild – Please include a photograph

Tafel 1 – Table 1

Music Theatre Miniatures

Live musical performance, like theatre, takes place in a steady middle ground. Without the intervention of the technologies of sound or moving-image reproduction, which allow rapid variations of distance and scale (the filmic long shot or close up, the amplification of faraway noises or intimate whispers in music), theatre and music occupy a narrow spectrum of human perception. Live performance creates the proximity of sociability amongst strangers - not too far, not too close - constructing its audience as part of a similarly sociable group - neither the single individual addressed by a painting or TV, nor the massed crowds of the sporting event or rally.

The German composer Manos Tsangaris is interested in subverting some of these expectations of musical and theatrical performance, creating works in which the experience of music and sound cannot be divorced from spatial location or point of view, all of which are “composed” with equal care by Tsangaris. The particularities of the relationship of the audience to the performance event thereby becomes crucial. [Nicholas Till]

Featuring EAR ensemble with special guests Manos Tsangaris [percussion], Adhi Jacinth [piano], Thomas Meixner [percussion], Stephan Meier [percussion], Sylvia O’Brien [soprano], Pedro Carneiro [percussion], members of Spiral Staircase theatre company, and many more

www.tsangaris.de

Tickets €12 / €15

Sounds Electric '07 is supported by:

Sounds Electric is presented by EAR new music collective.

Contact: soundselectric@ear.ie

Press Enquiries: 085 723 8930