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Expo Manchester Preview:
Manchester Victoria baths

Sunday 25 June

Sonic Arts Network takes over Manchester’s vast and historic Victoria Baths with a specially curated programme of sound installation, sonic intervention and performance. Headliners The Owl Project will blend the historic craft of wood turning with hectic glitch electronica; Artists will perform in the derelict and empty swimming pools; Turkish baths will be filled with experimental noise and a man will drown his computer. Food and refreshments will be available throughout the day.

Performances
12.00 – 12.30 Ben Gwilliam - Empty Spiel
13.00 – 13.30 Behaviour
14.00 – 14.30 Golgonozza - The Marriage of a Table and a Chair
15.00 – 15.45 Rogue Wave Collective - First Wave
16.00 – 16.30 Tim Malone - Sync
17.00 – 17.30 The Owl Project - Sound Lathe

Installations by
Nic Bullen, Bob Chapman and Joanne Roberts, The Caretaker, Crypto-Audiological Society, Leslie Deere, Patrick Furness, Naomi Kashwagi, Katy Merrington, Nemeton, Nick Rothwell, Cath Shea, Adrian Wilkins and Denise Bryan, Simon Woolham, Joseph Young

 

Sonic Postcards Exhibition, Plymouth



Sonic Postcards has been working closely with Creative Partnerships in 9 schools across Plymouth, working with over 230 young people and some 100 artists, teachers and other creative practitioners from across Plymouth. This work has been based on a variety of popular locations and communities in Plymouth and it has enabled pupils, through sound and visual art-forms to examine, explore and express their feeling about the places they go, inhabit and live. A one-off exhibition incorporating nine installations and film work from the nine schools is free – details below. This event has been produced and directed almost entirely by young people from the participating schools.

Brewhouse Art Space, Royal William Yard, Millbay, Plymouth PL1 3RP on Saturday 17th and Sunday 18th June - free

 

3 - 8 June
Brighton University Graduate Show 2006
(degree show)
University of Brighton, Arts Faculty
Degree show for the University of Brighton, including work from the Music and Visual Art degree.
http://www.brighton.ac.uk/

16 June - 27 July
Whiteplane_2
(installation)
UK wide tour
A collaboration in sound and light by Alex Bradley and Charles Poulet. Using ambisonics and large-scale planes of shimmering LED light, the audience sits, stands or lies as the space around them is rewritten with flickering vistas, floating panoramas and tactile surfaces. The installation will also feature a ‘live ambisonics’ performance on the opening night.
http://www.dotcog.co.uk/cmn/

17-29 June
Full Circle
(exhibition)
Phoenix Gallery, 10 14 Waterloo Pl. Brighton
Exhibition featuring Julie Marsh, Cecilia Jardemar and a sound installation by Charlotte White. Based upon a series of statistics ranging from levels of tea consumption in the UK, to numbers of deaths by starvation in Africa, Charlotte White has created a sound installation that presents such information in aural form. Issuing forth from a circle of eight speakers, a cacophony of voices reads out nearly 100 of these "facts", and the resulting effect is created by the random selection of sound samples, triggered at various intervals by a computer.
http://www.phoenixarts.org

17 June
Music for Bodies Open Day
(open studio)
Unit 61, Regents Studios, E8 4QN
Directed by Kaffe Matthews, Music for Bodies is a research project linking the sonic mapping of human bodies to architecture, through a practical study of bioresonance and interface building.Its aim is to discover new methods of experimental music making, as well as make new music more accessible to the wider community. It is doing this concentrating on making music to feel rather than just listen to. Currently it is making Sonic Beds around the world.
http://www.musicforbodies.net/

Various
Resonant Spaces
(tour of performances)
Various
Resonant Spaces sets out to free the sound of some of the most exciting and incredible locations in Scotland. Locations that resonate and echo, or that have fantastic ambient sounds or dense, near endless reverberations.
Check out the website to find out where. http://www.arika.org.uk/resonant-spaces/

17 June
Vertigo Magazine: Summer 2006 New Issue Launch
(film/performance)
Curzon Soho, Shaftesbury Avenue, London
Fingertips a live music film event by Tereza Stehlíková, with an original soundtrack performed live by Philip Jeck lauches the new issue of Vertigo - which champions innovation & diversity in form and culture for independent film and the moving image.
http://www.vertigomagazine.co.uk

19-21 June
Body, Environment and Human Sound Making
Sound and Anthropology Conference
(conference)
St Andrews University, Scotland
This conference is the result of a collaborative project between the Social Anthropology Department, St Andrews and the Sound Arts and Design department, LCC, University of the Arts, London. The project has involved collaboration and dialogue between sound artists and anthropologists, covering subjects such as the soundscape, acoustic ecology, poetics, language, as well as postgraduate training in methodologies and skills. Session topics include Human Sound and Environment; Human Sound Interaction; Sound, Silence and the Built Environment; Oral History and Archives and Sound Exchange-Moving Sound: Representation and Methodology.
http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/

22 June
Waterplay
(concert)
Guildhall, St Giles Square, Northampton
Music for piano and electroacoustics with a watery theme, including three world premieres of piano works by Edward Cowie - 24 Preludes Book 1 accompanied by Cowie's paintings projected overhead Northampton-based composers Lisa Reim (Pebbles) and Tom Williams (Rip Tide), plus Aurora Borealis for piano and electronic sounds by Philip Mead.
http://www.northamptonfestival.co.uk

27 June– 23 July
Almeida Opera
(performance)
Almedia Theatre, London
Xavier Dayer’s setting of Maeterlinck’s symbolist classic Les Aveugles opens the award winning new music theatre season. Raymond Yiu's cabaret-inspired debut The Original Chinese Conjuror, Schoenberg’s Pierrot Lunaire and Michael Nyman’s latest opera follow in July. http://www.almeida.co.uk

8-16 July
9 public concerts during the Stockhausen Courses (concerts)
Sülztalhalle, Kuerten, Germany
In 9 concerts which take place in the Sülztalhalle in Kuerten, 41 Stockhausen works will be performed including 2 world premières and 2 German premières. In all concerts Stockhausen will be the sound projectionist.
http://www.stockhausen.org

20-23 July
Futuresonic 2006
(festival)
Various, Manchester
The 2006 festival takes place over three days traversing music and the arts, involving multiple spaces. It takes in headline gigs, breaks musical acts, maps the city and ships in artists and musicians from around the World.
http://www.futuresonic.com

24-30 July
SuperCollider Symposium
(symposium)
Music Department, University of Birmingham
Presentations, concerts, and composer/developer meetings and both beginner and advanced courses in SuperCollider during the week, with James McCartney as keynote speaker and a host of SuperCollider gurus, composers and adventurers.
http://www.music.bham.ac.uk

20-23 September
Visiones Sonoras 2006
(conference)
Mexico City
Electroacoustic Music and Composers Meeting, the second edition of Visiones Sonoras will take place at the National University of Mexico in September. The four day long festival includes seminars, workshops and presentations together with daily concerts. The Festival also includes grants for composers wishing to participate and an electroacoustic music coposition prize. http://www.visionessonoras.org


 


Max/MSP Summer Courses

Goldsmiths College Electronic Music Studios is pleased to announce its annual summer programme of MaxMSP courses.

Our MaxMSP courses have, since 2001, attracted participants from across the UK, Europe, North & South America, the Far East and Australia, including students, educators, mainstream musicians, composers/sound artists and performers who utilise live electronics.

Course dates:

Introductory Level Max/MSP
Tutor: Tim Ward
Course #1 : Sat. 15th, Sun. 16th, Sat. 22nd & Sun. 23rd July
Course #2 : Tuesday 18th - Friday 21st July

Intermediate Level Max/MSP
Tutor: Sebastian Lexer
Course #1 : Tuesday 18th - Friday 21st July
Course #2 : Tuesday 25th - Friday 28th July

For further information, including cost, accommodation information and to download a booking form, please go to
http://www.goldsmiths.ac.uk/departments/music/ems/courses.html


CCMIX: 8-Month Course in Electronic Music

The Centre de Creation Musicale Iannis Xenakis (CCMIX) announces its annual 8-Month Course in Electronic Music. The course will take place from October 2006 - May 2007 in Paris, France. Faculty and guest lecturers include: Carla Scaletti, Jean-Claude Risset, Gerard Pape, Trevor Wishart, Sinan Bokesoy, Makis Solomos, William Setharis, Curtis Roads, Agostino di Scipio, Julien Bilodeau and Yiorgos Vassilandonakis. This course explores a compositional world where sound itself is the primary material. The nature of sound, how it is perceived, how it may be transformed in differing time scales, and what new forms result are key subjects. In keeping with Xenakis' belief that interdisciplinary understanding can provide rich, new avenues for musical creativity, our course stresses the importance of interdisciplinary learning and interaction. In addition to lectures, conferences and discussions, a variety of computer music tools will be presented in classes and workshops. Participants will receive 9 hours individual studio time weekly; assistance is provided when needed. Interested participants may pursue creative work in the CCMIX Sound / Visuals Atelier. Participants' work will be premiered and produced in concert by CCMIX.

More information is available by email from Randall Neal, Admissions.ccmix@vtlink.net


MRes in Sonic Art

New MRes in Sonic Art - at Hull University, Scarborough Campus,UK

(Scholarships available)

Course details:

http://www.scar.hull.ac.uk/arts/cmt/sonic-arts/index.htm

Studio Facilities:

http://www.scar.hull.ac.uk/arts/cmt/studios.htm

For enquiries about Scholarships - please contact Tim Howle
(t.j.howle@hull.ac.uk)

Call for Assistance

Cornerhouse and Sonic Arts Network are seeking artists and students of sonic art to assist in the staging and presentation of Staalplaat Soundsystem's The Ultrasound of Therapy.

http://www.staalplaat.org/ultrasound.html

Inspired by the ancient French hospital 'La Salle des Malades" the installation mimics a clinical environment. First visitors details are taken, then they will be admitted to a cubicle, complete with hospital bed, where artist 'doctors' and 'nurses' will treat their 'patients' with personalised sound therapies, ranging from relaxing and energising to slightly disturbing. In addition to the individual therapeutic sounds, an overall acoustic is created for the whole space, unifying it into one immersive sound installation. This sound will be transmitted to radios mounted in the space, speakers in the room and to special bass shakers mounted under the beds.The installation will be launched at Cornerhouse on the 23 June to coincide with the launch of SAN Expo festival (23 June - 26 June). It will then run until the 30th July.

Cornerhouse and Sonic Arts Network are calling for volunteers to act as 'doctors' and 'nurses' during the installation's run.Volunteers will be 'trained' during the Expo festival by members of Staalplaat Sound System.This is a rare opportunity to be involved in the staging of the UK debut of The Ultrasound of Therapy, an installation which is sure to make a huge impact as part of Cornerhouse and SAN's international exhibition of sonic art.

Please contact richard@sonicartsnetwork.org for more information

Foldback Sound Festival Call for submissions

Curators: Matt Lewis, Tom Richards, Sebastian Lexer
3rd July deadline for all submissions

Foldback will be a three day festival held at Reception Space (Cremer St, Shoreditch. http://www.receptionspace.org / receptionspace@gmail.com) from the 3rd to the 5th of August 2006 with an affiliated sound show to be held at Meals and SUVs Gallery in Dalston.

http://www.mealsandsuvs.co.uk

The main objectives are to bring together a diverse cross section of sound practitioners to meet, compare notes and present new and existing work in a loosely categorised framework. The event will provide a platform for education, new collaborations and a celebration of many types of sound based creativity.

The Event will be split in to five sections as follows:

Thurs 3rd August- Soundtrack First
An evening focusing on the relationship between sound/music and moving image. To include performances and screenings that investigate the dynamic between what we see and what we hear in film and video, looking at soundtracks, foley, music video, broadcasts and more.
Submissions are welcome from musicians, sound artists, visual artists and film makers working in any genre. Proposals might be for works using found material, improvised soundtracks, remixed or re-scored films or films where the soundtrack provides the starting point for the visual content.

Fri 4th August- New Retro Sound Machines
A day of presentations on new musical instruments, with a special focus on instruments in the acoustic or analogue realm. In the age of laptop musicians and Max Patches- there are still inventors and musicians coming up with fresh sounds with no computers necessary. This will be a chance for them to explain and demonstrate their audio wares and compare notes on this under-represented world of musical invention. Submissions welcome.

Sat 5th August- Interface.
A day of seminars, demonstrations and discussion on the theme of audio interfacing. We are looking for new ways of communicating with musical and audio hardware/software. As computers become ever more useful and powerful in the audio world are the means of real time control keeping up? Also where does the human input stop and the machine become creator? We want people creating new ways of talking to computers in order to create sound.

Sat 5th August- Odd Meter
Submissions invited for contemporary music that is not in common 4/4 time. Either submit your own work or suggestions for other composers/producers This event will be the closing party and contributions will be collated and mixed by DJ Yuri Suzuki http://www.affectedmusic.co.uk/ http://www.yurisuzuki.com

Satellite Projects for the duration of the event.
We would be interested in any stand alone audio work to be affiliated with the festival. This could be installation work, audio walks, web based work or anything else you might deem relevant, impress us! These projects will be promoted as part of the festival.


Submission Guidelines

Please state clearly which part of the festival you are interested in.

Audio CD/DVD/weblink Max 15 minutes and or written proposal max 500 words. Plus CV and brief outline of technical requirements.

Post to: Foldback
FAO Tom Richards
1st Floor
295 297 Haggerston Road
Dalston
London
E8 4EN


Email to: receptionspace@gmail.com


Call for Video Artist and Sound Recorder

Independent short film based on artist Stephen Flanagan for up and coming exhibition. Required to film an interview with the artist about his life and work.

Also sound recordist required to record sound piece to accompany the exhibition. Half days work, expenses paid.

Email CV to mailto:stephenflanaganstudio@googlemail.com


Hazel Clark Prize

The Stockhausen Courses Kuerten are pleased to announce a new prize for the 2007 courses and beyond.

The Hazel Clark Prize will be awarded each year for the best musicological essay or extended writing on a Stockhausen work or works. The prize is valued at 1000 Euros and will be presented during the awards evening at the end of the courses.

This new prize marks the maestro's desire to recognize excellence in Stockhausen scholarship and to acknowledge the important role academic research into his work has played in promoting the Stockhausen's ouvre internationally.

The Hazel Clark Prize is being entirely funded by the 23project in Los Angeles, California, an endowment/gallery dedicated to the promotion of the maestro's work in the United States. Tom Clark, director and his brother Robert, a participant in the 2002 courses, are the sponsors. The prize has been named in memory of their grandmother who was a great admirer of the maestro during her lifetime.

Calls for submissions will be handled by the Stockhausen Foundation for Music, Kettenberg15, D-51515 Kuerten, Germany. We encourage all writers, academics and musicologists to submit.


Call for Soundart

SoundLab is looking for soundart works of:
a) experimental character
b) electronic music
c) Voice -sound/music integration
d) and other forms

Theme : "Memoryscapes" based on the subjects of "memory" and "identity"

The submission has to be posted on a webpage for download, please do not send it as an email attachement. Submission format: .mp3

Size: Max 5MB, exceptions possible, but on request.

The authors/artists keep all rights on their submitted works.

Deadline 30 June 2020

http://weblog.nmartproject.net/
 


Dion Workman / Mattin
S3

(Formed Records, Formed #101) (CD)

Dion Workman and Mattin are laptop musicians from New Zealand and Bilbao respectively. They work primarily with feedback and computer noise, often within an improvisory realm. This collaboration falls firmly within the ‘ambient / noise’ category and is released on San Francisco’s Formed Records.

Albums of this nature have a tendency to resist reviewing. 40 odd minutes of high-frequency subliminalism and low rumble with occasional static noise asks not so much to be recalled and evaluated, but rather, merely experienced. However, there are certain aspects of the piece that do stand out, but this does not do justice to the overall effect. In terms of ambient music, this does its job admirably, transcending the realms of everyday language.

This album works best with the window open, presenting the strange illusion that someone’s increasing the volume of the outside world. It’s not even as if any of the sounds contained herein are particularly environmental or natural; most of this resembles a highly amplified noise-floor, with the occasional bit of interference. As such, S3 inspires the fanciful notion that the ‘noise floor’ (if that’s what it is) could be compared to a jungle floor; alive with fervour and existence, life and death, consciousness, breathing and being. This is contrasted with a rarefied and permeating high-frequency noise, which seemingly leads in and out of each ‘movement’, providing the dynamic framework on which said noise floor can be draped. The sound itself is particularly pure, inspiring the hairs on the back of my neck to stand on end – a pleasurable sensation rarely achieved by others in this genre. The combined effect resembles a very large and heavy machine being controlled with the precision of a neurosurgeon.

Disappointingly, Workman and Mattin decided to include what can only be described as ‘break points’ between each ‘movement’. These come in the form of sudden and unexpected bursts of noise, which interrupt the overall feeling and frankly, scare the shit out of this reviewer. Once aware of these, they lend a sense of foreboding – like watching a horror film and knowing that something bad is going to happen, but not knowing when… This dread of the inevitable dampens the aforementioned ‘hairs on the back of the neck’ effect. Despite this, these interruptions sink back into the mix relatively smoothly and it doesn’t happen too often.

Overall, this is one of the finer ambient noise efforts I’ve heard. Workman and Mattin draw out the most dynamic, responsive and stimulating frequencies from extended noise and craft them into gently undulating aural structures. I would play this at a higher volume since it warrants immersive listening, if it wasn’t for those bloody noise bursts, which, when I’m sleepily basking in music, do nothing more than scare the living daylights out of me. Nevertheless, this minor gripe aside, S3 is a fine album that will benefit from repeated listening, due to its finely tuned control of perceptual manipulation.

Reviewed by Andrew Fletcher
doomsausage@hotmail.com