Category: Festival

Kyma at ICMC2015

Kyma had a strong presence at the 2015 International Computer Music Conference in Denton Texas, September 25 — October 1, including live performances by

Jeffrey Stolet,
ICMC2015JeffStolet2

Wang Chi,

Jon Bellona,
JP Bellona ICMC2015.jpg

Jon Bellona angst2

and Sun Hua,
Sun Hua ICMC2015.jpg
a keynote lecture by Symbolic Sound president Carla Scaletti,
ICMC2015 keynote Title Slide

ICMC2015 keynote social brain crowd

ICMC2015 keynote IMS to Platypus

ICMC2015 keynote platypus meets capybara Wang photo

ICMC2015 keynote close2

ICMC2015 keynote SSC in 1989

ICMC2015 keynote smiling at laptop2

ICMC2015 keynote output from the brain

ICMC2015 keynote computer musicians predict the future

ICMC2015 keynote making imaginary real

a one-hour Kyma workshop also presented by Scaletti (new music pioneer Larry Austin is seen in the audience at the lower left)
Kyma workshop ICMC2015 photo by Chi Wang

and fixed media pieces by Fred Szymanski and Jinshuo Feng. (If we’ve left anyone out, please let us know!)

Thanks to the ICMC 2015 organizers, presenters, and composers!

Special thanks to the ICMC organizers, Wang Chi, Sun Hua, and Jon Bellona for the photos and Iacopo Sinigaglia for the video excerpt.

Anne La Berge, sound hero

Screen Shot 2015-06-25 at 11.37.58 AMFlutist/composer Anne La Berge is featured on the cover of the July 2015 issue of freiStil magazine. Inside, an in-depth interview delves into Anne’s history, music, and politics.

When asked about her electronic beginnings, she recounts, “My first electronic instrument was the microphone. To this I owe some of the most magical aspects of my sound: whistling, harmonies, echoes of vowels and consonants, to name just a few.” She soon started to expand on those effects with hardware like the Clavia Micro Modular, then the Clavia Nord Modular G2, and now “currently I am a passionate Kyma system user… I do most of my pieces in conjunction with a Kyma. I am fascinated by the expansion of the flute sounds by electronics. I really appreciate auxiliary means for obtaining an incredible dynamic range. Sometimes in an ensemble situation, the flute can’t be heard. So I’ve developed sound patches that allow me to be heard in almost any musical situation.”

Anne can be heard performing her live Kyma-processed flute compositions at the Berlin Heroines of Sound festival in 10-12 July.

QUANTUM in the desert: art, science, technology & collaboration

In April 2015, QUANTUM, the dance piece Jobin created inspired by his residency at CERN, will be touring northern Mexico including Culiacan, Hermosillo, Tijuana, Ensenada and Mexicali. Technical director Marie Predour will be running the live sound for the piece using a Kyma 7 Timeline.

Choreographer Gilles Jobin took a moment to talk a little about the piece, to explain his ideas on algorithmic choreography and to reflect on collaboration, art, science, and technology.

 

What’s interesting about technology is not so much the technology as a tool, but technology as a new way of thinking — as a different way to organize your work or to think about your work. The same is true when choreographers work with scientists or with musicians. There is a kind of exchange of practices that is enriching for everybody.

14 April Culiacan РFestival Danza Jos̩ Limon

16 April Hermosillo – Un Desierto Para La Danza

19 April Tijuana – Cuerpos in Transito

21 April Ensenada – Espuma Cuantica

23 April Mexicali – Entre Fronteras

27 April to 2 May Torreon – Gilles Jobin will be on the jury for Premio Nacional Guillermo Arriaga

Slow art, like slow food, gives you time to contemplate

You’ve heard of the “slow food” movement; now that concept is being extended to the experience of art. At the premiere Slow experience at the Glyptotek Museum in Copenhagen, you can partake in talks in the cafe, soundscapes in the wintergarden, simmering food surrounded by ionic columns and Roman statues in the ceremonial hall and tours that get you close to the art. The first event is on Thursday March 26 starting at 17:00 and is based on the rather appropriate theme: “Time”.

The event opener is sound artist SØS Gunver Ryberg performing her new quadrophonic piece using a spatialized Kyma 7 Multigrid in the unique and beautiful surroundings of the Glyptotek Museum Wintergarden.

wintergarden

In addition to live sound art by SØS, you can hear Egyptologist Mogens Jørgensen talk about embalming and time or philosopher/author Erwin Neutzsky-Wulff discuss the nature of time; you can sample food laid out on long tables overseen by long-dead Romans frozen in marble; you can experience a new type of museum lighting that lets you get much closer to the art, and, most important of all — you can savor the time you’ve been given to contemplate the entire experience.

http://www.glyptoteket.dk/slow

Kyma 7 at SEAMUS

If you’ll be participating in the SEAMUS electronic music festival at Virginia Tech at the end of the week, you’ll have an opportunity to hear several performances in which Kyma 7 played a part, among them:

  • Every Problem is a Nail, Scott Miller
  • Imagined Destinies, Jeffrey Stolet
  • Violin Power, Mark Phillips
  • Youngman/Overholt, Jon Bellona
  • Number Vortex, Olga Oseth
  • Shin no Shin, Simon Hutchinson
  • Magic Fingers, Chi Wang

If you’re at the conference, you can cheer on your fellow Kyma practitioners and be sure to introduce yourself to them after the concert.

EZUFFPP#6 Film Festival in New York

opus caementiciumOpus Caementicium, a short, abstract cinematic ode to concrète by Karin Schomaker with a Kyma generated score by Roland Kuit will be screened in New York on March 13, 2015 at EZUFFPP#6 NY— a festival bridging experimental architecture, experimental film, and experimental music at Spectrum Space in NYC.

Described as “an experience of form, light, surface, sound and movement,” Opus Caementicium is “an attempt to transcend the mere material.” For the soundtrack, Kuit uses the Slipstick synthesis module to create pulses that are frequency modulated and fed into a Resonator Bank. These reflections of sound are then Time/Frequency shaped to create a beautiful concrete sound/music environment.

EZUFF is different kind of film festival that spans objective and subjective realms and bridges gaps among different scholarly traditions. They see horizons not boundaries. EZUFF is a ‘projectivist’ project playing with ideas of:

  • the projection of moving images – the film medium
  • the idea that the projections of moving image could be related to (or used as a pretext to address) actual & future ‘projections’ of the city/urban life

Using short experimental movies to make a link between contemporary urban forms of expression/representation and the political imagination for the city of today, EZUFF is about oblique ways to dig into present day urban cultures and imagine alternatives for the cities of tomorrow

Di Scipio’s work featured in Forms of Sound Festival

Agostino Di Scipio is the featured composer/scholar/sound artist at the Forms of Sound Festival in Calgary 29-31 January 2015.  Featured works include:

  • Modes of Interference n.3 (2007) by Agostino Di Scipio
    • Autonomous feedback system for electric guitars & Kyma
    • open daily in the CIBC Hub Room (Rozsa Centre)
  • Two Pieces of Listening and Surveillance (2009-2010) by Agostino Di Scipio
    • Autonomous sound-generating system with flute and live Kyma electronics
    • August Murphy, flute
  • Agostino Di Scipio 2 sound pieces with repertoire string music and live Kyma electronics

 

Organic sound, Bach, Lübeck, Kyma, and KISS2014

IMG_3339

Everyone knows J.S. Bach as a composer, but it turns out he was also a music-technology enthusiast and a sound designer, having spent many hours of his childhood hanging out at the local organ workshop, fascinated with what was the state of the art in sound synthesis technology. Throughout his life, Bach continued to support experimental musical instrument development (like the forte-piano and the bassono grosso) and his experience with the organ (aka additive synthesis), led him to experiment with creating new timbres in his instrumental music through unusual voicings and instrument combinations. In fact it was his technical expertise, as much as his mastery of organ performance, that landed him his first post at the New Church in Arnstadt, where, at age 18, he was hired to both play and maintain the organ there.

Kungsleden_trailIn October 1705, the then 20 year-old Bach requested a one-month leave of absence from his post in Arnstadt so he could visit the famed organist/composer Dieterich Buxtehude in Lübeck Germany. Obviously, Bach didn’t have a car, so he ended up walking the 250 miles to Lübeck, where he was so intrigued by what he heard, he stayed for an extra two months. We don’t know exactly what happened to Bach in Lübeck, but we do know the experience had a deep influence on both his music and his ideas for new instrument designs throughout the rest of his career.

On 25-28 September 2014, we invite you to undertake your own music-technology and sound-design pilgrimage to Lübeck for KISS2014. At KISS2014, you can immerse yourself in sound and ideas, surrounded by an international community of sound-technology enthusiasts who share your passion for sound, music, and the future of musical instruments. And, like Bach, you’ll return home refreshed, renewed, and with enough new ideas, contacts, and friendships to keep you motivated and inspired for your entire career.

Whether you’re a Kyma expert, new to Kyma, or are simply curious about what Kyma might be and why it inspires so much enthusiasm among composers, live performers, sound designers for film and games, researchers, and educators, KISS2014 is your opportunity to experience an inspiring four days of ideas, music, and interaction with your fellow music/technology/sound enthusiasts.

Registration open until 25 September 2014

Registration includes access to paper sessions, demonstrations, workshops, the Kyma open lab, opening reception and all evening concerts, plus a free lunch with your fellow symposiasts each day: http://kiss2014.symbolicsound.com/kiss2014-registration

For travel and lodging information, please visit: http://kiss2014.symbolicsound.com/travel-and-lodging

More information

Get the latest KISS2014 news and updates:

KISS2014 Site: http://kiss2014.symbolicsound.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Kyma-International-Sound-Symposium/241910735840451
Twitter: http://twitter.com/KymaSymposium

Contact the organizers: mailto:info.kiss2014@gmail.com

 

Making people

In Garth Paine‘s new interactive Kyma work, CrossTalk, created in collaboration with Simon Biggs and Sue Hawksley, the text is automatically transcribed from the dancers’ speech as they describe inner body sensations and their relationship to the system. Later, the dancers collide with the sentences and the system generates a new language which they then dance, and so on. Watch as the printed sentences take the form of dancing stick figures projected on the back walls:

The creators describe it as an auto poetic system for making behaviors based on the anthropological idea of “making people” as described in their paper published in MOCO the Proceedings of International Workshop on Movement and Computing at IRCAM.

In July Garth presented an entire evening of his music (all composed and performed with Kyma) at the Skopja Summer Festival in Macedonia.

From Organs to Organs — KISS2014: Organic Sound

Workshops, Talks, and Live Performances on “Organic Sound”

From organs (biological) to organs (musical), this year’s Kyma International Sound Symposium (KISS2014), to be held in Lübeck Germany on 25-28 September 2014, will explore multiple meanings of the phrase “organic sound” through technical talks, live performances, and hands-on workshops. Sound designers, composers, and live performers are invited to participate in a wide range of thought-provoking activities including:

  • An examination of how to emulate the organic sound of the analog recording studio using Kyma, presented by composer/sound engineer Greg Hunter of Dub Sahara
  • A special evening of “pipe organs like you’ve never heard them before” in the experimental, virtuosic hands of master organist/composer Franz Danksagmüller and his students
  • Intensive afternoons in The Collaboratory creating and rehearsing several world premieres including a live sound track for a new film by experimental filmmaker Theo Lipfert performed by faculty and students of the Musikhochschule Lübeck processed through Kyma
  • A hands-on “plantification” workshop where you’ll learn from Rudi Giot and his graduate engineering students how to control Kyma sounds through the growth of living plants

Events will kick off on Thursday with the unveiling of a major new release of the Kyma software and will culminate on Sunday with an evening of dancing to Kyma beats at club Parkhaus. The full program is online at: http://kiss2014.symbolicsound.com/detailed-program

Stummfilmprojekt

About the Symposium

KMHHosted this year by Franz Danksagmüller and the Musikhochschule Lübeck, each morning of KISS2014: “Organic Sound” features technical/philosophical sessions on topics ranging from voice processing, to sonification of organic chemicals and the Internet, to organic growth and decay, to how to build your own performance controller and use it to control Kyma via OSC, to presentations by individual composer/performers detailing how they utilize Kyma in their live performances and installations.

Afternoons are dedicated to interaction and hands-on activities including open rehearsals of collaborations-in-progress in The Collaboratory, a workshop on Conduction ensemble improvisation techniques presented by London Improvisers Orchestra trombonist and Kymaist Robert Jarvis, and the Kyma Open Lab where Kyma experts (Jeffrey Stolet, Cristian Vogel, Bruno Liberda, Scott Miller, Kurt Hebel, Carla Scaletti and others) will be on hand to answer your questions and consult with you on your current projects.

Franz foreground recording two percussionist

This year’s KISS features more live performances than ever before, with concerts every evening showcasing some of the best work created in Kyma this year, presented in the acoustically perfect MHL Große Saal and the Jakobikirche Lübeck with its three historically important pipe organs, famously decorated with faces on every pipe.

Check out the exciting lineup of presenters, composers, performers and Kyma experts here.

Who should attend

organ pipesAnyone who lives for sound — whether you are a novice looking to kickstart your career, an expert seeking a fresh jolt of inspiration, or simply someone who is curious about sound and Kyma — you will find in KISS2014 a chance to meet kindred spirits and immerse yourself in sound and ideas for four intense and inspiring days and nights of non-stop discussions, interactions, music and sound design.

Here’s how Chicago-based sound designer and re-recording mixer, Dustin Camilleri (http://www.pulsetrain.net) describes his experience at a previous KISS:

“…The unique thing about Kyma, I find, is that it appeals to such a wide spectrum of people doing such an amazingly diverse set of things, but sharing a common language. The conversations I had were so incredibly inspiring; the performances I saw were just over the top, and the community at large was just some of the nicest most genuine people I’ve ever had the pleasure of spending some time with.”

Registration and travel

Registration is now open: http://kiss2014.symbolicsound.com/kiss2014-registration. Discounts are available for students and for anyone registering before 1 August 2014.

For travel and lodging information, please visit: http://kiss2014.symbolicsound.com/travel-and-lodging

More information

Stay apprised of the latest KISS2014 news:

KISS2014 Site: http://kiss2014.symbolicsound.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Kyma-International-Sound-Symposium/241910735840451
Twitter: http://twitter.com/KymaSymposium

Contact the organizers: mailto:info.kiss2014@gmail.com