Ensemble for Experimental Music of the Ghent Royal Conservatory

Christian WOLFF (1934-)

"Changing the system" (1973)

Christian Wolff can be considered to be one of the rare and small group of composers giving serious consideration to the inner politics of the ensembles wherefor he writes. There is no conductor, no hidden hierarchy in the ensemble. The score is not prescriptive in an authoritarian way, but rather tries to reveal the typical inner workings of ensembles performing chamber music. As many pieces from the same period, this piece tries to redefine the notion of composition from a linear series of prescriptions and recipes to a rather game like and rule based system.  This approach may well become visionary for a type of contemporary music practice  to come.

To quote the composer:

"To turn the making of music into a collaborative and transforming

activity (performer into composer into listener into composer into performer etc...), the

co-operative character of the activity to be the exact source of the music. To stir up,

through the production of the music, a sense of the political conditions in which we live

and how these might be changed, in the direction of democratic socialism".

Christian Wolff was born on 08.03.1934 in Nice (France). However, his origin is german, and his family emigrated in 1941 to the US.  There, in New York,  he met in the early fifties, the progressive composers John Cage, Earle Brown and  Morton Feldman who have been very influential on his own work.

Frederic RZEWSKI (1938)

"Lullaby: God to a hungry child" (30.10.1994)

Frederic Rzewski is a well known pianist and composer whose work very often is tied to conveying political ideas and/ or the expression of injustice done to people. This little song may demonstrate this. He was one of the contributors of pieces to the Scratch anthology.

He teaches composition at the Liege conservatory.

Cornelius CARDEW (1936-1981)

"The Great Learning" Paragraph 6 (1969)

This composition is part of a very large scale project involving very big ensembles. Paragraph 6 however can be performed by smaller groups and shares the same considerations for musical democracy as can be found in the Christian Wolff pieces.  In the mid seventies the composers had close contacts and collaborated in what was then called the 'Scratch Orchestra'.

"How should we interpret the word 'soon' in the statement 'there will soon be a high tide of revolution'?' …" (1971)

One of the many songs Cardew started writing in his Maoist period.

Godfried-Willem RAES (1952- )

"Cues" (1972)

This piece goes back to the first years of the existence of the Logos group in Belgium, the oldest still existing group devoted to experimental musics. At that time the composer had close contacts with the composers in and behind the 'Scratch Orchestra' in London. Hence this composition shares similar considerations as the pieces by Cardew and Wolff from the same period. The piece was published in the Experimental Music Catalogue published by Gavin Bryars.

Godfried-Willem RAES

Capita selecta from:

<Songbook> (1995) , for voices and invisible instrument

program notes: http://www.logosfoundation.org/songbook.html

<A Book of Moves> (1992) , for invisible instruments

program notes: http://www.logosfoundation.org/bom.html

For biographical data on the composer: see website.

http://www.logosfoundation.org/cv-god.html

Salvatore SCIARRINO

For flute

Title & data: ask karin herself:

Email: "Karin De Fleyt" karmac@skynet.be

Soloist: Karin DE FLEYT

Kristof LAUWERS

"Processing #3"

for theremin, ringmodulator and instruments.

In 1998 Godfried-Willem Raes asked the students in his composition class to build theremins and to write new pieces for this revolutionary instrument dating back from 1917. For this concert, Kristof Lauwers was asked to revise his composition so we could pick it up in this program.

For biographical data: see website

http://www.logosfoundation.org/index-lauwers.html

Moniek DARGE (1952-)

"Caete" (1995/98)

This piece piece shows the authors interest in both the ritual aspects of permance and in the integration of soundscape composition.

In this piece we find three layers of sound material:

- soundscape of water (underground rivers and streams at Ouro Preto, at Jandira -the Buddhist center-, and at Caete)  realized in 1995 in Minas Gerais (Brasil)

- sounds of the Brasilian farmland at Caete

- an instrumental translation of a poem (written 01.01.98) in which a second of intense eyecontact with a very old dying woman is evocated.

For biographical dat: see website

http://www.logosfoundation.org/index-mon.html

Extra possibilities and pieces we bring/can/will perform , maybe as part of masterclass/workshops:

Godfried-Willem RAES

<Songbook>, for voices and invisible instrument

<A Book of Moves>, for invisible instruments

<Cohiba>, for flute and computer

program notes:

http://www.logosfoundation.org/scores_gwr/cohiba.html

Extensive program notes can be found on the logos website.

PERFORMERS / INSTRUMENTS:

NOTE: the order in which the pieces will be performed will be decided on the moment of the concert. The pieces will be announced.