Composing with mobile technology: Lara Stanic – media artist

 

Electronic composition, performance, sound art: Zurich-based composer, performer, media artist and flautist Lara Stanic is hard to categorise. In her concert performances, she combines media, instruments, objects and musicians’ bodies and refers to specific locations and contexts. In this interview, she gives an insight into the creation of her latest works for the Zurich Baroque Orchestra.

 

Lara Stanic in ‘waves’, Festival Rümlingen 2020 © Kathrin Schulthess

 

Gabrielle Weber
I meet Lara Stanic for a cup of coffee at her kitchen table on a snowy Saturday morning at the beginning of January. We talk about her latest composition ‘Du matin au soir’: it was written in summer 2023 for the Zurich Baroque Orchestra and consists of eight sound interventions that were performed between individual symphony movements by Haydn. The concerts took place at different times of day in various Zurich locations: the botanical garden, an outdoor swimming pool and in St Peter’s Church.

Lara Stanic generally uses electronic media for her pieces and often also integrates context-related objects. The selection of specific media is a process, says Stanic. “I let myself be inspired by the context, the performers, the instruments and the way they can be played. This generates sounds in my head and I conceive ways of playing.”

In Sonnenstand, the sound intervention to Haydn’s symphony Der Mittag, the musicians ‘play’ with round portable mirrors that produce sound using smartphones. The idea came from a childhood memory. “As a child, I used portable mirrors to catch the sunlight at noon and create shadows and light reflections on a nearby wall,” says Stanic.

Sonnenstand by Lara Stanic, from du matin au soir, composed for the Zurich Baroque Orchestra, premiered in Zurich in 2023. Botanical Garden and St. Peter’s Church, Zurich, Videos © Andreas Pfister and Philip Bartels.

 

In Sonnenstand, the musicians also capture sunlight with mirrors, but this time turning it into music. Mobile phones are attached to the back of the mirrors. Built-in motion sensors, microphones and loudspeakers capture the movements of the mirrors and convert them into sounds. Stanic explains that this creates a hybrid form of two the media, mirror and smartphone.

Sonnenstand thus also reflects a basic theme characterising Stanic’s artistic work: In electronic music, she is often bothered by the clumsiness of large, almost threatening loudspeakers and mixing consoles. By using mobile devices, she searches for lightness and mobility. Stanic also often appears as performer of her own works. She first tests what she develops on herself. “I always was and still am my best guinea pig,” she says.

Stanic first studied the flute, then music and media art in Zurich and Bern. She continues to play and teach the flute and sees it as her musical home. “My training as a performer and teacher provided me with a foundation and knowledge of compositional thinking. I am equally interested in creating sounds on acoustic as well as electronic instruments.” Her first access to music was through radio and television during her childhood in former Yugoslavia. Even back then, she was fascinated by the amount of emotions sound waves could trigger. The connection between music and electronics was therefore obvious, she adds with a laugh: “Of course, I didn’t realise it being about sound waves at the time.”

 

Lara Stanic Performance ‘Spielfeld Feedback’ 2003 © EDITION DUMPF – Florian Japp

 

Humour and playful lightness also characterise her works with everyday objects. In Kafi, another sound intervention, this time for Haydn’s symphony Der Morgen, an oversized Bialletti espresso machine becomes an instrument. Two concert masters brew coffee on stage and ‘play’ with the sounds of the bubbling. “When I get up in the morning, I make my coffee in a Bialetti machine. It sounds very nice and I always associate the smell of coffee with that sound. I remember the sounds and smells from my childhood. And then an orchestra always has to drink coffee during rehearsal breaks. So there’s a very practical side to it as well…”
Kafi, another sound intervention by Lara Stanic from Du matin au soir, composed for the Hayn Symphony Der Morgen, Zurich Baroque Orchestra, premiered in Zurich in 2023, at St. Peter’s Church, Video © Andreas Pfister, Renate Steinmann.

 

Kafi is all about transformation, the sound and aroma of coffee being transformed into music. In addition, there is an electronic extension of classical instruments, as the violin bows of the concert masters are equipped with motion sensors. They use them to touch the coffee machine like magic wands, which are then swung through the air. This amplifies the sound of the bubbling, spreads throughout the room and mixes with the beginning of the symphony. In her own words: “The violin bows become magic wands, which in turn transform the aroma of the coffee into music”.

The process behind it is very simple though. First there is the idea, then a sound, in this case the bubbling of the coffee and then she looks for solutions as to how this can be connected to the sound of the instruments. The performative actions of the concert masters form a bridge for the audience between the sounding everyday object and the instruments. Based on this simple principle, Stanic transforms everyday objects into music and leaves a lasting impression on my morning coffee.
Gabrielle Weber


Lara Stanic, Du matin au soir, Video collage of the eight sound interventions for the Zurich Baroque Orchestra on Haydn symphonies, world creation Zurich 2023, Video © Andreas Pfister, Renate Steinmann, Philipp Bartels.

Lara Stanic is co-founder and member of the trio Funkloch featuring also PR and SH, which invites six composers each year to an experimental studio concert broadcasted live on air, or the GingerEnsemble, a Bern-based composer-performer collective. She composes for soloists, ensembles and orchestras, as well as for her own performances, which she regularly performs at international festivals and has been a lecturer in Performing New Technologies at Bern University of the Arts since 2011.

FunkLoch celebrated its sixth anniversary on Saturday, 20.1.24, 17h at Kunstraum Walcheturm with works by Annette Schmucki, Daniel Weissberg, Svetlana Maraš, Dorothea Rust and Joke Lanz.

Features SRF Kultur:
MusikMagazin, 10.2.2024: Cafégespräch with Lara Stanic by Gabrielle Weber, editorial Benjamin Herzog.
Zämestah, 21.12.2020: TV-Portrait Lara Stanic
Musik unserer Zeit, 21.09.2013: Spiel mit urzeitlicher Elektronik: Das Ginger Ensemble, editorial Lislot Frey

neo-profiles:
Lara StanicFunkloch OnAir, Kunstraum Walcheturm, Sebastian Hofmann, petra ronner, Annette SchmuckiDaniel WeissbergSvetlana Maraš, Joke Lanz, Neue Musik Rümlingen.

Self-taught musician with a soft spot for poetry: Christoph Gallio

Saxophonist, composer and event organiser Christoph Gallio has been shaping the Swiss and international free jazz and new improvisation scene for almost 40 years. In this interview with Friederike Kenneweg, he reveals how he moved from improvisation to composition and what role poetry plays in the process.

 

Christoph Gallio spielt Saxophon vor einem Mikrofon. Foto von John Sharpe
The saxophonist Christoph Gallio. © John Sharpe

 

Friederike Kenneweg
Young Christoph Gallio (*1957) used his first self-earned money to buy a soprano saxophone and taught himself to play. Even though he later spent a year at the Basel conservatory and at some point even completed a degree, he has remained true to this attitude of self-taught musician who simply does it and finds out how best to do it – as an improvising musician in free jazz, among other things, as a composer, as an organiser and as the operator of the PERCASO label.

Looking for new impulses

In order to develop further on his unconventional path, Christoph Gallio has always looked for new stimuli on the outside.

“It’s the crux of the self-taught artist, at some point one has to do something new. I can’t always be alone with my idiosyncrasies. I always need new inputs.”

After his time as a saxophonist in the Swiss jazz scene and after musical encounters with greats such as Irène Schweitzer or Urs Voerkel, for example, a change was needed.

 

From improvisation to composition

“I always and only improvised freely, going into free jazz to some extent. But at some point that no longer satisfied me, as there was this danger to go round in circles, without getting any further and only ever come up with the same things.” In contrast to the many irretrievable moments of improvised music, Gallio wanted to create something that could be repeated – and began composing. At first, he mainly wrote for his own band projects, such as the trio Day&Taxi, which has been with him for 35 years. Over time, commissioned works for other artists were added.

 

Die Band Day&Taxi, Schwarz-Weiß-Foto in urbanem Setting, Foto von Jordan Hemingway
On average, ‘Day&Taxi’ has changed its line-up every seven years since it was founded in 1988. Silvan Jeger (bass), Gerry Hemingway (drums) and Christoph Gallio (saxophone) have been playing together since 2013. © Jordan Hemingway

 

On Day&Taxi‘s 2019 album Devotion, poems by Friederike Mayröcker served as a source of inspiration for Christoph Gallio, with bassist Silvan Jeger taking on the vocal part.

 

Merging miniatures into a whole

Christoph Gallio prefers to use texts as starting point for his music – especially poetry, for example by Robert Filliou or Gertrude Stein.

“If I have a text as a basis, it just works. Without a text, it’s much more difficult for me to compose.”

In the piece The Ocarina Chapter for string trio and voice, which the Mondrian Ensemble premiered with baritone Robin Adams in June 2022, one characteristic of Gallio’s music is particularly evident: his work with miniatures. These arise from his preference for short, lyrical, often humorous texts, which inspire his compositions.

“What I like about small pieces is the seemingly unimportant, the everyday. Why not do funny things too, why not bring humour into the music, why is most music so strict and serious, why do certain people who make music take themselves so seriously?”

 

In The Ocarina Chapter (2021), Christoph Gallio brings together poems by Annina Luzie Schmid (*1983), Markus Stegmann (*1962) and Peter Z Herzog (*1950).

 

Each miniature is a picture in its own right

In The Ocarina Chapter, thirty miniatures, some purely instrumental, others with words set to music, are put together in a sequence of almost forty minutes. The rapid changes this requires are a particular challenge for the performers.
“The musicians have to practise a lot with these miniatures. Each one being a picture in its own right. One has to be sung one way, the next differently, there has to be shouting, then whispering, without much transition time in between.”

 

Freedom for interpreters

Christoph Gallio finds the right sequence for the individual sections by putting the pre-sketched miniatures together differently on the computer until everything sounds right. The space between the individual parts is also important in order to create the desired effect. Particularly in those places, Gallio does not dictate everything to the performers of his pieces for the performance, but leaves the exact arrangement up to them.

At the premiere of The Ocarina Chapter, violinist Ivana Pristašová specified the length of the pause between the sections. “Ivana simply conducted it and made decisions about how long the ensemble should wait and when it should continue, showing the right instinct.”

The volume levels are not notated in the composition either; the ensemble had to make its own decisions about the piece’s dynamics.

“I want to give the musicians a lot of freedom in the hope that they will enjoy the piece. This works fully when they realise to have the freedom and the opportunity to work it out the way they please.”

Needless to say, Christoph Gallio takes the same kind of freedom for himself again and again on his journey.
Friederike Kenneweg

Robin Adams, DAY&TAXI, Silvan Jeger, Gerry Hemingway, PERCASO, Ivana Pristašová, Irène Schweitzer, Urs Voerkel, Annina Luzie Schmid, Markus Stegmann, Friederike Mayröcker

neo-profile:
Christoph Gallio, Petra Ackermann, Karolina Öhman, Mondrian Ensemble

Forging improvisation: Willisau Jazz Festival 2023

 

SRF-Video interviews of How Noisy are the Rooms? and Der Verboten

Since its foundation in 1975, Willisau Jazz Festival has been an important hub for improvised music. Every year in late summer, improvisers from all over the world gather together in the Lucerne hinterland, where they perform in intimate settings or as larger acts in the festival hall. SRF 2 Kultur portrays them every year in various programmes. This year, SRF Kultur music editors Roman Hošek and Luca Koch also conducted live video interviews with various bands and artists. Luca Koch presents two of the featured bands in our neoblog: Der Verboten and How Noisy Are The Rooms?

‘Der Verboten’: Antoine Chessex, Christian Wolfarth, Frantz Loriot, Cédric Piromalli

 

Luca Koch
Anyone who discovers the band name (Der Verboten) in a programme might immediately think of a white, round sign with a red border or even think the name is a typo. Does it mean “das Verbot” (prohibition) or “die Verbotenen” (the forbidden) or “Der Vorbote” (the precursor)? What appears to be grammatically incorrect originally arose from a joke, as the quartet featuring Christian Wolfarth, Frantz Loriot, Antoine Chessex and Cédric Piromalli rehearses in both German and French, including translation errors. The name has stuck, because who defines what is right and what is wrong? Like music, our languages are made up of rules and structures that can be broken. Der Verboten’s music of is free of rules, intertwined, and it’s precisely this interplay that drives the band.

 

Der Verboten: Refinement instead of innovation

Exploring new sounds or expanding the individual instruments’ sound is not the focus of the ensemble, they try instead to sonically merge and deepen their collective sound. In the interview, Christian Wolfarth repeatedly emphasises how important it is to find the right bandmates. This quartet is like an old friendship, even if they haven’t rehearsed or played on stage for a long time, they pick up exactly where they left things when they last met.

Time merging

In order for piano, drums, viola and tenor saxophone to grow into a single musical organism, the band needs one thing above all – time. The desired form of interwoven interplay only emerges during long improvisation sessions. “I think I can say that we manage to achieve it during every concert,” says Christian Wolfarth in the interview. The ensemble played a total of two pieces in their one-hour set at the Willisau Jazz Festival and the break in between served as an opportunity for everyone – especially for the audience – to catch their breath. Slow developments and barely noticeable changes meant that the audience in the concert hall kept wondering how Verboten had musically moved from A to B.

 


Christian Wolfarth and Antoine Chessex before their concert in a live interview at the Jazz Festival Willisau 2023.

 

The band performed on stage with the same calm and reflective approach as in a conversation. They transported me into their world of sound to such an extent that during the concert I no longer knew whether twenty or just two minutes had passed.

Another band that plays with the audience’s sense of time is How Noisy Are The Rooms? In contrast to Der Verboten, however, the minutes seem to run by, as their sound aesthetic is shaped by high tempos and high density of sounds.

 

‘How Noisy Are The Rooms?: Almut Kühne, Joke Lanz und Alfred Vogel

 

‘How Noisy Are The Rooms?’ likes to ask questions.

The trio featuring Alfred Vogel, Joke Lanz and Almut Kühne likes to ask questions: How much noise can a room tolerate or can music cause whiplash? Improvisation with lots of energy, punk aesthetics and fast interaction gives the listeners at How noisy are the rooms? concerts the feeling of being flung back and forth like balls in pinball machines. The trio’s creative musical anarchy on stage challenges the audience, sometimes even overwhelmingly. Alfred Vogel emphasises: “I don’t really mean to overwhelm people. Understanding follows listening. You just have to open your ears and, at best, it does something to you.”

Turntables and whistle notes

The driving rhythms of Alfred Vogel on drums with Almut Kühne’s vocal acrobatics lend How Noisy Are The Rooms?’s music an archaic flair, as percussion and voice are probably the oldest instruments known to mankind. Joke Lanz, looping and distorting sound samples with his turntables, brings a performative, electro-analogue and humorous component into play.

 


Alfred Vogel before the concert of How Noisy Are The Rooms? in a live interview at the Jazz Festival Willisau 2023.

 

Alfred Vogel wanted to become a rock star and this energy is still present in How Noisy Are The Rooms? but he is glad that he took a different path, as his current musical output is diverse and rich.

Post-musical hidden object image

The trio’s music consists of eclectic sounds and short, pointed phrases like in hidden object images. There are no clear structures, harmonies or tangible melodies in their soundscape. Nevertheless, the musical disputes between the three musicians conjure up images in the mind: I feel transported to a roaring metropolis or as part of a game animation.

 


How Noisy Are The Rooms? Video ©Denis Laner / Alfred Vogel 2021

 

With their density and abundance of individual musical parts, How Noisy Are TheRooms? capture the zeitgeist of today’s restless world.  Alfred Vogel explains in the interview: “Music or art should always reflect the world we live in. What is overwhelming? Today’s events are also overwhelming. Everything happens at the same time. Everything, everywhere, all at once. It’s the same in our sound”. How Noisy Are the Rooms? is this year’s edition biggest discovery for me at Willisau Jazz Festival.
Luca Koch

 

Cédric Piromalli, Christian Wolfarth, Frantz LoriotAlmut Kühne, Alfred VogelSudden infant

broadcasts SRF Kultur:
Neue Musik im Konzert, 25.10.2023: Anarchie und Energie am Jazzfestival Willisau, Redaktion Benjamin Herzog.

neo-profiles:
How Noisy Are The Rooms?, Joke LanzDer Verboten, Antoine Chessex

Breath flowing at a slower pace: pianist Judith Wegmann on her favourite music

Biel pianist Judith Wegmann gets to the core of time in music. So deeply that it almost ceases to exist. Whether in works by Morton Feldman, in her own improvisations or in her lively ensemble activities: Judith Wegmann is someone you should take the time to listen to.

Portrait Judith Wegmann © Simone Haug

Friedemann Dupelius
“I never used to record anything and was always devoted entirely to the live aspects of music,” says the musician, who was born in the canton of Zug and now lives in Biel. “That changed in 2016 when I was hospitalised for several weeks and therefore couldn’t play the piano for months. I really missed music as both a daily purpose and language.” As a musician who otherwise cultivates a daily relationship with her instrument, this six-month period must have felt almost endless.
“I therefore developed a strategy to still be able to deal with music and guide my thoughts in a positive direction by mentally sketching out concepts for my Le souffle du temps album. When I was finally able to go back to my studio after months, I withdrew for several weeks to realise the album. Without much previous experience, I recorded and mixed it myself.”

In her improvisation Reflexion IV from 2019, Judith Wegmann continues her project Le souffle du temps as an original composition from the moment.

The concept of time in music has been a major focus of Judith Wegmann’s work for over ten years. We all know that music is the art of time. However, Wegmann’s deep chronopoetic drilling takes her to the very core of this simple truth – to the point where time ceases to be measured, or strict metering.
“I’ve started playing very long concerts – two hours on average. It’s important to me to create a cosmos for the audience and for myself, where one can slow down for a moment and forget about everything else.” The pace being fast in this age of social media, for Wegmann, concerts can constitute a calm antithesis.

The breath of time
Judith Wegmann is a night person. She gets active in the afternoon and spends whole evenings and nights playing the piano in her studio. “For me, it is like a spiritual balm – relaxation and slowing down. The studio is on the 2nd basement floor, there’s no phone reception or internet connection, you can’t reach me there. When I play, I don’t think anymore.”

Portrait Judith Wegmann @ Algis Jakstas

Time expansion and deceleration being one of the defining elements of her work – interpersonal relationships are the other, just as important. Le souffle du temps entered its second round with her Réflexion project, for which she asked composers whom she personally appreciates to respond to her music. For example, there is Edu Haubensak, whom Judith Wegmann holds in high regard.

 


Edu Haubensak wrote a Réflexion (2019) for Judith Wegmann with the piece Manga. The collaboration between the two will continue in 2024.

And it became an intergenerational project as well. The 86-year-old Daniel Andres is not only Wegmann’s neighbour in Biel, “but also a wonderful and inspiring composer. I have a gut feeling for who I can work well with. I’m almost never wrong. There simply needs to be a common level of basic understanding of life, as individual as everyone is.”


Daniel Andres’ cycle: Souvenir d’un instant was also created as a reaction to Le souffle du temps by Judith Wegmann.

Morton Feldman and Judith Wegmann never got to know each other, theirs is therefore an abstract relationship, fueled exclusively by the music Feldman left behind. In his music too, time and how it can be cancelled out, is an essential aspect. “I’ve even used a calculator to try to mathematically analyse and learn to understand the complex rhythmic structure of Feldman’s music so that I could embody it in the first place. In the end, however, I can hardly explain it. There are numerous repetitions in this music with their immense durations. The experience of them during the concerts as well as the physical changes that occur are incredible.”

Judith Wegmann also worked intensively on finding the appropriate touch for Feldman’s works, which oscillate between the finest piano and pianissimo gradations. Although the piano pedal remains in use at all times, the individual notes still require precise touches to shape the sound.


Judith Wegmann has played almost all of Morton Feldman’s piano works, including Triadic Memories (1981). For the future she has planned the trio For Philip Guston (1984) for flute, drums and piano.

I ask Judith Wegmann whether she noticed an increased interest in contemplative music among audiences in the last few crisis-ridden years – as that is what I’ve noticed. “It’s always been a rather small audience for more experimental programmes, also because I’ve been organising almost all my concerts myself for years. I mainly play in art centres, which is where I feel Feldman’s music and experimental music projects generally fit in best. The audience can move around freely. People are happy to accept that and always do so with a keen sense for the music.”


Judith Wegmann plays Canto Ostinato (1976) by Simeon ten Holt, together with the pianist Simon Bucher (rehearsal recording, 2023, excerpt).

Wegmann’s concerts featuring music by Philip Glass, those with more classical programmes – as well as the ones with Canto Ostinato for piano duo by Simeon ten Holt – were very well received. Completed in 1976, the latter piece is something of a hit in the composer’s native Netherlands. “I came across it through studying the Glass etudes. I think Canto Ostinato is very beautiful, its melodic simplicity really touched me. Anyway, I go to so many different concerts – punk, garage rock, psychedelic, classical and I can draw something from all of them. Canto Ostinato consists of over 100 cells that the interpreter can repeat as often as he likes. A performance could last six hours, but together with my duo partner Simon Bucher we manage about two hours. It’s a very intimate performance situation. Eye contact with the partner decides when the next pattern begins. The piece requires a high level of concentration while playing and is still very quiet to listen to.” When asked about Simon Bucher, with whom she plays Canto Ostinato, Wegmann speaks very highly: “He has such a beautiful sound! Working with him is musically and personally very enriching.”

Judith Wegmann & Simon Bucher © Judith Wegmann (Screenshot from video)

 

Landing on the same note
She has equally affectionate words for pianist Marlies Debacker, her Cologne collaboration partner.


Judith Wegmann and Marlies Debacker on the joint album things in between, recorded in Biel in 2021.

An organiser thought it would be a good idea to put the two of them, unbeknownst to each other, on two grand pianos for a duo improvisation. And the idea was good: “We ended the performance on the same note. No words were needed, that came afterwards. Like me, Marlies is musically versatile. She plays classical, jazz as well as new music and on top of it, she has a good feel for archs of tension. For me it was like a symbiosis right from the start. When we listened to a common recording, I couldn’t always tell who was playing what.”
Friedemann Dupelius

 

Judith Wegmann & Marlies Debacker

Canto Ostinato (1976) by Simeon ten Holt, interpreted by Judith Wegmann, full length

Judith WegmannSimon BucherMarlies DebackerDaniel AndresPhilip GlassEdu HaubensakMorton FeldmanSimeon ten HoltHat Hut Records, Bruno Duplant, New3Art.

Upcoming events:
17.2.2024 Duo with Marlies Debacker, Raum für Musik Zoglau (D)
28.2.2024 Guest performance for Ensemble 5 (4+1), WIM Zürich

Upcoming Releases:
Three new CDs by Judith Wegmann will be released in 2024:
Kont.Takte with Ensemble New3Art features Karlheinz Stockhausen’s Kontakte, a commissioned work by Antoine Chessex (Geschichten der Gewalt) and an improvisation, co-produced by SRF2Kultur.
There is also a recording of Philip Glass’ Etudes and the CD univers paralleles II with sound designer und composer Bruno Duplant. All are released by the label Hat Hut (ezz-thetics).

Neo-profiles:
Judith Wegmann, Daniel Andres, Edu HaubensakAntoine Chessex

Improvisation with no parachute

Lucerne based saxophonist Christoph Erb is also founder and head of the label veto-records. After a six-month stay in Chicago, he has been exclusively improvising for more than ten years now, combining the greatest possible musical freedom with an intensified focus on the essentials: Sound and expression.

Lucerne based saxophonist and founder of veto-records Christoph Erb. ©Peter Gannushkin

Jaronas Scheurer
Christoph Erb and I meet for lunch at Lucerne’s Neubad. Full of energy, almost effervescent, yet highly focused. This is also true of his music, which combines the intensity and expressive will of free jazz with the focus of free improvisation and precise sound research at the edges of the instrumental sound of contemporary music. His saxophone rattles, chirps and squeaks, rustling, clattering and hissing. However, this variety of sound seems highly controlled: No wild sound escapades or chaotic blow-outs. The sound is given space to expand, develop and change and when playing with other musicians, another of Erb’s qualities becomes audible: his open ears for interaction and for the other person.

 


Christoph Erb (saxophone) and Frantz Loriot (viola): Iki, Record: Wabi Sabi, veto-records 2023.

Amsterdam, Lucerne, Chicago

Christoph Erb grew up in Zurich. After attending music school, he founded a rock band with friends and then went on to the Lucerne Jazz School, where he studied with Nat Su and John Voirol. After two years in Lucerne, he then moved to the jazz school in Amsterdam for a gap year experience: “But after three weeks it was too much for me,” says Erb. “Everyone was with the same lecturer and they all sounded like him.” He dropped out of jazz school and went to every possible jam session in town. “The Amsterdam jazz scene turned out to be my real jazz school.” He actually enjoyed an extremely traditional education there: Listening, jamming, playing along.

Back in Lucerne, he founded his first bands in the 00s: erb_gut with Peter Schärli as guest on trumpet, Lila with Hans-Peter Pfammatter on keys, Flo Stoffner on guitar and Julian Sartorius on drums, Veto and BigVeto. “I wanted to combine composed music with improvisation,” recalls Erb. “At some point, we were so well-rehearsed with Lila that we didn’t have to do anything. We went on stage, played freely and just let the themes flow. That was great.” And then came Chicago…

Lucerne and Chicago are “Sister Cities”, which means that the city of Lucerne runs a studio space in Chicago. Christoph Erb applied for it and spent six months there in 2011: “It was an initial spark,” says Erb. “But it was tough at first. The mentality is completely different, as is the way of making music. I went to an incredible number of concerts. I was fascinated by how strong the expression of the musicians was and with much less technique. This realisation was hugely important for my own playing. I got very close to ‘jazz’ in Chicago. I actually asked myself for the first time: What is this thing called jazz?”


Christoph Erb (saxophone) und Jim Baker (piano): Motyl, Record: Bottervagl, veto-records/exchange 2012.

DIY at all levels

Despite some initial difficulties, Erb managed to gain a foothold and made connections that extended beyond his six-month stay. Several collaborations with musicians from Chicago were released on his label veto-records and shortly before the coronavirus lockdown, he organised a large Chicago-Lucerne festival, for which he was able to invite some of his friends from the windy city to Lucerne. “Amsterdam and Chicago were central for me. That’s where I found my voice.” But most important, in Chicago, Erb got to know a do-it-yourself mentality that has stayed with him to this day.

The tours were also organised differently: “No money, sleeping on the floor, but at the end of the tour all the CDs were sold: Either you put your heart and soul into it or you left it alone. Little to no funding, no financing options.” So you don’t have much choice but to do everything yourself.

veto-records

This do-it-yourself mentality is also reflected in his label veto-records: “I spent a long time looking for a label for my first record with erb_gut, checking out everything until I didn’t feel like it anymore and decided: I’d rather do it myself, in order to have everything in my own hands.” Christoph Erb not only distributes his own music on veto-records, but also a whole range of other artists: The album Close Up by Julius Amber, consisting of Elio Amberg on saxophone and Julian Sartorius on drums, was recently released, and Christoph Erb is enthusiastic: “I pick people who I think are great and who have a kick. Elio Amberg is one of them. I’ve known him since I was a child, as I was his saxophone teacher. And now he makes very interesting music and we play together.”


Christoph Erb (saxophone), Magda Mayas (piano), Gerry Hemingway (drums): Under Water Falling, Record: Bathing Music, veto-records 2023.

Current projects

He plays with Elio Amberg and Niklaus Mäder in the bass clarinet trio Erbt Mäder am Berg?, the only formation with which he actually rehearses. “The line-up is very challenging because we all play the same instrument.” He also plays in another trio with drummer Gerry Hemingway and pianist Magda Mayas, in duo with violist Frantz Loriot and in yet another trio with Emmanuel Künzi on drums and Christian Weber on bass.

 

Magda Mayas (piano), Christoph Erb (saxophone) and Gerry Hemingway (drums) as a trio. Zvg. von Christoph Erb.

As different as these formations might be, Erb’s style is always recognisable: the will to express himself, the intensity, the focus on the edges of the conventional saxophone sound. “I’m still finding new sounds and ways of expressing myself on the saxophone, it’s probably never fully explored. For me, playing concerts is the greatest thing. And when something new happens at a concert – for me, with the band and in the overall sound – then I’m really happy afterwards. Improvisation should always be new. The main thing is no parachute.”
Jaronas Scheurer

Christoph Erb, veto-records, veto-records/exchange, Magda Mayas, Gerry Hemingway, Julian Sartorius, Frantz Loriot, Christian Weber, Flo Stoffner, Elio Amberg

New records on veto-records:
Two new LPs with Christoph Erb are on veto-records: Wabi Sabi of the Duo Erb-Loriot and Spazio Elle of the trio Erb Weber Künzi.

There ist also a digital release of the solo record ACCIAIo DOLCE FUSO. Study on Extended Sax of the Italian saxophonist Mario Gabola on veto-records.

Neo profiles:
Christoph Erb, Julian Sartorius

(Deutsch) Contrechamps Genève feiert das Hören

Contrechamps Genève celebrates listening: partage ton Vinyle!

A busy season with numerous highlights just started for Ensemble Contrechamps Genève. The programme represents the new direction of Geneva’s most important ensemble for contemporary music under the artistic direction of percussionist Serge Vuille. He took over five years ago and has since radically reshaped the ensemble’s DNA. Conversation with Serge Vuille:

 

Portrait Serge Vuille © Serge Vuille

 

Gabrielle Weber
Contrechamps performs in Geneva’s Victoria Hall, opens the Biennale Musica Venezia as well as Sonic Matter Zurich festivals or simply invites you – without giving a concert – to a vinyl and neo.mx3.ch release listening weekend in Geneva. The different events are characteristic of the new direction of this long-established ensemble under the direction of Serge Vuille.

“Contrechamps seeks balance between different musical practices,” Vuille explains. On one hand, there are concerts with instrumental music for large ensembles, often linked to composers and Switzerland’s French-speaking young music scene; on the other hand, there are projects in connection with other disciplines and musical genres, in combination with visual and performative music, electronics, pop or jazz. Vuille is always interested in very special listening experiences.

The first part was represented at the beginning of the season by a concert to mark the 65th birthday of Geneva composer Michael Jarrell, with a “traditional”, conducted concert for large ensembles in Victoria Hall. Contrechamps commissioned seven new short pieces from its students. “We are thereby supporting and promoting the regional creative scene, which is an important objective for us,” says Vuille.

At the end of 2022, a tribute to Éric Gaudibert had taken place, Gaudibert was a composer from Lausanne who died ten years ago and had a significant influence on the scene. In addition to Gaudibert, 22 new pieces by former students had been performed, miniatures lasting only around one minute each, with very different, freely chosen instrumentation.

 


Éric Gaudibert, Skript, pour vibraphone et ensemble, Contrechamps, Bâtiment des Forces Motrices de Genève, Concours de Genève, 2009, in house-production SRG/SSR.

 

In a completely different context and setting, for the Biennale Musica Venezia opening, Contrechamps presented GLIA for instruments and electronics, a work by US electronic pioneer and sound artist Marianne Amacher, who died in 2009. Vuille is also interested in the aspect of special shared listening experiences in Amacher’s work: at the festival opening in a large, empty and darkened hall of Venice’s converted Arsenale shipyard, the large audience (including the author), surrounded by loudspeakers, followed extreme sound changes by wandering around and with the instrumentalists playing on a platform, as vibrating sound sculptures, or moving through the audience. “GLIA is almost a sound installation, part of it actually takes place in the listeners inner ear vibrations, not in the room and it is not based on a score, but on reports from those involved, which demands a high level of creativity from each individual performer,” says Vuille.

 

Maryanne Amacher, ‘GLIA’ opening concert Biennale Musica Venezia, Contrechamps, Arsenale 16.10.2023 © Gabrielle Weber

 

Back to the Gaudibert miniatures: they can now be found on one of the new vinyl records mentioned at the beginning and mark the start of the new Contrechamps/Speckled-Toshe vinyl series, together with the Lausanne label Speckled-Toshe. “The 22 composition commissions, each lasting one minute, were an immense amount of work and resulted in such diverse works that we wanted to conclude the homage with a lasting object of this new generation. The vinyl record is the most suitable format for this: there is hardly anything better in terms of recording and transfer quality”.

 


Daniel Zea, «Eric – Cara de Tigre» for ensemble and tape, one of the  22 miniatures on the new vinyl, Contrechamps / Speckled-Toshe 2023. The story: Gaudibert appeared to Zea in a dream shortly after his death as a laughing tiger: he cried for a long time afterwards between grief and joy.

 

For the vinyl launch, Contrechamps invited guests to a special listening experience: at les 6 toits, a trendy Geneva cultural centre on a former industrial wasteland, the public could listen to the new vinyl releases as well as its own favourite records in listening lounges during an entire weekend. The newly released Contrechamps audio archive on neo.mx3.ch was also celebrated with a vernissage and there were also live recordings and radio broadcasts on RTS as well as SRF2Kultur about listening and recording contemporary music.

Like vinyl, the SRG online platform stands for a way of listening and a care in production: “There is a link between the two, as they give contemporary music visibility and duration – through both meticulous new editions as well as maintenance of historical archives”.

The platform for Swiss contemporary music also features numerous rarely performed works with unusual instrumentation, such as Michael Jarrell’s Droben schmettert ein greller Stein from 2001 for double bass, ensemble and electronics.

 


Contrechamps recorded Jarrells piece 2005 in tthe Ansermet radio studio under the direction of George Benjamin, in-house production SRG/SSR.

 

Contrechamps is gradually opening up the extensive radio archive, going back to the earliest recordings of 1986. It is important that such platforms exist and are appreciated. Many of the pieces cannot be heard anywhere else: that is unique,” states Serge Vuille.

Feux by Caroline Charrière, is another piece to be discovered. Born in Fribourg in 1960, the composer Charrière died young, in 2018, and Contrechamps is committed to her work, as Vuille is also keen to give more visibility to the work of female composers and contribute to a better gender balance in contemporary music.

 


Feux for Flöte, Clarinette, Marimba and Strings by Caroline Charrière, under the dircetion of Kaziboni Vimbayi, performed by Contrechamps 2019 at Victoria Hall Geneva, in-house production SRG/SSR.

 

At the opening concert of this year’s Sonic matter festival in Zurich, Contrechamps will present new pieces by three female composers from the Middle East for small electronic ensemble. Vuille’s other passions come together here: “I’ve been very interested in the Middle Eastern scene for a long time. It is very lively in terms of creation, especially in regard of electronics”. The fact that Sonic Matter is collaborating with the guest festival Irtijal from Bejrut this year is an excellent opportunity for the first collaboration and certainly also for unique listening experiences.
Gabrielle Weber

 

mentioned concerts:
Festival Sonic MatterBecoming / Contrechamps 30.11.2023, 19h (introduction 18h)
Biennale Musica Venezia, Maryanna Amacher, GLIA / Contrechamps, 16.10.2023
Genève, Les 6 toits: Contrechamps: Partage ton Vinyle!, 20-22.10.2023

Speckled-Toshe; Contrechamps/Speckled-Toshe:
1.Vinyl: 22 Miniatures en hommage à Éric Gaudibert
2.Vinyl: Benoit Moreau, Les mortes

Sonic matterNilufar HabibianIrtijalles 6 toits

broadcasts SRF Kultur:
Musik unserer Zeit, 18.10/21.10.23: Partage ton Vinyle! Ensemble Contrechamps Genève feiert das Hören, Redaktion Gabrielle Weber
neoblog, 7.12.22: Communiquer au-delà de la musique, Autorin Gabrielle Weber
neoblog, 19.6.2019: Ensemble Contrechamps Genève – Expérimentation et héritage, auteur Gabrielle Weber

broadcasts RTS:
L’écho des pavanes, 21.10.23: Aux 6 toits, enregistrer la musique contemporaine,  auteur: Benoît Perrier
Musique d‘avenir, 30.10.23, Partage ton Vinyle, ta cassette ou ta bande Revox!  auteur: Anne Gillot

neo-profiles: ContrechampsDaniel ZeaFestival Sonic MatterBenoit Moreau