gaudeamus muziekweek 2012 festival guide

[festivalbeeld]

ENGLISH VERSION

DRAAI OM VOOR NEDERLANDS

LOCATION- AND

PROGRAM OVERVIEW

PAGE 18 + 19

2 — gaudeamus muziekweek 2012 — english

INDEXIntroduction Henk Heuvelmans 2

Now! New! 3

Music and location:

from the Walter Maas House to

Museum Speelklok and further... 4

From conservatory to concert stage 5

AskoISchönberg: 40 years of new music

An interview with Wim Vos, director 6

Music in creases and folds

An interview with William Engelen,

sound artist 7

Gaudeamus Muziekweek flies all

over the world 8

Music in the open air:

‘Walk With Me’ and ‘Musicaerial’ 9

Portrait:

Sergey Khismatov and Thanasis Deligiannis,

nominated for the Gaudeamus Prize 2012 10

Over the border:

between composing and making music 11

A laptop, a dresses and a muse;

composing in 2012 12

Beyond craftsmanship:

interview with Martijn Padding,

composer and jury member

Gaudeamus Prize 2012 13

Loose, looser, loosest

column Aad van Nieuwkerk 14

Thanks to / Become a Friend /

Gaudeamus Concert series 15

Program overview/ locations / tickets sales 17 – 20

BY NOW IT’S A TRADITION TO OPEN THE BEGINNING OF THE SEASON WITH THE UTRECHT MUSIC MONTH. DIRECTLY AFTER THE LAST NOTE AT THE EARLY MUSIC FESTIVAL, THE GAUDEAMUS MUZIEKWEEK OVERWHELMS THE CITY WITH THE NEWEST NOTES BY THE YOUNGEST GENERATION OF COMPOSERS. THIS IS WHERE THE FUTURE SWEELINCKS ARE DISCOVERED.

Young creators from all over the world will come to Utrecht from 2 through 9 September to present their works to you. Together with colleagues and established older composers, they will discuss their plans and new ideas, how tomorrow’s music should sound. All sorts of questions arise: is there something like a Hague school, a Dutch musical style, a European sound? And what are the best ways to let the public share in all this? At the Gaudeamus Muziekweek you will hear and see composers start their careers. Some will blossom here into giants on whose shoulders the next generation can stand. That’s why we’re opening this year with the most recent work by this country’s best known living composer, Louis Andriessen, why we’re looking at how previous prize winners are faring. and why we’re offering others the opportunity of being heard by you and an international public. We will gladly guide you along the countless concert locations, where a variety of well-known musicians and recently discov-ered ensembles will present themselves to you. Try it for a change and let yourself be carried along. There’ll be no time to become bored; almost all the concerts last less than an hour and not a single concert overlaps another event. So if you want to, you can go to all 32 concerts this week, plus a large number of stimulating sound installations, workshops, lectures and seminars. Gaudeamus has quickly established itself in Utrecht. Besides the annual Gaudeamus Muziekweek, we organize a concert series at the Huis a/d Werf and the notorious Proeflokalen, and innumerable other activities in Muziekhuis Utrecht. Projects that go beyond genres and disciplines are set up together with other organizations and festivals. Did you get the taste of it after visiting this festival? In that case we can offer you a steady supply of today’s music in Utrecht and you can continue to witness the birth of the latest developments in contemporary music. Internationally we also present high-profile festivals such as Gaudeamus Muziekweek New York and Gaudeamus Russia. Gaudeamus thus makes an essential contribution to the Utrecht city goal of becoming the European Cultural Capital in 2018.

Henk Heuvelmans Director

Sweelincks, emphatically in the plural form: today’s young composers are really rocketing all over in style, instrumenta-tion and their use of space and material. Many are at the verge of claiming their place in music history. Of course you want to be there! The Gaudeamus Muziekweek warmly welcomes you, not for a nostalgic trip, but for a magical mystery tour into the unknown.

ARE YOU READY FOR IT?

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IF YOU WANT TO, YOU CAN GO TO ALL 32 CONCERTS THIS WEEK, PLUS A LARGE NUMBER OF STIMULATING SOUND INSTALLATIONS, WORKSHOPS, LECTURES AND SEMINARS.

english — gaudeamus muziekweek 2012 — 3

Are you tempted by catchwords like these? Does your heart leap when the virtues of something is extoled with these words? ‘No,’ you’ll probably say. We’re continually bombarded with catchwords like these. Empty slogans are meant to evoke an acute feeling of necessity, but are ignored by ever more people. ‘New’ no longer wins hands down. And by tomorrow, ‘now’ has already passed by.

‘Music is my religion.’Jimmy Hendrix

‘And a way of life.’Manuella Blackburn

‘Lucky Jimmy, I’m an agnostic’Thanasis Deligiannis

‘And my religion is music.’Andys Skordis

NOW! NEW!

This edition of the Gaudeamus Muziekweek zooms in on two important themes that give direction and meaning to the concept ‘new’: the ways composer and performers collaborate, and the format in which music is presented. Instead of the traditional division between the lone composer who is ‘ready’ after finishing his score, and the musicians who take it on from there, this festival edition demonstrates the results of working processes relinquishing this strict division.

The other ‘new’ in this edition of the Muziek-week is the way in which music is presented: a broad range of presentation styles that fit the music being performed, instead of the standard concert format of two 45-minute sessions plus an intermission.

The selection of thirteen brand new pieces nominated for the Gaudeamus Prize by the jury, consisting of Martijn Padding (the Netherlands), Annie Gosfield (United States) and Christopher Butterfield (Canada), offers plenty of opportunities to look for new

presentation forms. This young generation of composers again has its entirely own viewpoint on what music is or can be. The diversity in the pieces by the nominated composers is enormous, tempting the Muziekweek to an equally extended variety of concert formats. Night programs with ‘sleep music’, lunch concerts, reading sessions, evening routes in which you walk from one concert to the other, an overwhelming quantity of musical styles and approaches at full speed in ‘The Night of the Unexpected’, or expressive sound installations directed to the personal musical experience: A colorful series of divergent and typical concert settings constitutes the program of this Muziekweek.

‘But what does another type of presentation do to the music? Doesn’t the music stay the same?’ We think not. A church offers a totally different ambiance than does a concert hall, a museum provides the listener with other information than does a botanical garden. And we are convinced that this information steers the eyes and ears of the listener. The experience of a concert in the dark is completely different, and you listen to sounds differently when walking or when sitting.

Such divergent situations play with the expectations of the listener/viewer and can lead to a deeper experience of the music.

Of course these different concert situations demand a different attitude by the musicians. So, for them too, it’s ‘different’. As a musician you’re challenged to work things out in such a ‘different’ situation and to let this work to the advantage of the music. And you can feel that the wonderful musicians and ensembles populating the Gaudeamus Muziekweek can’t rely on routine or experience. The music they play is new, the thoughts from which this music emerges are new and the way in which the result is presented is new: geared at maximal contact between music, musicians and you, the public.

An overview of the whole program can be found on page 18 and 19.

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A COLORFUL SERIES OF DIVERGENT AND TYPICAL CONCERT SETTINGS CONSTITUTES THE PROGRAM OF THIS MUZIEKWEEK.


With the arrival last year of the Gaudeamus Muziekweek in Utrecht, the festival returned to familiar territory. Gaudeamus was once the brainchild of Walter Maas, the charismatic organizer and cultural entrepreneur who founded the organization in Bilthoven in 1947 with the aim of ‘promoting contemporary music’. Walter Maas bought the premises from the composer Julius Röntgen, which soon became the port of call for composers in the Netherlands and the favorite haunt of celebrities both in this country and abroad. People such as John Cage, Karlheinz Stockhausen and György Ligeti were guests in Bilthoven, in addition to Dutch colleagues such as Ton de Leeuw and Louis Andriessen.

‘Let us not forget that the greatest composers were also the greatest thieves. They stole from everyone and everywhere.’Pablo Casals

‘I wish I had been introduced to this concept when starting out as a composer! I am still captivated by the wonders of quotation, borrowing, reworking and rehashing.’Manuella Blackburn

Music and location: from the Walter Maas House to Museum Speelklok and further...

Now, 65 years later, the Gaudeamus Muziekweek is in Utrecht, not even 10 kilometers from its birthplace. The goal is more or less unchanged, but the way in which the organization operates has completely changed. After the war, the arts, including composing, symbolized an unremitting trust in the achievements of a new age. Today, several generations later, composing is an extremely eclectic happening expressed through all sorts of forms and styles and which has to relate to a society in which diversity and temporality seem to be the only indisputable values.

The central location of the Gaudeamus Muziekweek 2012 is Museum Speelklok, which coincidently stems from the same period in Dutch history as the festival. Museum Speelklok dates from 1956, when the exposition ‘Van speeldoos tot pierement’ was held in Utrecht. Today Museum Speelklok is the festival hub, where you can see installations by William Engelen and Felix Thorn, and where the interactive ‘Passage’ by Pierre Jodlowski will take you on a trip through your own history and memories.

The collection of the Museum tells esteemed stories about the ageold longing to render music by letting the automatic music instruments come to life in their context. During the Muziekweek, Museum Speelklok becomes an ode to mechanical music, which greatly fascinates today’s composers and public. In the CM Studio of the Centraal Museum, a little further downtown, you’ll see the beautiful installation ‘Cold Pin’ by the New York composer Eli Keszler. The Gaudeamus program includes wellestablished concert locations such as the Geertekerk and the Nicolaïkerk, in addition to one that’s very special: Hostel Strowis, which is offering three nights of ‘sleep music’.

This edition of the Gaudeamus Muziekweek is in cooperation with the Open Monuments Day, which will be held on 8 September. That day you can visit a number of short concerts in the Utrecht Museum Quarter. For example, you can hear the POW Ensemble with music for harpsichord and electronics in The Utrecht Archive, which houses the richest collection of archives, prints, cards, photos, films and publications on the history of the city and the province of Utrecht. The Sonnenborgh

Observatory forms the striking decor for the winner of the Dutch Harp Festival: Italian composer Nicoletta Andreuccetti.

One activity is outside the center of Utrecht, but is certainly worth a trip by bike or bus. ‘De Zingende Toren’ in Leidsche Rijn, an art work/glass carillon by Bernhard Heesen, will ring with music by Jorrit Tamminga, Christina Oorebeek, Luc Houtkamp and Wim the Ruiter.

Felix’s Machines

De Zingende Toren

‘If someone believes that composing can be done without stealing, it’s like claiming that he or she can give birth to someone without having sex. And if it can somehow miraculously be done, then I feel sorry for him or her.’ Thanasis Deligiannis

‘Then wouldn’t they be rich or in jail?’Andys Skordis

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TODAY MUSEUM SPEELKLOK IS THE FESTIVAL HUB, WHERE YOU CAN SEE INSTALLATIONS BY WILLIAM ENGELEN AND FELIX THORN, AND WHERE THE INTERACTIVE ‘PASSAGE’ BY PIERRE JODLOWSKI WILL TAKE YOU ON A TRIP THROUGH YOUR OWN HISTORY AND MEMORIES.


MARTIJN’S TIP

MARTIJN BUSER (31)PROGRAMMING AND PRODUCTION As programmer of the Muziekweek it’s naturally difficult for me to choose; I gladly and proudly programmed each ensemble and composer. But if I have to choose a single tip, for me Ensemble Klang and Knalpot are the two best non-conformist groups in the Netherlands in the past few years. As in a vision I tried to capture the sound of both groups in a new sound spectrum. And to my great joy this combination is indeed going to result in something entirely new! Maximal music at a high volume, an ultimate crossover that will appeal to lovers of contemporary music, electronics, jazz, and progressive pop!

Ensemble Klang + Knalpot

Sun 9 Sept | 17:00 hrs | Zijdebalen Theater

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FROM CONSERVATORY TO CONCERT STAGETHE GAUDEAMUS MUZIEKWEEK IS BOTH A HOTHOUSE FOR NEW DEVELOPMENTS WITHIN COMPOSED MUSIC AND A FESTIVAL THAT PRESENTS THE RESULTS OF THOSE DEVELOPMENTS. THIS IS THE PLACE FOR A DISCOURSE ON CONTEMPORARY COMPOSED MUSIC AND THE PLACE WHERE THE RESULTS OF DILIGENT COMPOSITIONAL WORK ARE PRESENTED TO THE PUBLIC.

This means that the Gaudeamus Muziekweek is both a festival for professionals as well as a public festival, which is well illustrated by the two locations. The professional part is mainly held in Huis a/d Werf, where, led by the jury of the Gaudeamus Prize, young composers get together on a daily basis to talk about the music they heard the day before. Museum Speelklok, prominently situated in downtown Utrecht, is the heart of the public part of the festival. Martijn Buser, programmer of the Muziekweek:‘Last year we tried to combine those two functions at a single location so as to connect the public side of the Muziekweek directly to the professional side. That turned out not to work for the simple reason that there was always one of those beautiful organs in the Museum Speelklok thundering with an impres-sive volume right through a conversation.’

Gaudeamus aims at stimulating contact between composers and performers of new music and audiences. Specifically for the up-and-coming generation of composers are four free lunch concerts, organized by staff and students of the composition departments at the conservatories in Amsterdam, The Hague, Rotterdam and Utrecht/Hilversum. At these concerts young student composers can present their work, performed by their con temporaries, to colleagues and the general public, and talk with them afterwards. This exchange of work and ideas is crucial: a composer’s relatively solitary and abstract craft is much helped by colleagues’ reflections.

Martijn Buser: ‘I think that real changes in new music occur in the contact among contemporaries. Young composers often experience a gap between themselves and older, purified musicians. Young musicians are more open; their open-mindedness is crucial for the way in which a new piece is performed, whereas experienced musicians tend to revert to older examples.’

One of the responsibilities that the Gaudeamus organization has formulated for itself is increas-ing the visibility of the participating composers. Martijn: ‘In contrast to some of the other art disciplines, young composers often don’t feel at ease when presenting themselves to an audience. We want to focus on who these young composers are, how they think and what they do. We hope that through these lunch concerts with the composers, we can profile their work more strongly.’ Thus the lunch concerts will be rounded off with a discus-sion in which the audience is explicitly invited to participate. In addition, those nominated for the Gaudeamus Prize will introduce themselves with a short, funny, informative or otherwise striking YouTube film, such as may be seen on the Muziekweek site.

In the past year Gaudeamus has also started a concert series outside the festival. In order to ground Gaudeamus in this city through its steady presence, this coming year a concert series will be organized around new music in Huis a/d Werf and in Muziekhuis Utrecht.

Ensemble Gending

In addition, Gaudeamus is developing plans for an annually recurring meeting for all composition students in the Netherlands. During this Young Composers Ball, as the working title of the platform reads, future composers meet each other to listen, discuss and to network. ‘That’s where we want to think about other concert formats, develop collective public relations, establish contacts with young musicians and strengthen contacts with Dutch concert halls. This way the discourse on composing will gain a substantial impulse,’ according to Martijn.

A good example of how such a platform actually works, may be seen and experienced in this festival edition. Together with a number of adventurous composers, Ensemble Gending will take a close look at the role of the Javanese gamelan in contemporary music. Musical material for all corners of the world will be rehearsed, analyzed and discussed during the ‘Gending Reading Sessions’.

The heart of the festival is formed by the work of young composers from all over the world. Besides the competition, other new work is also presented, by student composers, composers further in their development, and by inter nationally celebrated composers. And finally, the Muziekweek functions as a platform for exchanging ideas, methods and best practices for composers as well as performers.

Lunchconcerts conservatories

Tue 4 thru Fri 7 September, 12:30 hrs

Huis a/d Werf

Ensemble Gending

Tue 4 and Thu 6 September, 14:00 hrs,

Sun 9 September, 12:30 hrs

Het Utrechts Conservatorium

‘Young musicians are more open; their open-mindedness is crucial for the way in which a new piece is performed, whereas experienced musicians tend to revert to older examples.’


For decades the flagship of Dutch ensembles, AskoISchönberg has the honor of opening this edition of the Gaudeamus Muziekweek. The program includes works by the top Dutch composers Louis Andriessen and Martijn Padding, and a brand new piece by Marko Nikodijevic, winner of the Gaudeamus Prize 2010. The program is rounded off with two pieces selected by the jury to compete for the Gaudeamus Prize 2012: ‘7 Unceremonious occasions’ by Andys Skordis and ‘Insomniac’ by Charlie Piper. A conversation with Wim Vos, director of AskoISchönberg, about new music past and present.

ASKO SCHÖNBERG: 40 YEARS OF NEW MUSICAN INTERVIEW WITH WIM VOS, DIRECTOR

‘Avant-garde music is sort of research music. You’re glad someone’s done it but you don’t necessarily want to listen to it.’ Brian Eno

‘Good music always wants to be listened to.’Manuella Blackburn

‘Well yes, we are all free to choose what museum we want to visit.’ Thanasis Deligiannis

‘Good…’Andys Skordis

In the past: a Dutch ensemble culture emerged in the early seventies, with works by Louis Andriessen, among others, achieving an impressive position, first in the Dutch music scene and later also internationally. Presently: as of 2012 we’re left with a highly depleted infrastructure for newly composed music. Triggered by the digital revolution, audiences making different demands, and cutbacks unparalleled in history, only a limited number of small and medium-sized ensembles will survive. What is the role of the composer amidst all this? And is the music that he or she composes so different from 40 years ago? AskoISchönberg occupies a unique position among Dutch ensembles, in which new compositions, a high level of per-formance, and attention to education are all related to each other. Wim Vos: ‘We’ve developed into the guardian of a repertoire that can actually only be performed by ourselves. The essence of AskoISchönberg is based on intensive contacts with a number of composers going back some 30 or 40 years. The repertoire that goes with this stretches from Schönberg to the present and we regard it as our task to keep it alive.’

HOW DO YOU VIEW THE CURRENT SITUATION IN NEW MUSIC IN COMPARISON TO THE SEVENTIES, WHEN YOU CAME INTO BEING?

‘The typical radicalism back then has disappeared in our times. And the concert format has changed greatly. We’ve definitely put behind us the custom of entering and leaving the stage four or five times an evening. And we’re also looking into what increased concentration on theatrical means might offer us and our repertoire. But what really has changed, is musician-ship. Today’s young violinist who has just graduated, can join in relatively easily. That used to be quite a different story. However, the repertoire knowledge of many of today’s young musicians still needs to be improved.’ DOES ATTENTION TO THEATRICALITY THREATEN THE MUSIC’S AUTONOMY?

‘No, I don’t believe so. I don’t see today’s composers assuming other competencies in order to win that trick. Even though they work with relatively conventional means, the composers with whom we work know how to achieve a different result each time. Today’s young composers work hard on their development with regards to content. Most composers are now very internationally orientated and know how to generate a lot of work. Although they are a lot more conscious of entrepreneurship, that doesn’t reduce their autonomy. What I do see is increased attention to technology and the enormous potential that offers. HOW DO YOU SEE THAT IN THE NOTES THEMSELVES?

Nowadays scores look really slick, while you used to get pieces that were too dirty to touch, in a manner of speaking. Midi files accompanying a score are of course relatively new and offer an aural impression of a piece, which can naturally be useful. For those composers who write their work with a computer there’s the technological seduction into the pitfall of external glamor and virtuosity. The meaning of ‘style’ is then sometimes narrowed to the relationship between a series of issues of a magazine, that’s my gut feeling about this. The playback button on the computer is for many composers simply too tempting. This stops other composers from using the computer. Some aspects of composition are of all time. The fact that composers demand the utmost of the technical knowledge of musicians is one of these aspects. I’m convinced this will never change.’

Asko|Schönberg

Mon 3 September, 20:00 hrs

Vredenburg Leeuwenbergh

BUT WHAT REALLY HAS CHANGED, IS MUSICIANSHIP. TODAY’S YOUNG VIOLINIST WHO HAS JUST GRADUATED, CAN JOIN IN RELATIVELY EASILY. THAT USED TO BE QUITE A DIFFERENT STORY.

Asko|Schönberg

Wim Vos

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WILLIAM ENGELEN TRANSCENDS THE BOUNDARIES BETWEEN VISUAL ARTS AND COMPOSITION. HE WORKS TOGETHER WITH MUSICIANS WHO TRANSFORM HIS VISUAL WORKS INTO SOUND. ‘I’M AN AUTODIDACT AS A COMPOSER,’ HE SAYS. ‘FOR ME COMPOSING IS FIXATING TIME. I DON’T WORK WITH MUSIC NOTATION, BUT WITH GRAPHIC NOTATION SYSTEMS THAT I CONCEIVE MYSELF, THAT GIVES MUSICIANS A SHARE BECAUSE THEY ARE INVITED TO CREATE STRUCTURED IMPROVISATIONS.’

Since the end of 2010, William Engelen has been creating scores with ‘Falten’, scores released from the restraints of two dimensions: ‘It’s a composition method with which on the one hand I can alternate sound and silence, and on the other hand simulate the ‘spatiality of sounds’. Folding a sheet of paper creates an object with different layers and folds, with differences in heights, spatial forms and overlaps. I add music staves to all the parts that don’t disappear into the fold when the object is pressed flat. By then folding it open, the blank parts turn up, the silences. The ‘architecture’ of the score is translated into music together with the musicians. That’s how we can change spatial forms, stratifications and differences in height into performance techniques, timbres, pitch and other musical elements. ‘Falten’ makes these connections and the way they develop in time, visually and auditively.’

Until now most versions of ‘Falten’ have been for soloists. The scores have generally been standard sized A2 and A1 paper. Engelen: ‘The score for the string quartet is considerably larger. It has become a landscape measuring ten meters long and 35 centimeters high, through which the musicians walk. This exceptional length allows me to play with the form in different ways. I can knot it or fold the paper over a great length. Such interventions have implications for the music: long silences or temporarily stopping a

few instruments, for example. Exhibiting it in Museum Speelklok creates a relationship with the carillon book music on view there.’

The question is then if he regards such a score primarily as an art object or if he immediately aims at a certain musical effect. Engelen: ‘It’s chiefly an object that I look at as visual art. It’s only when the form appears to be musical and readable that I continue with it. In the course of time I’ve learned how the different treatments of paper and the resulting object determine the sound. What started as uninhibited play has evolved into serious research into the representation of space in imagery and sound. I’m very interested in what the score’s spatiality evokes musically with the musicians of the Sonar Quartett.’

Engelen is represented at the Gaudeamus Muziekweek with ‘Falten for string quartet’. It will be performed at the CM Studio of the Centraal Museum by the Sonar Quartett, who will also perform works by Turgut Ercetin and Mathias Hinke. As a visual work, it may be seen in Museum Speelklok, next to an impressive musical machine by Felix Thorn, and the installation ‘Passage’ by composer and multimedia artist Pierre Jodlowski, a corridor in which sensors transpose the movements of visitors into sounds, music and dazzling light.

William Engelen – exhibition ‘Ontplofte blik’

Tue 4 thru Sun 9 September, 11:00 – 17:00 hrs

(also 7 July – 28 October)

Centraal Museum

William Engelen – Falten

Tue 4 thru Sun 9 September, 10:00 – 17:00 hrs

Museum Speelklok

Wed 5 September, 20:30 hrs

CM Studio Centraal Museum

HENK’S TIP

HENK HEUVELMANS (58)DIRECTORIn 2010 Aliona Yurtsevich was rated as one of the three highest eligible for the Toonzetters BumaCultuur Prize. Since then we have been keeping track of her and have now set up a new produc-tion with her, in which music, fashion, theater, movement, and electronics all play a role. We have had many interest-ing discussions about it with her. But how all these elements will ultimately merge together in a live performance by this talented young composer...that’s something to look forward to with excitement and suspense.

Aliona Yurtsevich

PIANOdress: Sun 9 Sept | 15:00 hrs | RASA

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Music in creases and folds

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‘I would advise my young colleagues (...) to drop by sometimes at the kindergarten. It is there that it is decided whether there will be anybody who understands their works twenty years from now.’Zoltán Kodály

‘And where you will find future musicians and audience members.’ Manuella Blackburn

‘I wish composers had visited me when I was in kindergarten... Then maybe I would still have been friends with most of the children there.’Thanasis Deligiannis

‘Hmm…’Andys Skordis

SEBASTIAAN JANSSEN (27)PUBLICITY AND MARKETING

During the festival, I walk around with my phone to keep our social media followers informed about what’s happening. At the end of each day I will enter a blog post on our website, writing about that day, what’s going on in reviews, videos, photos, etc. As for myself, I’m looking forward the most to ‘Cold Pin’ by Eli Keszler, nominated for the Gaudeamus Prize 2012, an excit-ing and fascinating installation set up industrially. In addition, I would advise everyone to listen to ‘Mozartkugel’ by Marko Ciciliani, performed by the EnAccord String Quartet. This piece beautifully demonstrates how thin the boundary can be between classical music by the ‘Great Masters’ and full-blown kitsch.

Eli Keszler | Cold Pin

Tue 4, Thur 6, Sat 8, Sun 9 Sept | starting 11:00 hrs |

CM Studio Centraal Museum

EnAccord String Quartet

Mozartkugel: Tues 4 Sept | 20:30 hrs|


SEBASTIAAN’S TIP

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GAUDEAMUS MUZIEKWEEK FLIES ALL OVER THE WORLD

The Night of the Unexpected

Thu 6 September, 21:00 hrs

Tivoli

ECO Small Form #04

Fri 7 September, 19:00 hrs

RASA

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From the very beginning Gaudeamus has operated internationally. Gaudeamus invites young composers from all over the world to the Netherlands, and sends Dutch composers and ensembles abroad. This year, emphasis is on contacts with New York and a number of Russian cities. At the European level, Gaudeamus is active with the Ulysses Network, in which leading institutes offer young composers workshops and concert venues for their work. The main thing in international contacts is continuity, according to Gaudeamus director Henk Heuvelmans. ‘That way you can really learn from each other and can achieve more beautiful things.’

In the course of its existence, Gaudeamus has developed a network reaching far beyond Dutch borders. Because the organization has always offered a concert venue to inter-national young talent, it’s at the lead in musical develop-ments. Contacts with composers and musicians, established during the Gaudeamus Muziekweek, are also valuable at a later stage. ‘In January 2012 the first edition of a now annual event ‘Gaudeamus Muziekweek NewYork’ took place at The Issue Project Room in Brooklyn, New York. The program-mer of The Issue Project Room studied here,’ Heuvelmans explains. ‘The venue recently moved to a much larger and better situated building. They wanted a fine presentation at that new location, wanted to link themselves to an inter-national name. So they got in touch with us again. Without that previously established relationship, this wouldn’t have happened. In the opening program there were Dutch names such as MAE and Wouter Snoei, in addition to American names. There we can also position representatives of sound art. We have built up considerable knowledge in this area. Next year violinist Monica Germino is going on tour in the United States. We did our best for this, and on the other hand it leads to new contacts for us.’

Gaudeamus has also developed an extensive network in Russia. In 2013 Dutch composers and ensembles will tour various Russian cities. Heuvelmans: ‘We gladly seize upon special occasions. Because this is a Russia-the Netherlands year, we can more easily ask for support. A tour through Russia may radiate less on the participants than a perfor-mance in New York, but audience numbers are always high. And it offers possibilities of contacting young talent who you would like to bring here for their development.’ Part of the exchange with Russia is ‘The Night of the Unexpected’, in which Russian musicians and composers participate. The ‘Night’ will subsequently travel to Moscow and St. Petersburg. Within Europe, Gaudeamus participates in the Ulysses Network, to which for instance IRCAM, a prominent institute for new music (electronic or otherwise) in Paris, is also linked. Under the auspices of Ulysses, productions and composers circulate a number of venues in Europa. ‘Young talent can thus develop themselves in a variety of surroundings. Very useful,’ Heuvelmans says. ‘We’re also working on the European Contemporary Orchestra, in which three ensembles want to present a new sound: the French Télémaque, the Belgian Musiques Nouvelles, and orkest de ereprijs from the Netherlands. Members from these ensembles join each other and work intensively with composers. We’re looking into other setups for concerts with them. There’s a world to be won in that field.’

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Monica Germino, will perform at Gaudeamus Muziekweek New York 2013

Sarah Nicolls, The Night of the Unexpected 2011

THE GAUDEAMUS MUZIEKWEEK PRESENTS TWO STRIKING SOUND INSTALLATIONS CONNECTING PUBLIC SPACES OF UTRECHT WITH MUSIC. WITH ‘WALK WITH ME’ BY SOUND ARTISTS JEROEN STRIJBOS AND ROB VAN RIJSWIJK, GAUDEAMUS EMPHASIZES ITS CONNECTION TO ITS HOME BASE AND DEMONSTRATES ITS AMBITION TO REVAMP MUSICAL EXPERIENCE. ‘MUSICAERIAL’ BY FROUKE WIARDA IS THE OTHER INSTALLATION, WHICH WITH THE HELP OF COLORFUL KITES LITERALLY SENDS MUSIC BLOWING THROUGH THE AIR.


Strijbos & Van Rijswijk

With an iPhone in your hand and your ear-phones plugged in, you walk through the streets that connect Museum Speelklok and Centraal Museum to each other. ‘Walk With Me’ is at the cutting edge of composition and installation. It is designed as an app (applica-tion) and works with GPS, which means that ‘Walk With Me’ is firmly rooted in today’s world. With the help of GPS, Strijbos and Van Rijswijk can quite precisely establish places within a certain area where they link musical inter-ventions and happenings. They can transmit sounds via the iPhone microphone and let these sounds undergo a change. They can conjure up composed fragments. For some of these fragments they’re using music performed at earlier editions of the Gaudeamus Muziekweek. Each fixed place forms the middle point of a circle within which the effect may be heard. These circles often overlap each other. Thus a musical experience is created, consisting of various layers, different for each individual part. The music and the sounds broaden and change the experience of walking through downtown Utrecht.

The two sound artists have had the app operate at various locations this year, recently as part of the Oerol Festival at Terschelling. ‘The Lange Nieuwstraat is the axis of the composition we’re making for the Muziekweek,’ Rob van Rijswijk says. ‘It’s the largest distance we’ve covered until now with ‘Walk With Me’. Each place has its own characteristics and challenges. We discover them by walking around. A hard nut to crack here in Utrecht is the traffic. That sound is about the same for the entire length and it’s emphatically present. On the other hand there are lovely side streets and courtyards all over, often with special acoustics and atmospheres. Here we can zero in with the sounds that we program in the app for those places.’

Until now Strijbos and Van Rijswijk have only handled their own recordings and compo-sitions in ‘Walk With Me’. This is the first time that music by others will be used. Van Rijswijk: ‘We’re going to deal carefully with this. On the one hand we want to recycle that music with respect. But the pieces we use also have to fit within our own music. It’s a quest for us. And it will also be a quest for the visitors.’

Frouke Wiarda’s ‘Musicaerial’ in Lepelenburg Park is also meant for outside. Her installation consists of kites for which composers wrote music. The kites themselves were designed by artists. ‘The kites are the source of sounds and the source of inspiration,’ she says. Vibrations in the string, made audible by a contact micro-phone, serve as the basis for the compositions. Sensors on the kites register changes in the movements, the wind, and the pressure on the surface of the kite. This data forms the material that composers such as Marije Baalman, Danny de Graan, and Wouter Snoei incorporate in their music, using real-time electronics. Wiarda: ‘Others use the kites purely as an acoustic instrument. Koen Kaptijn connects the string to his trombone in order to enter into a fight with the elements. In all its simplicity this object evokes different images and associations for everyone. Lightness, the idea of a flight, connecting to other spheres. As for myself, I use a string made of a super fiber, Dyneema, that conducts sounds in a special manner. The string not only vibrates because of the wind, but also by the voice of singer Meri Nikula via loud-speaker cones. It’s as though you hear voices of people from past centuries, voices that are still drifting in the atmosphere.’

Walk With Me app

download here: http://bit.ly/GMW12_wwm

Sun 2 thru Sun 9 September

with iphone between Museum Speelklok

and Centraal Museum

Musicaerial

Sun 2 September, 13:00 – 18:00 hrs

Park Lepelenburg

‘EACH FIXED PLACE FORMS THE MIDDLE POINT OF A CIRCLE WITHIN WHICH THE EFFECT MAY BE HEARD. THESE CIRCLES OFTEN OVERLAP EACH OTHER. THUS A MUSICAL EXPERIENCE IS CREATED, CONSISTING OF VARIOUS LAYERS, DIFFERENT FOR EACH INDIVIDUAL PART.’

Walk With Me app

MUSIC IN THE OPEN AIR:

‘Walk With Me’ and ‘Musicaerial’

Musicaerial


SERGEY KHISMATOV AND THANASIS DELIGIANNIS, FROM RESPECTIVELY RUSSIA AND GREECE, HAVE BOTH BEEN NOMINATED FOR THE GAUDEAMUS PRIZE 2012. WHAT FOLLOWS IS A PORTRAIT OF THESE TWO COMPOSERS, THEIR BACKGROUNDS, MOTIVES, AND THE COMPOSITIONS SCHEDULED DURING THE MUZIEKWEEK AND COMPETING FOR THIS YEAR’S PRIZE.

INGRID’S TIP

INGRID BEER (27)PUBLICITY AND MARKETINGDuring the Muziekweek I bike around on my delivery bicycle so that everyone attending the festival has a flyer, program info and/or a festival news-paper. In short, I take care of the publicity. Of all the beautiful festival programs, I’m looking forward the most to the concert by VOCAALLAB. The singers of VOCAALLAB come out so well in the Nicolaïkerk and moreover it promises to be a very beautiful, almost magical program. I can’t wait!

VOCAALLAB

Tue 4 Sept | 19:00 hrs | Nicolaïkerk

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PORTRAIT:

SERGEY KHISMATOV AND THANASIS DELIGIANNIS, NOMINATED FOR THE GAUDEAMUS PRIZE 2012

‘I love music passionately. And because I love it, I try to free it from barren traditions that stifle it.’Claude Debussy

‘I find traditions appealing now, as I wonder what new ideas may be inspired through working with old or established forms. Perhaps within the barren we might find abundance...’Manuella Blackburn

‘Well, I agree with Claude, but many of my friends accuse me of being a patronizer.’Thanasis Deligiannis

‘It’s good if you love it.’Andys Skordis

‘There’s not much room in Russia for new music. In St. Petersburg there are maybe three or four interesting young composers, plus one ensemble that only operates on the basis of projects. The situation is better in Moscow: there around twenty composers are doing interesting things, and the conserva-tory’s department of electronic music has new equipment with eight tracks. But aside from Moscow, there are practically no commissions or contemporary concerts on the large stages. It’s often easier to get my music programed at festivals abroad than here. In 2006 I finally got a decent connection to internet. That’s when I first heard ‘Pierrot Lunaire’!’ In 2010 Khismatov, together with another composer, decided to organize a series of concerts by contemporary composers in St. Petersburg.

Khismatov was selected for the Gaudeamus Muziekweek in 2010 with ‘Spring Relapse’ for voice and electronics, and in 2011 with the hellish and theatrical ‘To the left’, in which the conditions of the homeless in Russia are expressed as one big musical delirium. This year his ‘Microphones Quartet’ will be performed at ‘The Night of the Unexpected’.

‘For ‘Microphones Quartet’ I went to the Rimsky-Korsakov Museum. They had a concert piano I was allowed to use. I wanted to create a piece without fixed tones, but it should not be sheer noise either. The piano is tapped and explored by microphones; the resulting sounds come from all four corners. Actually it’s a percussion piece for microphones and piano.

I don’t know how it’s going to sound live: I only have the score and a demo tape.’ Thanasis Deligiannis: ‘Actually I just fool people into believing I’m a composer. I don’t think in notes, I think about music as movement and image. My father is a traditional musician, he plays clarinet, and my mother is a dancer. As a child I started playing instruments, but it was only at the music school that I learned to sight-read. I still have problems with solfeggio, and the piano lessons were awful. I graduated in composition, but I learned the most about what sound does and its potential from music theater courses.’

’Yriaeas’, the piece that is being performed at the Muziekweek, is conceived as a sort of theater dialogue between the instruments. The double bass is the leading actor, but all the other instruments also act as if they are the protagonists. If you think away the words and the theater, then you’re left with this piece. It has a continuous flow; I removed the bar lines because they got in the way, just like prison bars.’

‘Ultimately I’m not aiming at creating a big Gesamtkunstwerk, rather at returning a ritual in which everything has a place: music, move-ment, space, time. The use of video – moving image! – is natural for me, precisely because of the time factor. What I learned from Greek folk music is a horizontal way of thinking musically: not based on harmony and counterpoint, but as something continuous, almost like in a raga.’

‘My music should be both playful and serious. No playing around. The pieces develop in dialogue with the musicians, but I still remain the Composer with a capital C. As in the original meaning of the Greek word synthesis: putting things together.’

Sergey KhismatovThanasis Deligiannis

‘ACTUALLY I JUST FOOL PEOPLE INTO BELIEVING I’M A COMPOSER. I DON’T THINK IN NOTES, I THINK ABOUT MUSIC AS MOVEMENT AND IMAGE.’

Sergey Khismatov – Microphones Quartet

The Night of the Unexpected

Thu 6 September, 21:00 hrs

Tivoli

Thanasis Deligiannis – Yriaes

Nieuw Ensemble

Fri 7 September, 20:30 hrs



The Gaudeamus Muziekweek is exploring new avenues. Besides other ways of presenting music to the public, Gaudeamus stimulates the search for new forms of collaboration between composers and musicians. The strict division between the two is age-old: the one conceives it, the other performs it. The Muziekweek would like to suggest various alternatives. Two examples are the collaboration between Knalpot and Ensemble Klang, and between J.O.N.G. and composer Arthur Wagenaar.

OVER THE BORDER: BETWEEN COMPOSING AND MAKING MUSIC

‘Composers should write tunes that chauffeurs and errand boys can whistle.’ Thomas Beecham

‘I’d like to hear someone whistle some electroacoustic music.’Manuella Blackburn

In bringing together Knalpot and Ensemble Klang, the demarcation between composer and performers becomes blurred. At the initiative of Muziekweek programmer Martijn Buser, these two groups dived into each other’s repertoire and prepared pieces together. For the duo group Knalpot (guitarist Raphael Vanoli and drummer Gerri Jäger), the initial emphasis was on improvisa-tion. Gradually the duo began using electronics, allowing them to manipulate sounds and to thus introduce an extra layer. Their music, which materializes while rehearsing, offers a lot of freedom for action. ‘When we rehearse, we often work associatively and try out concepts,’ according to guitarist Vanoli. ‘We record our rehearsals and zoom in on the strongest pieces. We crystallize such fragments into whole numbers that we then further develop in a live setting. A free inter pretation of our compositions keeps them fresh, both for us and for our audiences.’ ‘Knalpot doesn’t sound like a duo for guitar and drums,’ says Pete Harden, artistic director and guitarist of Klang. ‘With an incredible feeling for detail, they dive in on a minuscule element and blow it up while you’re looking on. In this they’re radical and unique.’ Klang consists of three wind players, piano, guitar, and percussion. In contrast to Knalpot, Klang has composers writing for the group. Because the music is conceived for the individual members, the group determines the end result to a large extent. Harden: ‘We work a lot with early compositional sketches. Our rehearsals with that material are workshops where we flesh out the music. Composers have a clear idea of what they want. In ‘Schwarz-weiss’ Christopher Fox has established a global structure in which he notated the rhythms in detail, but left the choice of the sounds up to us. An open score gives us the opportunity to live in it, as it were. We become part of the creative process. Just like Knalpot, we continually fiddle and tamper with a piece, even if there’s a ‘definitive’ version recorded on a CD.’

During the Muziekweek, Klang and Knalpot will perform each other’s repertoire, independently of each other. In addition, they will work on new music during rehearsals, which they will present together. The concert in September, the final concert of the Gaudeamus Muziekweek, should mark the beginning of an intensive collaboration. The J.O.N.G. ensemble (the abbreviation stands for Jonge Ondernemende Nieuwe Generatie: young, enterprising, new generation) performs both classical and contemporary music. Although it emphasizes high-quality musicianship, it also strives to blow the dust off of music and its presentation. Composer and keyboard player Arthur Wagenaar, active in the music theater field with his band Susies Haarlok, works with J.O.N.G. on ‘Soldatenverhalen’ (‘Soldiers’ Stories’). ‘In ‘Soldatenverhalen’ I use drums and electric bass, not necessarily for the notes, but for the power of the sound that these instruments produce. I let the ensemble improvise. Not completely free phrases, but pieces in which they have to react instinctively and directly to signals played by certain members. It’s a drill, like the military learn. The musical reactions are determined, but not the moments that those signals are given. J.O.N.G. is open to everything, it’s in for wild plans. But you stay caught in a strange circle. Classically trained musicians can read insanely good and quickly perform the music you’ve written. But you need time to try things together, to undo those established relationships. And there’s simply no time. In music theater you can rehearse for months to create something. Ensembles simply don’t have that luxury.’

Knalpot + Ensemble Klang


Zijdebalen Theater

J.O.N.G. Ensemble

Music around Monuments

Sat 8 September, 15:30 hrs

Park Lepelenburg

‘I’m sure they now all have their own iPods.’Thanasis Deligiannis

‘Composers should whistle.’Andys Skordis

Knalpot Ensemble Klang

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The standard image of the composer sitting at the piano, entrusting his musical imagination to music paper has had its day. Today’s composers employ many other working methods. Prompted by changes in the relationship between maker and performer, or the development of new tech-nologies, today’s composer approaches music from unusual angles. All these possibilities are in the rich spectrum of composers presented by the Gaudeamus Muziekweek. Three composers prominently represented in the festival program talk about the way they work.

A LAPTOP, A DRESSAND A MUSE; COMPOSING IN 2012

Electronics is a natural element in the sound worlds that Wouter Snoei creates. During the Muziekweek the POW Ensemble will play ‘Keys’, written for harpsichord and two laptops. Snoei uses the laptops to manipulate the harpsichord sounds. In addition, with contact microphones he amplifies touching the keys of the three instruments. ‘Originally I was focused on electronics in order not to be tied down to the limitations of acoustic instruments. I wanted to construct new sounds. Computers offer unlimited possibilities. But you do lose an unpredictability and a liveliness that you get for free from instruments. A musician is important as an eye-catcher. It irritates me when I see a laptop operator fixated on his screen.’ Through electronics he can expand the sound of an instru-ment: ‘I use the sounds of the instrument itself as much as possible. This is also the case in ‘Keys’. Every touch of the keys, both of the harpsichord and of the laptops, is part of the music, part of the composition. Because I work with electronics, I think in sounds and of ways of getting processes going and adjusting them. I’m also conscious of the spatial functioning of music. You can place loudspeakers around the audience. That will lead to another arrangement of the instruments and thus to another way of experiencing the concert.’ ‘In my work as a composer I cross the boundaries of the musical media,’ Aliona Yurtsevich says. During the perfor-mance of ‘PIANO-dress’, which will be premiered during the Muziekweek, pianist Tomoko Honda will wear a gigantic dress completely decorated with electronics. ‘This piece wants to thwart the expectations people have of the relationship between a piano and a pianist. Usually the musician serves the instrument; the movements while performing, which are in themselves hardly interesting, only serve to operate the instrument. In ‘PIANO-dress’ the body of the musician becomes the instrument. The moods and the operations, which I have noted in the score, are variations in musical observation.’ Yurtsevich, herself a pianist, has worked for a number of years as a visual artist and designer in New York before she once again devoted herself to composing. ‘Music develops in my thoughts as a hologram that I can model and rework. Changes in the image correspond to changes in the sound, in the musical structure. In ‘PIANO-dress’ the conceptual image determines the progression of various movements. That

offers me the possibility of addressing the relationship between instrument and performer from various angles. ‘PIANO-dress’ joins sound and image, is both a composition and an installation. It’s not about musical virtuosity and that’s why it’s hard to perform. Often there’s hardly any sound. I believe that there’s also music beyond the borders of the audible. If you don’t perceive any sounds, that doesn’t mean there’s no music.’ ‘It’s crucially important to write for a specific musician,’ Louis Andriessen says. His ‘La Girò’ is programmed during the Muziekweek. The foundation for his conviction was laid sixty years ago when he first heard ‘Birth of the Cool’ by Miles Davis. ‘My brother Jurriaan took it with him from the United States. Listening to music via mechanical means was highly unusual. In our family we all played ourselves. I was already busy working out pieces at the piano. What Davis did was new; the expanded wind section in his band. The songs with their rhythms bore a close resemblance to dance music. The harmonies and the arrangements pointed the way towards polyphony in free jazz.’ That album was the root of Andriessen’s preference for brass instruments, but it also pointed to writing for people, like in jazz. He already did that before Orkest De Volharding. He wrote ‘La Girò’ last year for violinist Monica Germino. The piece is based on Anna Giraud, one of Antonio Vivaldi’s favorite female singers. Vivaldi’s muse inspired Andriessen to write something for one of his muses. ‘I can ask Germino to tell a story or to sing a song in such a way that she seems to be improvising. Her possibilities give me ideas as to what I want to write.’

JONATAN BRAND (24)COORDINATOR VOLUNTEERS / PRODUCTION

I’ve been involved with the Gaudeamus Muziekweek since last year. During this year’s Muziekweek I’m responsible for the volunteers and for some production tasks. I also hope to be able to go to a lot of concerts. I’m especially looking forward to the ‘Slaap zacht’ evenings, when international artists and jury selections perform special night works in the intimate setting of a bedroom at the Hostel Strowis, during which the audience may fall asleep. A special and unique concert experience.

Slaap Zacht

Thu 6 – Sat 8 Sept | 23:30 hrs |

Hostel Strowis

JONATAN’S TIP

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Wouter Snoei

Louis Andriessen

Wouter Snoei – Keys

Music by Monuments

Sat 8 September, 12:30 hrs

Het Utrechts Archief

Aliona Yurtsevich – PIANO-dress


RASA

Louis Andriessen – La Girò

Asko|Schönberg



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Martijn Padding (NL) is chairman of the jury for the Gaudeamus Prize 2012, which is further comprised of Annie Gosfield (USA) and Christopher Butterfield (CAN). Besides composing, Padding is coordinator of the Composition Department at the Royal Conservatory in The Hague. Three of his works are being performed during the Muziekweek: ‘Three Summer Pieces’ by Asko|Schönberg, and ‘Nederland Muziekland’ and ‘Piéton de Hauterives’ by orkest de ereprijs.

Beyond craftsmanship

‘The trouble with music appreciation in general is that people are taught to have too much respect for music they should be taught to love instead.’ Igor Stravinsky

‘Giving rise to those barren traditions!’Manuella Blackburn

‘Stravinsky, I haven’t decided yet if you’re my enemy or not.’Thanasis Deligiannis

‘Love is taught?’Andys Skordis

‘A prize is really a prize for the arts, not so much for that guy or girl who wins the prize, because you can easily think of a hundred other composers. Naturally there’s always one who’s a bit better than the others, but in the arts this is ultimately difficult to measure. So I’d rather think about it as something you celebrate with each other.’

‘The first thing that surfaces in the jury is: ‘It shouldn’t be a compromise!’ We’ve selected someone who made a really crazy installation with cables etc.: Eli Keszler with ‘Cold Pin’. That type of eccentricity, that isn’t eccentric anymore. By now that, too, is steeped in an enormous tradition. It simply belongs to the rest. That used to be impossible. When I was studying in the eighties everyone did the same thing. You had to have a really excellent command of the handiwork, otherwise it wouldn’t be performed. It’s not like that now. The arts aren’t so straightforward anymore. And that has emancipated the arts. But if you listen to those sort of things a whole evening, you start to think: I sure wouldn’t mind hearing a really good chord progression.’

HOW DOES THAT APPLY TO YOUR OWN COMPOSITIONAL PRACTICE?‘My specialty in composing lies in thinking a long time about a note that I find beautiful. And whether that note comes from a strange synthesizer or from a computer or from a piano, that doesn’t really matter that much to me. For many years I worked on productions together with Krista Vincent. There was a piece in which we wanted to make glissandi on the piano like on a violin. That’s something you can’t do on a piano. Because a piano only has fixed tones. So I asked if she could develop a program so that when I pressed a piano key, the result would be an immediate glissando to another tone. In order to realize this she wrote a special computer program.‘

AS YOU DESCRIBE IT, TODAY YOU CAN’T COMPOSE IN YOUR STUDY ANYMORE. BECAUSE THIS WAY OF COMPOSING IS BEYOND THE SCORE, BECAUSE YOU TRY THINGS OUT IN A STUDIO, BECAUSE YOU RUN THROUGH CHOREOGRAPHIES. TO WHAT EXTENT DOES THIS DEMAND A NEW WAY OF WORKING AND THINKING? ‘Dialogue is terribly important. But Mozart also understood that, he didn’t design his own choreographies for his operas. Traditionally, composing is working together. People like Michel van der Aa (winner Gaudeamus Prize 1999) are unique in this sense: they can do everything by themselves. But on the other hand, there’s an advantage to dialogue. It allows you to jump really high. If you say, ‘That’s not possible’, the other person responds, ‘But it is possible.’

That dialogue can also be with a computer. Because a computer can do things people can’t. If you press a button and hear everything backwards, then you hear things… if I had to write that out myself, it would take me three weeks.’

BUT DOES IT ALSO CHANGE HOW YOU LISTEN? SIMPLY BECAUSE THE CHOICE OF AVAILABLE SOUNDS HAS EXPANDED SO MUCH? ‘Yes, absolutely. You develop a new way of listening. I remember the first time I listened to Vivier, in the eighties. I sat in De IJsbreker; I had never seen the score, never even heard of the guy. Afterwards I told the bass player: ‘Jesus, you guys really played way out of tune.’ They were those terribly good, precisely notated micro tonal chords. And I thought, ‘I’ve heard something wrong.’ Only much later, when I could get hold of the score, I understood that my ears had totally fooled me. That’s a very good example of how art can make you listen better.’

Martijn Padding – Three Summer Pieces

Asko|Schönberg



Martijn Padding – Nederland Muziekland

and Piéton de Hauterives

orkest de ereprijs

Wed 5 September, 19:00 hrs


The jury for the Gaudeamus Prize 2012

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RECENTLY, I INTERVIEWED THE VIOLIST OENE VAN GEEL (THE NORDANIANS, ZAPP 4). ‘IT’S TOO BAD,’ OENE SAID, ‘THAT IN THE CLASSICAL MUSIC SCENE AND FOR THAT MATTER, EVEN IN THE ‘NEW’ MUSIC SCENE, THERE’S SUCH A CHASM OF DEFERENCE AND AWE BETWEEN THE COMPOSER AND THE MUSICIANS.’ THE COMPOSER WROTE IT LIKE THAT, SO WE WOULDN’T DARE CHANGE IT. THE SCORE AS INFALLIBLE AND HOLY PRESCRIPTION. PREDICTABLE. VERIFIABLE.

LOOSE, LOOSER, LOOSEST

I immediately had to think of the feeling that came over me during the Cage-weekend in the latest Holland Festival. John Cage, who kicked sacred cows with humor and relativism, himself seemed to have turned into a sacred cow in the celebrations of his 100th anniversay. With care – and certainly beautifully – museologically conserved. If he would have been there, he would have enjoyed one thing the most, I reckon. Slagwerk Den Haag played ‘Child of Tree’ and ‘Branches’ on cactuses, vegetables and vegetative-based percussive instruments. During the performance you could hear children in the foyer letting out little cries, simply not conscious of matters of respect, but busy gathering the dried beans and nuts that had fallen onto the ground and bringing them back to the musicians. Unpredictable. Unverifiable. A bit looser, say, then we are used to. Exactly what we can learn from children. Maybe the music gets looser if the roles of the composer and musicians become looser. You could say: that’s exactly what we can learn from singer/songwriters. You invent a song, and you simply play and sing it yourself. Just how you think it should sound and irrespective if someone else can sing it ‘better’. Or indeed, someone else unconcernedly sings the song in his/her own way. Could we learn other things from adjacent stages? You’re darn right. From the pop scene: play by heart. The fact of the matter is that you’re communicating with an audience. Just like having a conversation – you don’t do that using cheat sheets. A while back I saw the Double Espresso saxophone quartet without music stands and without sheet music, and that immediately made the evening so much nicer, more intimate, cozier as it were. From hard rockers: talk with your audience. Tell them what you’re going to do. Explain what’s going to happen. Check out on YouTube how Dave Grohl (Foo Fighters) sends an aggressive audience member out of the hall. Or go look how Alban Wesly of Calefax goes about it, then you know what I mean. And what do we learn from the jazz cats? That good notes aren’t automatically always good music. You can also impro-vise outside bars 23 thru 38, outside the prescribed freedom. Improvisation doesn’t have to be a wild poster wall (‘here you’re free to hang up anything you want’). Loosen control and predictability.

And what can we learn from amateurs? That it doesn’t have to be a problem if your mother, brother, uncle or neighbors take some snapshots or make a video of your performance. Naturally it shouldn’t disturb the performance. But you can simply agree beforehand as to what’s allowed and when. Play a five-minute piece at the beginning of your concert, a piece during which these things don’t matter, and invite everyone to take pictures or to film (and immediately put it on Twitter and Facebook!) – and the deal is that afterwards we all keep quite so that everyone can concentrate on listening. If need be, temporarily dressed in a prim and proper straitjacket.

Aad van Nieuwkerk editor-in-chief of VPRO Radio 4

Aad van Nieuwkerk

During the festival the Dutch broadcasting

organization VPRO will record a special festival

program. The concert recordings will be made in close

cooperation with the Concertzender, VPRO Radio

4, Omroep MAX and the web radio station Radio 4

Eigentijds. There will be online broadcasts through

a livestream at www.radio4.nl/eigentijds and on

september 20th there will be a broadcast featuring

all the highlights from the Muziekweek at Radio 4.

Youtube:

http://bit.ly/GMW12_FooFighters

http://bit.ly/GMW12_Calefax

FROM HARD ROCKERS: TALK WITH YOUR AUDIENCE. TELL THEM WHAT YOU’RE GOING TO DO. EXPLAIN WHAT’S GOING TO HAPPEN. CHECK OUT ON YOUTUBE HOW DAVE GROHL (FOO FIGHTERS) SENDS AN AGGRESSIVE AUDIENCE MEMBER OUT OF THE HALL.


The Gaudeamus Muziekweek is THE inter-national festival for young composers and new music. In the first week of September, composers, musicians and music fans from all over the world come to Utrecht to enjoy the many concerts and sound installations at beautiful locations throughout the city. An important part of the festival is the internationally renowned Gaudeamus Prize for composers under thirty, which has already produced many talents, like Michel van der Aa and Yannis Kyriakides. Besides the festival, the Gaudeamus Muziekweek organizes a serie of concerts throughout the season at Huis a/d Werf, and the monthly Proeflokaal at Muziekhuis Utrecht.

The Gaudeamus Muziekweek stands for the development of talent, innovation, exchange, and a personal approach. But we can only fulfill these goals successfully with your financial support. By supporting the Gaudeamus Muziekweek we can continue our dedication to today’s Mozarts, facilitating opportunities for their development.

GAUDEAMUS CONCERT SERIESConcert calender September thru December 2012

FUNDERS

PROGRAM PARTNERS

IN PARTNERSHIP WITH

INTERNATIONAL PARTNERS

MEDIA PARTNERS

THANKS TO

* This project has been funded with support from the European Commission. This publication reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.

COLOPHON This magazine is issued

by Gaudeamus Muziekweek

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3552 XE Utrecht

tel: +31 (0)30 82 00 111

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articles and interviews

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Floris Solleveld

editors

Geert van Boxtel, Ingrid Beer,

Sebastiaan Janssen, Martijn Buser,

Henk Heuvelmans, Jonatan Brand

translation

Helen Metzelaar

concept and design

Studio Lonne Wennekendonk

print

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ALBA/COMPOST – BEAR VS SHARKComposers: Elizabet van der Kooij, Ben Lammerts van BuerenThu October 11 | 20:30 hrsHuis a/d Werf (Boorstraat 107, Utrecht)

ZWERM + MR. PROBE – POPCORN (INCL. DEZ MONA EKKO)Composers: Yannis Kyriakides, Daan Janssens, Bruno Nelissen, Stefan Prins, Serge Verstockt, Stefan Van EyckenThu October25 | 20:00 hrsHuis a/d Werf (Boorstraat 107, Utrecht)

POW ENSEMBLE + GOSKA ISPHORDING – STRINGS ATTACHEDComposers: Wouter Snoei, Lucas Wiegerink, Angel Faraldo, Kieran Klaassen, Jorrit Tamminga, Chad LangfordThu November 1 | 20:30 hrsHuis a/d Werf (Boorstraat 107, Utrecht)

CELLO 8TET AMSTERDAM + HADEWYCH MINIS – DICHTEN Composer: Boudewijn TarenskeenThu November 29 | 20:30 hrsHuis a/d Werf (Boorstraat 107, Utrecht)

ENSEMBLE GENDING – POETRY AND SOUNDSCULPTURES & THE OBSCURE THOUGHTS OF ISABELLA GREENComposers: Lukas Simonis & Henk Bakker (WORM), Dyane DonckThu December 12 | 20:30 hrsHuis a/d Werf (Boorstraat 107, Utrecht)

PROEFLOKAALThe Proeflokaal is from September 18, every third Tuesday of each month in Muziekhuis Utrecht (Loevenhoutsedijk 301, Utrecht). Proeflokaal is the testing ground for musical experimentation and electronics.

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Adèle Wickert Fonds

gaudeamus muziekweek 2012 festival guide

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