Meet Simon Steen-Andersen

Steen-Andersen: Black Box Music 12/03/14 | Queen Elizabeth Hall 0844 847 9940 | southbankcentre.co.uk | londonsinfonietta.org.uk

Simon Steen-Andersen Simon Steen-Andersen is fast becoming one of the most important composers and installation artists of his generation. The recipient of several major prizes including the coveted Carl Nielsen prize, his work never ceases to challenge, intrigue and excite; pushing artistic boundaries and challenging musical thinking. Combining amplified instruments with samplers, video, simple everyday objects and homemade constructions, Simon’s work explores the choreographic aspect of instrumental performance.

How would you describe your style?

Expanded music, maybe. In the sense that the core of what I do is still music, even if it also has strong visual or conceptual aspects. Rather than taking music plus something else and combining them as separate layers, I try to integrate them or to expand the borders of music to also encompass these parameters and materials, without breaking the space of the musical experience or compromising the focus on the detail.

Do you remember when you first became fascinated by sound?

The first memory I have of a conscious fascination of the phenomenon of sound is probably working with my Amiga 500 in around 1990. I got one of the first affordable PC samplers for it and I also did some sound programming (“machine code”).

We’re performing RunTime Error in March.

Can you tell us more about the piece?

The rules of the game: only use materials/objects/ instruments found at the location. Only use each object once, organise them so there’s a (sonic/visual/physical) connection between each neighbouring object/event and spread them out on a route through the venue, ending where it started (in order to have a loop). So that’s what we did. We went to Southbank Centre and explored it thoroughly, gathering materials from their huge storage rooms full of strange stuff. When a route is “composed” I play it through - running through the route - closely followed by a camera. We did three compositions/routes exploring public and non-public areas of the hall as well as two bonus routes or “detours”. At the concert I will be performing with these videos, manipulating them live with two joysticks.

We will also be performing Black Box Music in the concert. What is the main idea behind this work?

The conductor/soloist is playing with his hands inside a sound insulated box with microphones inside it as well as a camera, projecting the inside of the box onto a big screen on stage. The starting point is the giant hands conducting the 15 musicians spread out across the hall in three groups, playing around with the inherent audio/ visual possibilities, the expectations and the clichés from the conductor-orchestra situation. From there it goes somewhere else - ad absurdum, if you will - turning the hierarchy upside down, as if the ensemble is accompanying a hand choreography. Eventually the soloist also starts producing sounds inside the box using a simple spatialization technique, where microphones in the four corners of the box are connected to loudspeakers in the corresponding corners of the hall, so that moving a sound around inside the box makes the sound move around in the hall.

Simon’s playlist A sneak peek into Simon’s record collection.

Eivind Buene By the River Fanfare Ciocarlia Iag Bari Beethoven Symphony No. 7, 4th movement Roberto Goyeneche Corazon No Le Hagas Caso Helmut Lachenmann Zwei Gefühle Meshuggah Sickening Matthias Spahlinger Adieu m’amour Bent Sørensen Sirenengesang Listen to Simon’s playlist at londonsinfonietta.wordpress.com