Artist
Composer scientist public speaker
EDWARD COWIE
“Cowie is the Leonardo of our time” - The Observer
Edward Cowie Profile
(click to view)
On the world scene, Edward Cowie is one of the most remarkable of men- a person who sees no boundaries between art and science and who communicates the infinite connectivity of forms, patterns, natural things and energies with a dynamism that is nothing less than astounding and mind-opening. He is much sought-after as a public speaker and entertainer, taking us into new regions of thought and action and involving especially the combination of sight and hearing in a ceaseless exploration of invention and creation. He is in fact, the perfect exemplar of scientist/artist to sage!
http://www.edward-cowie.com/
NATURE
music
ART
science LECTURE/RECITAL AND
WORKSHOPS
Edward Cowie
Reviews “An hour spent under Cowie’s spell is a lifechanging experience. He is a superb public speaker with a very special gift for making complicated and wonderful things simple.” The Melbourne Age “Edward Cowie is a magician who conjures with ideas about art and science in an entirely new way. Like the rest of the audience, I came away spell-bound and transformed!” The Sydney Morning Herald “I doubt if there is anyone more suited and qualified to unzip the workings of the cosmos and human mind. Here is a true ‘renaissance man’
LECTURES/RECITALS OPTION 1 ARE BIRDS COMPOSERS? OPTION 2 THE SCIENCE OF ART AND THE ART OF SCIENCE OPTION 3 THE VOICES OF GAIA A NATURAL HISTORY OF SOUND
WORKSHOPS OPTION 1 THE VOICES OF GAIA
with a gift for innovation and insight into the nature of the creative process and the creative forces of nature second to none”
OPTION 2 MARRIAGE OF THE SENSES
Adelaide Advertiser Reviews taken from his recent Australian Lecture/
OPTION 3 THE FOUR ELEMENTS
Recital Tour- February/March 2013.
Also
BOOK YOUR EVENT US: Karen sciencetosage@gmail.com Europe: www.edward-cowie.com/
YOU-tube - Profile & Artists Process Collaborative Project Festival - Artistic Director
captivate songsters
enthrals
LECTURE/RECITAL
OPTION 1
Edward Cowie
ARE BIRDS COMPOSERS? Almost every place on earth is home to singing birds. Poets, painters, filmmakers, musicians and even dancers have responded in one way or another to the life and habits of birds. But considering how noisy they are and the fantastic range of kinds of sounds they make from the ravishing tones of great songsters like mockingbirds and nightingales to the raucous rattle of cormorants and crows, is what they are doing musical? Renowned composer, visual artist and natural scientist, Edward Cowie thinks he knows the answer to this question and in a presentation lasting around 90 minutes, he’ll take you on a sound-adventure of a lifetime! Once you have heard and seen what he has to say (and play), you’ll never think of birds in quite the same way again. Nobody knows more about how and why birds sing than he does, and he has the added benefits of being able to put his unique messages across in a way that captivates and enthrals.
We booked Edward Cowie as the keynote speaker for our international conference in New Zealand. His reputation had gone before him but nothing could have prepared us for the amazing things he shared with us. Imagine 1500 people in the insurance business listening to a whole new world of ideas about sound and the human mind! He was scheduled to talk and play for an hour yet the spellbound audience was still baying for more after 3 hours!!
Max Merriman - CEO Australian Mutual Provident (AMP) On the occasion of Cowie’s keynote presentation in Christchuch, New Zealand. August, 1989.
connect universal
musical
LECTURE/RECITAL OPTION 1
LOGISTICS This presentation can be done with an audience of any size and without any expertise in the world of birds! Duration: 90 minutes with a 20 minute interval after 45 minutes. Venue: Any largish space but a good piano is essential so ideal for Art Galleries, Museums and Concert Venues. Projection screen required to be run from a computer with a Powerpoint Presentation. Large White marker-board and black markers. CD players. Fee: US dollars: from $1500 plus reasonable travel expenses and accommodation as
appropriate
Edward Cowie
Physicist fusion
Artist
LECTURE/RECITAL OPTION 2
THE SCIENCE OF ART & THE ART OF SCIENCE Internationally famous composer, painter and scientist, Edward Cowie is absolutely unique in the world of ideas and creative action in our time. Trained as both physicist and creative artist, Cowie has continued to expand his highly-charged ideas about the way all things connect in the Universe. He believes, in fact, that the specialised way we look at the arts and sciences is leading us further and further away from the truth about creation and the way the universe works as an ‘inventor’ and experimenter of unlimited connectivity. He takes us deep into the mind of a fusion thinker, showing us in sound, image and speech just how magnificent the shape and action of the cosmos is and how ideas about forms, patterns, numbers, matter, time, colour, soundthe macro and the micro of the cosmos are manifestations of one and the same thing.
The last time I saw and heard
And he should know, his music has been commissioned by august bodies such as The
someone as brilliant as this at
Royal Society in London, The Institute of Physics, The Humboldt Foundation in
unzipping the world or arts and
Germany and the department of physics at Oxford University. He has worked closely in
sciences was Jacob Bronowski!
collaborative partnerships with leading physicists in the world including Sir Michael
Simply stunning!
Berry FRS and Professor Brian Foster FRS OBE.
Paul Griffiths. The Financial Times
As if these aren’t credentials enough, he has also made an award-winning film for television on Leonardo da Vinci and written and presented major series of radio programmes on the art of science and the science of art as well as continuing to lecture; give recitals; and exhibit drawings and paintings that help to bring to us how
vividly these tremendous connections really are.
forms,
patterns, numbers,
matter, time,
colour,
sound
LECTURE/RECITAL OPTION 2
LOGISTICS This presentation can be designed for several types of audience, namely: University level science and creative arts departments, especially physics and mathematics, fine arts and music; A general audience with a curiosity for the world of arts, sciences and ideas and of any age from 15 years upwards; A school audience of children and students between the ages of 8-14 years.
• • •
Duration normally 90 minutes with a 20 minute interval after 45 minutes. Venue: Depending on options above but numbers from 30 upwards in a good spacious venue with a good piano and whiteboard to hand. Screen for Powerpoint Presentation from a computer. CD playing. Fee in US dollars: From $1500. Non-local events to include travel and accommodation
within reason.
Edward Cowie
LECTURE/RECITAL OPTION 3
THE VOICES OF GAIA A NATURAL HISTORY OF SOUND Here is a chance to see and hear a composer/visual artist/natural scientist, with a world reputation, take us on a journey from the birth of a sounding earth through to today! From the first formation of an atmosphere on this planet, a time when it became noisy for the first time, Cowie takes us on a vision-and-sound adventure through the ‘orchestras’ of the earth: •
The sounds of the elements
•
Voices in the oceans
•
The first reptile singers
•
Insect songs
•
Birds as soloists and choirs
•
Mammalian voice
•
The human voice
This amazing story is told with the aid of images and sound and will utterly transform your feelings about how and why our world is so full of noise and
also why and how we respond to it in the way we do.
orchestra
EARTH
Adventure
LECTURE/RECITAL OPTION 3
LOGISTICS The presentation lasts for 90 minutes with an interval of 20 minutes after 45 minutes.
It is designed for audiences of all kinds and sizes with perhaps special interest to music clubs and organisations and/or wild-life clubs. Also good for children and school students from 8 years of age. Level of presentation is adapted to audience age and experience!
Venue depending on size. Either a good piano or good electronic keyboard essential. White-board and black marker.
Screen and computer for Powerpoint Presentation.
CD playing. Fee in US Dollars: from $1500
plus reasonable travel expenses and accommodation as appropriate
CREATIVE WORKSHOPS
Edward Cowie
CREATIVE WORKSHOPS Edward Cowie has given interactive workshop presentations throughout the world for more than 4 decades. These workshops are transforming and life-changing experiences. Edward is a consummate communicator, with a special gift for animating and drawing-out the creative impulses in all of us. He believes (knows actually), that all humans are deeply creative and that our senses cry-out for deep connections with the natural world. Offering workshops from 1 or 3 days, Edward will take you on a journey of inner discovery of things within yourselves that may have been buried or suppressed for one reason or another. Whether you are in business, commerce, at school, or university, or simply living and working in your homes and communities, Edward Cowie brings with him a unique and potent insight into the workings of human minds and senses. Book him now and as a result of time spent with your own imaginations and his, feel the change in the patterns, forms, shapes, thinkings, feelings in your inner and outer world!
In a 3 day workshop, participants will be encouraged to make their own musical instruments.
His co-work-shoppers have included professionals in the Medical profession (during his consultancy with The Kings Fund in London as part of The Senior Management Programme); in the Communication Industry (as consultant to BT in the UK); Bird Lovers and Scientists (during his Artist in Residency with The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds); to academics and students in Universities in the UK, Germany, the USA and Australia, and to people of all ages in the communities of the world from the ages of 8 to 90!
WORKSHOP OPTION 1
Edward Cowie
THE VOICES OF GAIA Right from the start, Edward Cowie unzips the magic of human voices within us. The human voice was the first musical instrument in our species and is still the most fabulously subtle and complicated sounding language in music! But this is not just about music. It is about giving form and expression to your voice(s) and so it is not necessary that you know anything about music, or that you have a ‘good singing voice’! No, this is an adventure with the breath and vocal chords in our bodies. We will reflect-on and use the voices of nature all around us in a quest for making wonderful new vocal sounds. We will walk into natural soundscapes close to where you live, and take those sounds back to the workshops and slowly draw-together something unique and very moving. You will become a ‘choir’ of fabulous natural invention and in the course of one or three days, produce a world premiere of a new piece of vocal sound. Yes that’s right, together you and Edward will rehearse, invent, discover and ultimately perform a new piece or pieces in a concert which we’ll give to an audience of your friends, family, and members of your community, who will be invited to attend the final ‘concert’. We shall record this magnificent invention so that you may be able to take-away a CD recording of what you have achieved. But most of all, you will experience the giving-birth of new sounds with your voices and the deep emotional and
spiritual grace and wonder of what you can make happen.
from
expression
voice
Field Trip
Celebrity Concert?
habitat
LOGISTICS The workshops are offered on a 1 or 3 day format, the 3-day one intended to go deeper into the experience of making vocal sound and music with a longer and larger-scale ‘performance’ at the end of it. Both formats will include ‘field-trips’ to your local habitat and environment (even if it’s in the midst of a town or city!). No previous musical skills needed! The workshops are preceded by a presentation/recital with Edward Cowie on the evening before the workshops begin. Entrance is free to registered workshop members, and $30 to other members of the general public. Venue should be a good space with chairs that can be moved to give a clear floor-space but also re-configured for an audience for the final celebration-concert! Members should bring note-books and pencils, but sheets of A4 paper and coloured pencils will also be provided. Feel free to bring your cameras or tape-recorders to keep your own photographic record. Numbers should be between 12-30 only, the minimum viability being 12. Workshop fees are $100 per person per day.
plus reasonable travel expenses and accommodation as appropriate for Edward Cowie
WORKSHOP OPTION 2
Edward Cowie ‘No man or woman is complete unless all of their senses work to the maximum’
Michelangelo
MARRIAGE OF THE SENSES All of us are aware of the working of our senses, but all too often we might think that they work independently of each other. The truth is that they are all connected and, working together, help us to form a complete picture of what is happening all around and within us. In the course of 1 or 3 days, the workshop-team is going to prepare a very special kind of ‘event’- an exhibition-dance-performance-installationinvolving all the senses! This will take the form of a kind of ‘ritual’ ceremony in which we will work together to fuse the senses into one beautiful and connected whole. Workshoppers will bring their skills and aspirations with words, images, voices, dance, cooking(!), constructions (like sculptures we can make) leading to a revelation about how the senses interconnect. Edward is himself an ‘inter-sensualist’ and has a very special gift for animating those connections in others. Bring your senses with you and discover how miraculously they marry with each other to make a complete ‘you’. We will invent dances, words, sounds, instruments, perfumes, textures, music, perhaps even song, that evokes and conjures with ALL of our senses and share those interconnections with our friends,
family and community audience at the end of the workshop.
senses
ALL
performance
LOGISTICS Probably more suitable to a 3-day workshop though by no means impossible in one intensive day of working together! Ideal workshop numbers: minimum 12, maximum, 24.
Venue should be spacious and with flexible seating. Ideally, there should be either walls on which to hang things, and/or tables on which to place exhibited objects.
The workshops will be preceded by a lecture/recital given by Edward Cowie, the night before the workshops begin. Entrance free to registered workshop members. $30 to members of the general public.
Workshop members will be sent a course-kit which asks for a certain variety of things to be brought to the workshop such as substances with different kinds of perfume (including perhaps things from the garden!), different foods for tasting including jams and preserves, fabrics and other materials with varieties of textures.
Workshop fees are $100 per day per person. plus reasonable travel expenses and accommodation as appropriate for
Edward Cowie
WORKSHOP OPTION 3
Edward Cowie
THE FOUR ELEMENTS The four elements, Earth, Air, Fire and Water, have dominated human thought and feelings for thousands of years. The most ancient ‘art responses’ have incorporated responses to the elements in one form or another. This workshop offers members a chance to join in a special and unique celebration of the four elements. This will be done by means of working-towards a concert/presentation in the form of sound, visual responses, words, installations, perhaps even movement. Yes that’s right, during the course of the collaboration, the team will strive to achieve a powerful ‘first performance’- a world premiere in fact- of responses and inventions arising from workshopping ideas about the four elements. All you need to qualify is a curiosity for nature and the cosmos and
the passion to share ideas and make new things happen!!
cosmos
Passion
Elements
LOGISTICS Venue should be spacious and with flexible seating. A stage is not essential but it will be necessary to arrange the space for both performance and audience.
Ideal numbers from 12-30
3 Day Workshop fees $300 per person plus reasonable travel expenses and accommodation as appropriate for
Edward Cowie
Cowie's Rutherford's Lights Movement 18, performed by Richard Casey
Cowie Talks about Rutherford's Lights
Keynote speaker/ lectures/recitals The Kate Springe
Memorial Lecture, London
The Ruskin Lecture, Oxford Royal Society for the Protec on of Birds Annual Conference, York Bri sh Telecom Research, Su olk Bri sh Gas Annual Dinner, Lincoln Music and the Mind Conference, Bath Spa University The Language of Water Conference, Bath The Colours of Water Conference, London University of Maryland Yale University University of Florida in Gainesville Duke University The Hunter Gallery, Cha anooga Dresdener Bank, Kassel, Germany
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Interna onal Conference on New Simplicity in Music, Berlin
Particle Physics Inspires Classical Composer
Australian Mutual Provident Annual Conference, Auckland, New Zealand The Gertrude Langer Memorial Lectures, Australia The Interna onal Conference on Thinking, Townsville Anzas Conference, Melbourne Australian College of Educa on, Brisbane Australian College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, Adelaide Interna onal Conference of the Inner Wheel, University of Sydney Numerous events for Rotary, Probus, and regional bird-watching and music clubs in UK and Australia.
Edward Cowie
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Profile (click to view-YOU-tube)
Cowie introduces Earth Music Bristol (he was Founder and Artistic Director)
Artist
Composer scientist public speaker http://www.edward-cowie.com/
EDWARD COWIE Book your event/US science to soul speaker series by science to sage Contact: Karen Elkins 1-435-674-2164 sciencetosage@gmail.com
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