My favourite artists are asked whether they exist.
Why do IÂ see them? Why do IÂ hear them?
SYNTH LIBRARY PRAGUE
deep listening no silencing all shapes and colours trigger change
Synth Library is a space filled with amazing instruments, books, and other resources run by female artists and curators, who are committed to creating strong base for everyone to learn, share and collaborate as equals – with respect, care and thoughtfulness. It is a place to start building self confidence as much as it is a space to learn new technology. The Synth Library with all it’s gear should not only be attractive and at times overwhelming, it should first and foremost be liberating and supportive of one’s own way to approach it and express oneself. Synth Library Prague is the first sister library of S1 Synth Library in Portland. It is run by Mary C, curator, music journalist, radio host, DJ and producer, who worked on it’s establishment with Alissa DeRubeis, musician, educator and co-founder of the original S1 Synth Library in Portland. Mary is a founder of music education platform focused on electronic music called Kreaton. She is also a curator and organizer of music education events such as Music Ports supported by Goethe-Institut. Her practice focuses especially on the empowerment of women in music. In the Synth Library she will be joined by Nikol Strobachova and her female collective Pink Noise, which formed within the collective of acclaimed Czech electronic handmade musical instruments producers Bastl Instruments. The Synth Library has weekly opening hours inviting anyone to approach the instruments in their own way. and gain resources about existing instruments and synth communities. Synth Library also hosts workshops on a variety of topics – from the broad theories of sound, sound synthesis and composition to detailed explorations of specific concepts or pieces of gear. Providing various kinds of workshops, courses, and lectures
One of the main goals of Synth Library Prague is supporting diversity and deep listening. Thus it has joined Feminist (Art) Institution initiative and their code of practise written by independent network of art institutions tranzit.cz “Our goal is constant learning and creating an environment where everyone can feel good, creating a base for dedicated creative work, that can become the foundation of broader social change.”
Kreaton was always driven to offer educational opportunities and spaces to share experience for electronic musicians in
Synth Library Prague, like the S1 Synth Library in Portland,
Czech Republic from the star. Their main goal was to bring
is made possible by its partnership with 4MS, it’s local
new impulses from musicians of different backgrounds and
collaboration with Bastl Instruments, and generous support
practices, continue exploring new territories of musical
of gear donations from an international community of makers.
practices and new technologies, and to create a caring and
The initial collection includes 4MS, Bastl Instruments, Make
inclusive community of like minded people interested in
Noise, Moog, Mutable Instruments, Erica Synths, Hexinverter,
social change.
Koma, Hosa, Mordax and it grows every week. Thanks everyone! instagram.com/synthlibraryprague
My king, something has been created I hate the rich man moaning as that no if he were poor. one has created before.
Kassia of Constantinople (circa 805) A Byzantine poet and musician. The only composing woman who had her hymns included in the service books of Eastern Church. She was
fearless not only in her writing, giving a voice to anonymous women, but also as an activist.
Enheduanna (2285-2250 BC) The first known composer and poet (female or male). High priestess of the goddess Inanna and the moon god Nanna in Sumer. She composed temple hymns that were used in temples around Mesopotamia.
I once believed that I had creative talent, but I have given up this idea; a woman must not wish to compose – there never was one able to do it. Clara Schumann (1819 – 1896) An influential musician, composer and music teacher also worked closely with her husband, Robert Schumann, who she inspired to start playing piano.
I want to show the world, as much as I can in this profession of music, the vain error of men that they alone possess the gifts of intellect and artistry, and that such gifts are never given to women.
I am just one of the people who is sick of the social order, sick of the establishment, sick to my soul of it all. To me, America’s society is nothing but a cancer, and it must be exposed before it can be cured. I am not the doctor to cure it. All I can do is expose the sickness.
Madalena Casulana (circa 1544-1590) An Italian composer,
Nina Simone (1933 – 2003) composer, pianist and singer,
singer and lutenist. The first female composer to have her music
important figure of the Civil Rights Movement in US, in her
collection Il Primo libro di madrigal printed and published.
music she fused classical music with gospel and jazz. She was finally inducted in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2018.
Ethel Smyth: The March of the Women
Shout, shout, up with your song! Cry with the wind, for the dawn is breaking; March, march, swing you along, Wide blows our banner, and hope is waking. Song with its story, dreams with their glory Lo! they call, and glad is their word! Loud and louder it swells, Thunder of freedom, the voice of the Lord! Long, long—we in the past Cowered in dread from the light of heaven, Strong, strong—stand we at last, Fearless in faith and with sight new given. Strength with its beauty, Life with its duty, (Hear the voice, oh hear and obey!) These, these—beckon us on! Open your eyes to the blaze of day.
Comrades—ye who have dared First in the battle to strive and sorrow! Scorned, spurned—nought have ye cared, Raising your eyes to a wider morrow, Ways that are weary, days that are dreary, Toil and pain by faith ye have borne; Hail, hail—victors ye stand, Wearing the wreath that the brave have worn! Life, strife—those two are one, Naught can ye win but by faith and daring. On, on—that ye have done But for the work of today preparing. Firm in reliance, laugh a defiance, (Laugh in hope, for sure is the end) March, march—many as one, Shoulder to shoulder and friend to friend.
„Dedicated to the Women‘s Social and Political Union.“ This song composed by Ethel Smyth in 1910 using Cicely Hamilton’s words became the official anthem of the Women‘s Social and Political Union and later the women‘s suffrage movement. It was sang during rallies and in prisons.
FELISHA LEDESMA
Felisha Ledesma is a multidisciplinary artist, co-founder of S1 and the Synth Library in Portland, Oregon, a low-cost resource for hands-on access to synthesizers and DJ gear. S1 is an artist run space that focuses on experimental sound, critical contemporary art, and non-traditional education. In her practise Ledesma prioritize diversity in the scene, concentrating on getting women and nonbinary folks comfortable creating and performing electronic music. Lately she has been focusing on diary style compositions with synths, voice, field recordings, etc. Do you have any favorite instrument or
through feelings, build and support one another, and invoke
technology and why is it important for you?
change.
I really love eurorack. I have found new ways to think about
Is there such a thing as a synth community?
sound by making mistakes. Without the synth library there is no way I could afford to play gear like this so I feel extremely
There is one, but I am not sure if I am the right person to define
grateful to share these resources with others. I love how tactile
it. There have been so many people who have been building
and intuitive modular synths can be and I get into a meditative
synths, playing synths, etc for years that have been so incredibly
state patching now. I found power in knowing I am not going to
kind and giving when it comes to accepting the synth library as
break anything by patching it and that is what I remind others,
a part of the community. I think aside from the synths it’s very
as well. It feels like calm and exciting energy at the same time!
important to surround yourself with people who are pushing change, who are questioning things, and who are making
How do you approach teaching synths and electronic
a difference. We have a vast network of artists, musicians,
music in general? Is there anything you try to change?
educators and activists and how we think and what we do to support each other is much more important than a piece of gear,
I like conceptual teaching. I like hearing what someone is interested
but it is a perk if synthesizers are a part of people’s practices.
in and pushing my knowledge to meet their needs. I lead with feelings/empathy, so I really like to listen to that part of me when
What helped you with building the community
I am teaching. If I see someone is not getting what I am saying/
around S1 and Synth Library and is it different
doing I try to go back and explain or give a different example.
from the majority of the synth enthusiasts?
Everyone learns differently, so it’s about being aware of that. I love one on one sessions where both of us can be vulnerable and open
Having the support of my friends and chosen family was
about what we know. I like to remind people that synthesizers are
everything. I’m super head strong (or maybe the right phrase is
fun – they can be therapeutic, they can create revolutionary sounds,
stubborn, hah) and gave up a lot to start S1 and the same with
and they can do anything they want! Once I hit my teens I was
starting the Synth Library. Alissa really helped me push beyond
TERRIBLE at school, so I like to remember teen Felisha and think
what I thought was possible with this project. Sometimes I still
about what would have helped her learn these concepts.
look around the space and get a little teary eyed. We really did it! We lifted each other and our ideas up and fought for what
How does the political situation in
we believed in. If it wasn’t for everyone involved (including
the US affect your work?
our members and students) it wouldn’t have been possible. People put energy behind it and believe in it. I think it’s different
It affects everything we do. I think about my time a lot and what
because we are an art space. We aren’t selling anything. We
I am giving it to. It’s difficult to balance and I am learning when
are here and we will support those who need it. The focus is on
I need to be in the streets, when I need to support artists at S1,
creating art and music on the margins.
and when I need to take care of myself. Over the years I feel like I have read and listened more and I think it is very important to
Are there any inspiring personalities that
spend time with like-minded folks and find little ways to work
helped you in pursue what you wanted?
through things even when we are feeling hopeless (that’s why I like to collaborate on projects and music).
I have a lot of amazing people in my life that have pushed me and supported me over the years. I learned how to be fearless and
Have you observed any changes in the
listen to my intuition from my mother. I’ve worked with Alex (who
behaviour of your audience?
helps run S1) for almost a decade now and I learned how to grow as a team and really found a true artistic partnership. I am grateful
Yes, it’s a struggle in the US right now. I think so many people
for all of the artists that have come through the S1 doors like
are fed up and I feel like more than ever it’s important to
Isabella, Baseck, The Creatrix, Russell E. L. Butler, Jeff Witscher,
give people the resources they need to create. I really believe
Nervous Operator, Ian Colon, Moor Mother (and the list goes on)
creating can help shift power (among other things) and it is
because they gave me hope that this project was worthwhile. And
our job to fight for the earth, the people that live on it, and pool
all of the S1 staff for completely holding it down and trying things
our energy and resources. I see the library as a place to work
and failing with me and picking it back up again.
YORKSHIRE SOUND WOMEN NETWORK LIZ DOBSON
Liz Dobson is a researcher, curator, musician and lecturer in computer music and sound for image at The University of Huddersfield committed to fostering opportunities in music and audio technology education for girls and women. Her work is guided by education research on collaborative learning, creativity and the work of feminist music and sound collectives across the globe. She is the founder and chair of the Yorkshire Sound Women Network. In 2012 she earned a PhD with her thesis An Investigation of the Processes of Interdisciplinary Creative Collaboration: The Case of Music Technology Students Working within Performing Arts. Most recently she wrote publications Digital Audio Ecofeminism: The Glocal Impact of All-female Communities on Learning and Sound Creativities and contributed to Creativities in Arts Education, Research and Practice: Glocalised Perspectives for the Future of Learning and Teaching. As a composer she has created 3 feature length independent film soundtracks, music for dance and digital art and 8 string quartet arrangements for the Liverpool band The Lotus Eaters. She is currently practising live coding using Tidal Cycles and is the European champion for 2nd dan veteran (40+) black belt patterns (2016 and 2017) in TaeKwon-Do. Do you remember any important steps in
Do you have any favorite instrument or technology
learning new instruments and technologies
now and why is it important for you?
and who helped you or inspired you? I’m incredibly fond of my solar powered noise generating yoghurt This is a wonderful question and I have thought about this a lot
pot. It was made by Flora Konneman, and gifted to me when
because of how our work with instruments shapes us (and the
we met in Berlin to talk about the audio electronics workshops
instruments) and how audio technology is not equally available. As
she delivers for girls. Her work is brilliant, and inspired me to
a child of around 8 (1983), I remember being fascinated by cassette
do more with girls too. Today however it is my Eurorack. Why?
tapes. Like many of my contemporaries, recording the top 10 pop
Because you think you understand sound until you have to
charts, making mock radio plays from our books, and secretly
make decisions about putting something like this together.
recording my family chatting in the kitchen. I was fascinated by the
Also because I teach; audio physics really comes to life when
idea of tape. I had a double cassette deck, and a lot of free time. So
you can send a synthesised signal into a computer and show
I would record ideas on the piano, then play them back and record
visualisations of the waveshapes (i.e. in IZotope’s Insight). I see
again until there was too much hiss to make any sense of it. Looking
no separation between understanding basic audio theory and
back, this freedom to play, this was everything. I remember playing
composition. I really love to find ways to help people understand
on a toy organ (which worked on additive synthesis and made
this because I have always struggled with the physics side of
such a beautiful sounds), then when I was older a ZX Spectrum
sound. Also, I think I might be attempting to revisit the 80s!
84K copying code from magazines to make silly bleep tunes. Later my father replaced it for a BBC computer and MIDI keyboard. At
What is your relationship with it and how
school there were a few BBC computers and they ran programmes
do you prefer to communicate with it?
that generated sound, including one for making scores by writing as this was before the invention of the mouse, Sibelius or Finale
My relationship is collaborative, and exploration but basically
software. and also a few years before the internet. We played with
it is my teacher. The modular synth nurtures mental logic,
what available at home and I was extremely lucky in this regard.
sonic imagination, creativity, faith in your ability and a spirit of
As music technology wasn’t clear to me as area of study, I enrolled
adventure. I have chosen loads of VCOs and LFOs and wave
on a music degree (majoring in composition and the viola mostly),
shapers, and an ES-8 which means that I can hook it up to
returning to music technology as a postgraduate because I wanted
Ableton and control it with LaunchControl and Push. Perhaps
to understand sound sequencing and composition for film. By this
because this is relatively new for me, when I’m working with
point I had access to Akai S1000s (Keyboard samplers with floppy
the modular I’m in what Mihalyi Czikshentmihalyi would call
disk) and an analogue recording studio where I learned how to
a state of ‘flow’: like playing a game, it is challenging but not
record the lunchtime concerts. I did a few days of work experience
so challenging that I give up and I lose all sense of time! Just
at the BBC, but at that time in North Wales unless you were fluent
starting to push open the door to access all kinds of possibilities,
in Welsh you were basically a mute observer. I did witness recording
as a musician, teacher and explorer. The modular feels like my
sessions using SADIE, and tape splicing. Since then I have sought
House of Leaves.
out environments that facilitate that interest in sound. I suppose I was fascinated by Tomorrow’s World (a television show) as
How do you tend to approach new
they sometimes presented features on new audio technologies.
instruments and technologies?
As a novice, going into a music shop to look at technology was incredibly intimidating, and computer music magazine covers
I explore. I don’t think I’ve ever read a manual but I have huge
showed images of broody men or sexy women and as a teenager in
respect for those who do things this way. Once I had a student
the 80s, I just didn’t feel like I fit in to any of that.
read the Akai S2000 manual before his tutorial and having
never touched it he just knew how to use it. I might focus on
2015 when those 16 women came together, 9 of us continued to
particular set of sound relationships, or an audio process, and
meet regularly until the end of the year – discussing our aims and
dig into those for a while before moving on. Thorough, but not
focus while facilitating events. Naturally the organisation evolved
systematic, but when I feel I have a reasonable grasp I might
and started to take shape in a particular way. It’s not possible to
look at the manual and explore online materials. I hold a strong
summarise all of the incredibly difficult decisions that we’ve had
view having access to equipment is incredibly important for
to make along the way. Grassroots organising requires donated
learning:if you’re anything like me you need to spend time with
labour so we made decisions to apply for funding and establish
it and maybe one other person, and the Lev Vygotsky’s cognitive
a more sustainable way of operating so that the Yorkshire
psychology of higher mental development really backs up that
Sound Women Network would still be here in a year, five years
idea. Too many people don’t get that opportunity, which is why
hopefully longer. The Arts Council England grant has helped us
I’m a fan of the Synth Library.
to engage in consultancy about organisational structures, and develop a business plan before choosing to become a non-profit
You have started YSWN, what was the motivation
community interest company with three directors. Our website
and what changed from that point?
explains who our various sponsors are. We have established and published our mission, resources, policies and procedures and
A group of us were responsible for starting YSWN really.
when we have our music coordinator we can really consolidate
I initiated the first meeting but it does help to explain where
and build on the activities and momentum that has gathered. That
that impulse comes from. My PhD was on social psychology
work continues.
and creativity, and one of the big take home messages from that
Now, following this long and fairly demanding process we
work was the value of community and the low risk environments
have established our dual focus: advocacy to audio and music
for learning. I conducted interviews with women and people
technology industries around the development of meaningful
of non-binary genders in Berlin, and this really strengthened
change that shapes inclusion and diversity, and education for
a few ideas for me. That social, cultural and economic capital in
girls through workshops and women through funded events and
electronic music has been strongly benefiting men (if you look
the broader network.
at the history in England, mainly white men) for many decades, resulting in the marginalisation and crucially isolation of artists
What do you consider the most important
and sound practitioners. Being a minority in that kind of space
when building a community like that?
is exhausting (because culture associates masculinity and technology, where women are assumed to not know or know less,
Transparency and honesty. We have to make extremely difficult
where minorities are at risk of attack through difference). An
decisions on a weekly basis. This is accomplished through
academic analysis of university degree applications to 38 courses
a process of monthly meetings and consultation as a group. It is
in Britain (over a period of ten years) showed that despite an
impossible for all people to agree but we feel that it is important
increase in applications of 1400%, 90% of applicants were male
to be as transparent as possible about what we are doing and
(See Georgie Borne and Kyle Divne: Music Technology, Gender
how. It does mean that some issues can take a little longer to
and Class: Digitization, Educational and Social Change in Britain).
reach a conclusion, but my view is that while feminist work like
This is reflected in female:pressure’s Facts Surveys and has been
this feels urgent, it is not an emergency, and sustainable change
explained in numerous other situations (conference attendance,
needs sustainable effort.
panel curation, journal editing, audio engineering). Now we are
Also, a strong set of guiding values. When we have the most
seeing a huge momentum of change, but that wasn’t really the
difficult decisions to take about partnerships and strategy we
case in 2015.
come back to these.
So back then, I wanted to create a knowledge sharing community just for women. To bring together experts and novices across the
What are your main goals when it comes to
breadth of audio production and music technology disciplines, and
teaching and learning with women?
increase our social, economic and cultural capital. An environment where one person teaches the group how to solder a contact
The YSWN mission is to support a flourishing industry which
microphone, another teaches a DAW, another field recording and
welcomes, encourages and progresses the inclusion of women
another two (and I’m thinking specifically of Nina Richards and Zoe
at all levels from studio floor to boardroom, and reflects the
Blade) sound synthesis. We share performance opportunities, give
diversity of its participating communities. So our goals are
feedback, and most importantly, create a safer space where people
to influence changes in the audio industries that support
can take risks and fail. Failure is important for learning, and also,
that mission, while providing opportunities for education and
by hearing ourselves talk about the process we come to appreciate
knowledge sharing.
the boundaries of our knowledge and push through them. When
We also aim to be constantly mindful of the incredible diversity
you bring a group together this way something truly spectacular
of women and the issues the women face. For example, most
happens, and those present know how powerful and empowering
women have faced issues that I absolutely haven’t as a cis white
that can be. It is really making a difference.
able bodied woman who has always had the access I needed. If
After the first meeting of Yorkshire Sound Women Network in July
we are attracting a particular cross section of women the aim
must be to address that, and the goal to remove barriers for all
It is still not easy to advocate for a change
women.
when it comes to diversity on the music scene
Also, to create environments where women are in control, and
and marginalized communities. What would
where participants feel safer and more able to explore on their
you advice other women when they have to
own terms. I don’t see it as teaching and learning, not in the
argue for the importance of safe spaces or
instructional sense, rather I see it as knowledge sharing; it is
effort to have more diverse line-ups?
important to understand the voice of the learner as she is also teaching the teacher. To really engage with the needs of those
So many things to say and I wish that this didn’t need to be
attending, creating scaffolding for knowledge development.
argued given the centuries of all male spaces. Invite men to
Kirsty Gillmore wrote a lovely blog post about our 2018 AGM
argue for it and maybe ask them to search #audioequitypledge.
and I think it really demonstrates that we are managing this.
It can be time consuming and I’m always concerned that
Finally, agility. To be able to respond to local needs while
minorities are putting so much energy into something that all
knowing when to make decisions such as artist curation for
people should be addressing. You may face objections on the
events and workshops. This comes down to mindfulness about
grounds of discrimination (which I see as a double standard
our own networks and I believe that is a lesson for people
given the many other much more homogeneous spaces that
curating festivals, academic conferences, producing journals and
have been protected for centuries), or a concern that these are
magazines. If we understand that we’re more likely to draw from
just echo chambers. For me, the only valid concern is that those
the people that we know about, then we need to know about
safer spaces require constant mindfulness about who does and
more people. If my circle is mostly like me, then I’m excluding
doesn’t feel safe.
the full diversity of our society so it is my responsibility to spend
There are quite a few resources available on this but
time on addressing that. If that circle is all male, I suggest the
I recommend Dr J Lewis’ work on how hack spaces may be
same to be true.
physically inaccessible and uncomfortable spaces for women If there ever where a time to take what some might feel to
When working with women musicians do you observe
be a bold or risky step in supporting women and diversity in
any common practise or approach to creative process?
general, it is right now.
Oh that’s an interesting question. A few years ago I would
Is there any woman from history of
have suggested that more women are doing in DIY work but
electronic music or pedagogy and academia
honestly I haven’t looked closely at this and wouldn’t like to
that have inspired you and why?
speculate. Also I’m conscious of this binary perspective on gender, but I do know that most university students are men and
Every single one. And for so many reasons! Here are handful, but
if our physical environment and kit access shapes our practice,
it’ll be a really long list. ManyManyWomen.com, Femintronic.
there are implications for what kinds of ideas and techniques
com, Syrphe and the database of African and Asian composers.
different demographics might explore. For example, in HE
I prefer not to say why because I really feel that they speak for
music technology, we have been teaching the work of white
themselves but overall because their work is deeply inspiring.
male sound artists for decades. This is a strong cannon of work,
Pauline Oliveros , Suzanne Ciani, Caterina Barbieri, Hildergard
complemented by access to multi-channel sound systems,
Westerkamp, Laurie Anderson, Natasha Barrett, AGF, obviously
and concerts of acousmatic music. Students can learn signal
Derbyshire and Oram! Most recently Grrrl.net.
processing and music software/hardware interface development and progress into careers where they are developing the tools that we use to compose our music (like Max for Live), or listen to it (i.e. in cinema audio). I see this and would love to see the industry flooded with more diverse people/ideas/inventions. I honestly can’t believe the situation that we are in!
SOME MORE CONCRETE TIPS ON ARGUING FOR SAFE SPACES AND DIVERSITY FROM LIZ DOBSON
(and I recommend joining the female:pressure database and connecting with that incredible community for resources and support)
Point to the many spaces that already exist. Why would women establish so many alternative safer spaces (and invest so much time and expense in this) if there is no problem with the established environment? Argue the case for learning. We all need a comfortable community through which to grow. As a minority in audio technology women usually have to work considerably harder to be recognised and received, especially women of colour and disabled women working in sound. As a minority, is more difficult to be intellectually and creatively vulnerable, and especially to take the risks that are necessary for learning and personal growth. By organising groups that welcome women and people of non-binary genders, the many groups like YSWN create an environment more conducive for learning. After working with YSWN, and interviewing five organisations in North America (including The Society for Women in Technology at NYU, Beats by Girlz, The Women’s Audio Mission and The Seraphine Collective) I wrote a book chapter which points to education theories that discuss social psychology, creativity and learning, then attempts to draw out examples of where we see this happening in some of those communities. Ok so now I’m plugging my book chapter, but I investigated this specifically to explore the various ways that these environments support education and also enterprise amongst women in sound. Argue the benefit of social capital for marginalised people. These groups offer a place to discuss experiences, share advice and resources about audio but also how to navigate the this field as a minority. This includes insight into how to be better at building bridges, as much as developed knowledge about equipment and music technology practices, gained informally through conversations around equipment. Scaffolding to climb through from having an idea that you want to be a DJ, to having access to and learning the technology, to performing privately, and then featuring on a club night. They say it’s not what you know but who you know – it’s both and women really benefit from communities that offer that kind of social and also economic capital. The economic argument. Whatever you might think, the economic argument might gain the most attention. We know that many many many women are incredibly active in audio technology fields as audio experts, DSP developers, and tech users. Any organisation looking to increase revenue might think about this market of users, but also by putting serious resources into a largely overlooked demographic the industry can model diversity. We know that diversity is better for business. I hate myself for arguing such a capitalist point, but the bottom line has to be opportunity and third sector support will only tak Think about blind spots. There appear to be many areas of blindness when it comes to addressing inclusion because those who are included weren’t excluded. I realise how silly that sounds but this is a helpful way to look at inclusion. Did you know that in England (at least), the pedestrian crossing boxes have a small dial underneath. People who can’t see the light, or hear the beep know that it is safe to cross when that dial starts rotating.
JOHANNA MAGDALENA BEYER (1888 – 1944)
I write music because I love to write music. I have to! It is an inner urge. It is a necessity.
Johanna M. Beyer, at the Composers’ Forum concert, 1937
Now despite that I have had concerts in London, San Francisco, Boston, New York, I am hardly known. Letter to composer Percy Grainger, 1937
This German-American composer, pianist and poet was the first woman to score work for electronic instruments. Her politically motivated Music of the Spheres (part of the unfinished opera Status Quo, 1938) was originally scored for “three electrical instruments and strings”. The composition was never fully realized and performed for the first time many years later by the Electronic Weasel Ensemble which included Donald Buchla and Allen Strange. Her inventive dissonant avant-garde work anticipated some of the future trends in music but also called for tolerance and unification. She composed a number of her significant pieces for percussions and created visual scores resembling plants in her instructive Piano Book. Funny fact, Music of the Spheres is listed on Youtube as Industrial Goth.
LUCIE VÁGNEROVÁ
A music historian and core Lecturer in Music Humanities at Columbia University. Her PhD is in Historical Musicology. Her dissertation “Sirens/Cyborgs: Sound Technologies and the Musical Body” (2016) explores the role of the body in electroacoustic music and her research spans women composers of electronic music, media history, sound art, and issues of gender, race, and labor in audio culture, experimental music, and popular music. She has taught courses on the Western classical tradition, non-Western music, popular music, and sound art and directs a public outreach project called For the Daughters of Harlem: Working in Sound that invites young women of color from New York’s public high schools to discuss, make, record, and produce music at Columbia. I often ask musicians what is their favorite instrument,
common assumption that they are singers when they walk into
do you, as a researcher, have any particular favorite
a rehearsal. The other issue is that the many women composers,
instruments of research you like to use?
producers, instrumentalists, and academics working today continue to get less scholarly and critical attention than their
I am a big believer in collaborative work, which hasn’t been
male peers. Singers are perhaps the exception, but they face
a traditional instrument of research in music studies and still
a whole other set of gendered obstacles.
tends to be underused and undervalued. There are so many benefits to collaboration. Whether we’re talking about co-
You also elaborate on the bodily music, voice
authored research or co-organized conferences, scholars get
and movement in electronic music. The common
a fuller picture of a project by working from multiple personal
stereotype attached to electronic music is that it is not
and disciplinary viewpoints. Collaboration also allows us to
“human enough”, that the musicians are not connected
notice the limitations of our disciplines and perspectives. Finally,
with electronic instruments. But in your research you
collaboration is an important vehicle of equity work in American
mention that the body is still significantly involved...
academia: if an established senior scholar works with a junior scholar from a background underrepresented in the academe
Yes, people often describe electronic and digital media practices
(such as women and gender-nonconforming persons, people
as “disembodied.” I am fascinated by this term: what does it
of color, individuals with disabilities, and intersections thereof),
really mean, “disembodied”? Also, it seems to me that electronic
this can ease the steeper path to academic seniority faced by
music has a lot to say about the body: for one, we listen to it
those populations. Of course, a lot of single-authored academic
using our bodies, and many electronic musicians who perform
research is actually the product of collaboration: the work of
with vocal filters and controllers seem to foreground and explore
graduate students, administrative staff, junior colleagues, and
this bodily dimension of electronic and digital music-making.
even spouses has often been uncredited and unpaid.
In my doctoral thesis, which looks at the music of Joan La Barbara, Laurie Anderson, Wendy Carlos, Pamela Z, and Laetitia
In your doctoral thesis you talk about gendered
Sonami, I set out to engage with the relationship of bodies and
and racial terms and practises in the field of
technologies in a more detailed and rigorous way than just
music. What are the notions and terms that
calling it “disembodied.” For one, I took social and historical
might be getting in the way in this sense?
context into account: it seemed to me that women, gendernonconforming people, and people of color working in the
Participation in music has long been restricted by social, cultural,
historically white and male space that is music technology are
and political forces, many of them operating along the lines of
more socially aware of their bodies. I understood this as a form
gender and race. Women were barred from singing in church
of expertise, and that’s why I was particularly interested in the
choirs, dissuaded from composing, unwelcome in research roles
way they build connections between bodies and technologies.
in music studios, absent from production and executive roles in the music industry, and even shut out of the academic study of
You also researched custom built electronic
music. Musical practices of the African diaspora in the U.S. have
instruments. Are there any that were particularly
been controlled through mechanisms like school segregation,
interesting for you in terms of how the
noise-abatement laws, copyright laws, the recording industry…
musicians play them or play with them?
There’s a great video of an MTV interview from 1983 where David Bowie calls out MTV for not featuring nearly enough
I like the late Michel Waisvisz’s controller called “The Hands”,
black artists. Of course, in some cases, women’s work and talent
which dates back to 1984. It is clunky and heavy and bound
was recognized, but even then it was corralled along gendered
by dangling cables. At Waisvisz’s first performance, the story
and racial lines: Mozart’s older sister Nannerl was a celebrated
goes, the controller malfunctioned and a sampled sound
harpsichord prodigy who was nevertheless dissuaded from
kept repeating. I like that story because malfunction is such
composing because it was “unladylike”; the classically trained
an integral part of performing with electronic and digital
pianist Nina Simone was steered into singing blues-derived
instruments, and so is clunkiness.
styles of music, contemporary electronic composer Pamela Z and saxophonist Shelley Washington both speak about the
When we discussed representation on the music scene
the work of women artists in an important way. The second is
and music technology, you mentioned one of your
visual artist Sabra Moore, who was a vocal critic of the MoMA
topics, women’s labour, and that it is often forgotten
from the outside for not showing enough work by women,
when we discuss women empowerment or equal
organizing protests and making amazing protest art.
opportunities. What were your findings in this field? Do you think that the situation in academia and Components used in audio technologies have long been
research is getting significantly better for women
made by a women-dominated workforce. Today, work in
and people of colour or are there still some
the electronics assembly industry is mostly done by young,
systemic problems that we should address?
unmarried, rural migrant women in Export Processing Zones in Southeast Asia and maquiladora factories in northern Mexico,
There are some metrics of equity that are not changing at
among other places. It’s a really vulnerable population whose
all. Women, people of color, and LGBTQ+ persons especially
work is absolutely central to audio culture and electronic
tend to find greater barriers to promotion. At the same time,
music-making (as well as academic work – I’m typing this
there is a social expectation that they will do more academic
on my iMac). We, users of audio equipment, phones, and
service work (i.e. work that isn’t research or teaching, such as
computers perceive our equipment in specific ways because
advising and committee work). Academic service is still not
it’s cheap, because it’s “Made in China” (or, in the case of some
as valued as research or teaching when it comes to promotion
boutique equipment, Made in Germany or the U.S.A.) and
criteria, and so this population of academics is trapped in
because we don’t think about who actually made it. Meanwhile,
a vicious cycle. In American higher education we refer to this
the history of audio and electronic music is usually told as
as “the leaky pipeline”. I don’t really like that term – folks from
a string of pioneer narratives: this guy invented this guitar, this
underrepresented groups aren’t an oil leak... Another issue
other guy invented this loudspeaker…I am interested in revising
in American higher education is that the last ten or fifteen
our methodologies for writing this history, re-centering it on
years have seen a huge shift from hiring professors to hiring
this large and disempowered workforce, and examining how
contingent faculty (such as graduate students, instructors paid
our emotional attachments to audio equipment is structured by
“per course” without full-time jobs or benefits, and lecturers
where it comes from.
and visiting faculty). In spite of many universities’ growing endowments, less and less money pays instructional staff.
In the last few years we have seen some interesting
A number of graduate student bodies and adjuncts across
revisions in the history of electronic music and
the country have unionized, but that is not the case at most
science that finally credited women who were unfairly
institutions. Finally, women and people of color are at risk for
forgotten. You also contribute to that in your work. Are
sexual harassment and inadequate institutional responses to it.
there some women that might have inspired you but
My former thesis advisor Ellie Hisama has done a lot of work on
are still not credited or praised the way they deserve?
these topics at Columbia, so I have learned a lot from her. I have also had the pleasure of collaborating with Andrés García-
There are too many to name, so let me pick three and tell you
Molina, an ethnomusicology graduate student at Columbia, on
a bit about how they inspire me. I am inspired by the recent
an article that addresses issues of academic labor as connected
work of sound artist Miya Masaoka, who has a piece called
to issues of curricula (coming out in Current Musicology soon).
“Vaginated Chairs,” and wrote a companion manifesto titled
All of these inequities affect what is taught, by whom, and how.
“The Vagina is the Third Ear.” Both the piece and the manifesto, “for vaginas real and imaginary,” provocatively re-situate our
How do you approach teaching and sharing
notions of who listens and how. They are pieces about sound
knowledge and experience and how do
as vibration, gender and sexual difference, and the increasingly
you think about a classroom?
sedentary nature of our lives. I am also inspired by the work of award-winning producer and recording artist Ebonie Smith, who
I take care to assign writing and media from a variety of people,
wrote a brilliant guest column titled “Why Are Female Music
disciplines, and registers, knowing that different texts will speak
Producers Everywhere, Yet So Invisible” for Billboard magazine
to different students. If your syllabus has no women on it, or if it
early this year. She names the social structures that deny critical
only features white authors, start over. As I see it, my role isn’t to
and creative attention to women working in the male-dominated
deposit knowledge in students’ heads but to help them become
space of music production, and ends by naming a hundred
better critical thinkers and listeners. I try to identify what each
women producers. She is also the founder and president of
student gravitates towards within the study of music and sound,
a not-for-profit called Gender Amplified, which supports and
and encourage them to develop projects on that topic. Also, and
celebrates women in music production. Finally, I am inspired by
I know some instructors might bristle at this, I’ve come to realize
two women who put pressure on the Museum of Modern Art in
that some of my most important teaching work is about care
New York to include works by women: the first is curator Barbara
and accessibility: finding an accommodation for a student with
London, who made the case for including new media work like
a disability, inviting a student to bring her child to class when
video art and sound art in MoMA’s collections and advocated for
childcare falls through, lobbying on behalf of trans* and gender-
nonconforming students so that they can use their preferred names on a school’s online learning platforms, understanding mental health issues on par with any other health issues… One of the projects you organize is Daughters of Harlem. What was the main goal of the project and what does it react to? For the Daughters of Harlem: Working in Sound is an initiative inviting young women of color from New York public high schools to discuss, make, record, and produce their own music at Columbia University under the guidance of invited workshop leaders. The project was founded by Ellie Hisama and I was lucky to be part of it from the beginning and direct it now. The scope of the project was inspired and originally funded by an Obama White House initiative devoted to supporting women of color, who are a broadly underserved group in the U.S. In April 2018, the inaugural workshop hosted a dozen young women, and in October 2018, thirteen young women participated over two weekends under the guidance of professional sound artists, producers, and composers. The broad goal of Daughters is to open up spaces: technologized spaces of music-making like the recording studio on the one hand, and the academic spaces of Columbia University and Barnard College on the other. Speaking to the former, research shows that institutional music studios are still very maledominated, and even though there is less quantitative data on race, they are also overwhelmingly white spaces. So the Daughters project creates a space where a woman of color isn’t a minority: what kind of music and sound art will come out of that? What kind of themes will she address in her music? What will collaboration with her peers look like? Speaking to opening up the space of the university, Columbia’s main campus in upper Manhattan is next to the historically black neighborhood of Harlem, and the university actually expanded into West Harlem recently – a controversial move that displaced five thousand residents under the banner of declaring the area “blighted” and ruling that the university has “eminent domain.” Meanwhile, Columbia can be quite intimidating to Harlem residents: it’s an elite institution (with stagnating numbers among tenured faculty of color), there are security officers everywhere, and the West Harlem campus (Manhattanville) aesthetically sticks out from the rest of the neighborhood. In my mind, we have the resources and the opportunity to welcome the Harlem community to our campus, recruit students from local public schools, advertise Columbia’s beautiful Wallach Gallery to the neighborhood, and share some of our resources for making knowledge and art. Finally, the project also aimed to provide a source of music programming to students from public schools that do not have resources like electronic music studios, drum machines, or basic sound recording technology, and often even lack music programming wholesale.
HEROINES OF SOUND FESTIVAL MO LOSCHELDER
After her studies at the Dusseldorf Art Academy from 1985 to 1991 with the famous painter Gerhard Richter, Mo Loschelder decided to move to Berlin, where she started to DJ and collaborate with the visual artist Daniel Pflumm and electronic musician Klaus Kotai, organizing the clubs “Elektro” and „Panasonic“, curating the music program at “Init”, running the label Elektro Music Department and producing LP’s and EP’s under the moniker Kotai+Mo, Los Dos, Mo feat. El Puma and under her own name. From 1994 to 1998 she worked at the record-store Hard Wax where she established the “Strange Music / Early Electronic” section. From 2002 to 2005 she was an executive manager at a manufacturing service in Berlin, and in early 2006 she started to work as a booking agent at Gostimirovic Music Management. In June 2009 Mo Loschelder founded her own agency MEDIA LOCA, focusing on experimental electronic artists, such as Gudrun Gut, Lucrecia Dalt, Electric Indigo, Jan Jelinek, Kammerflimmer Kollektief, Charlemagne Palestine. She co-produces and cocurates festival called the Heroines of Sound, (re)discovering female protagonists in music and increasing the public presence of their music. What was the motivation behind
We look up to your generation of amazing
starting Heroines of Sound?
women producers and DJs. Who were the role models for you when you grew up and do you
Heroines of Sound Festival was started in 2014 by Bettina
think the Berlin or German scene in general
Wackernagel, since 2015 we have been curating the genre-
was special in any way for women?
spanning festival together, with panel curator Sabine Sanio. The Heroines of Sound Festival has set itself the task of (re)
I grew up in the 1970s when feminism was a very political issue,
discovering female / female identified protagonists in music
fighting for the right to abort (a fight which is still going on)
and increasing the public presence of their music. The goal of
and against domestic violence. My role models were female
all Heroines events is to make the works of women pioneers of
musicians like Laurie Anderson, Lene Lovich, Grace Jones,
electronic music accessible to a wider public. Thus, audiences
Patti Smith… all of them very powerful and unique artists who
have the opportunity to discover connections between early
obviously were feminists, too. When I came to Berlin in the early
heroines and women composers active today in contemporary
1990s I started as a DJ and then as a live act and producer from
music and electronic performance. By making the often
1994. There were a lot of active women, like Electric Indigo who
forgotten and underappreciated quality and diversity of female
was then my colleague at HardWax and Ellen Allien, Marusha,
artists in the field of electronic music more visible and audible,
Maria Colours… But of course in other cities there were many
the Heroines of Sound Festival opens up new perspectives for
female originators, too, like in Amsterdam Miss Djax or in
an analysis of historical and current strategies of female musical
Munich Barbara Hallama, Monika Kruse, Acid Maria. I always
practice.
felt that we were many but obviously we were not visible enough and therefore Electric Indigo finally started the data
What is the most important goal of the festival now?
network female:pressure in 1998 which all of us appreciated and supported a lot.
The goal remains the same, since obviously there are still so many artists to be discovered from the past and from the current
As a booking agent you work with very
electronic scene. As long as we are thrilled by the program of
outstanding artists, is it challenging?
a wide range of artists we have selected we believe that the audience will be thrilled too.
Thank you for appreciating the artists on my roster! I love their music and yes, I believe that they are outstanding. That’s why
Visibility and appreciation of women became
I feel the need to bring them to the best places where the
a trendy topic but do you, as an experienced
audience can experience their performances in the best way. Of
DJ, promoter and agent, see a real change?
course, this is challenging because many times I do not know the promoters and have not seen the venues myself. Therefore
Yes, I can see a difference happening within the last 2 years.
I have to be very clear in my demands and very open to the given
Obviously many people (promoters, curators but also the
information. What helps a lot as a booking agent is my personal
audience) are now much more sensitive to the issue of the
experience. Because I was not only DJing and performing live
visibility of women. And this sensibility has been created by
myself, traveling internationally with my heavy luggage from
a wide discussion in the media and within social networks,
city to city, from hotel to hotel, from soundcheck to soundcheck,
started by the women themselves. And finally public fundings
but I was also running 2 small clubs and now I am co-curating
have been connected to a fair number of female artists in festival
a festival myself. So I understand the needs of each side, artist
line-ups, initiated by organizations such as Keychange or by
and promoter.
institutions like the Berlin based funding program Musicboard.
Music industry is changing rapidly. Are there any practises that you don’t like and are still common even on the experimental electronic scene? I see that there are more and more sponsored events where the line-up does not really matter so much and the artists are just part of the “event”. Many venues seem to be now in the hands of event managers who are very talented in communicating with big companies, not of music lovers. These events are super crowded, either because they are free or because too many tickets have been sold. The sound systems are often shitty and the drinks are sponsored too, so mainly shitty as well. This is a rather new phenomenon concerning the electronic music scene because this is the scene I know. So I prefer to stay away from such events which, luckily, is still possible. What would you recommend to young emerging artists that are starting to handle booking and managing their career themselves? The most important thing is to connect with others! Try to find places were you like the other artists. Try to find people to work with, either in organizing your own events, or in co-producing. Exchange with others, be open. And do not wait too long before starting to perform in public. Set up a good platform to present yourself, with a short biography, a few nice photos (in 300dpi quality and with credits), with a listening and maybe even a video link, and a clear tech rider. And try to work as much as possible in the field you enjoy the most, so even if you do not make enough money from the gigs for a while (and believe me, it can take quite a while!) do not waste your time with jobs in a completely different field but try to connect to the electronic scene asap. But really, I believe the most important thing is to connect.
ELSE MARIE PADE (1924 – 2016)
I have been searching for sounds all my life. Craft has nothing to do with music. Music has to do with ideas Else Marie Pade for Wire Magazine
As a young woman Pade joined an anti-nazi group spying on German soldiers. She was later imprisoned in a camp where she didn’t have anything and began writing her musical ideas on the wall. After the war ended she went to study piano and later composition. Inspired by a radio documentary on the musique concréte of Pierre Schaeffer, she went to Paris to study with him. In 1955 she premiered her first concrète composition, A Day At The Fair, based on the recordings of a local zoo, for a local TV documentary. This brought her more commissions to sonically illustrate radio plays and children’s stories, including Hans Christian Andersen’s The Little Mermaid. While working in the radio she met Holger Lauriedsen who inspired her to work more with synthesized sounds. Pade co-founded Aspekt, an artistic collective, and invited her colleagues from around Europe to teach in Denmark. Her piece Seven Circles was the first electronic music piece performed in the Danish radio. The 1958 Symphonie Magnétofonique was inspired by the 24-hour novel Ulysses by James Joyce. The piece contained the harsh sounds of marching soldiers and bombs as a reminiscence of the Second World War.
KAPRALOVA SOCIETY KARLA HARTL
Karla Hartl is founder and chair of the Kapralova Society, a Canadian music society based in Toronto, Canada, dedicated to promoting Czech composer Vitezslava Kapralova and other women in music. Hartl‘s research on Kapralova has been published in the Kapralova Society Journal which she coedits with Eugene Gates, a retired faculty member of the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto. Her articles have also appeared in Tempo (Cambridge University Press), Journal of the IAWM (International Alliance for Women in Music), VivaVoce (Frau und Musik), Czech Music Quarterly (Czech Music Fund), Czech Music (Dvorak Society for Czech and Slovak Music), Martinu Revue (Bohuslav Martinu International Circle), Opus musicum, Harmonie, Tydenik Rozhlas (Czech Radio), and FOKus (Prague Symphony Orchestra). Hartl is co-editor of the first monograph on Kapralova in English, The Kapralova Companion, published by Lexington Books (Rowman & Littlefield) in the United States in 2011, and shortlisted for the F. X. Salda Foundation Award. She also wrote a text on women in Czech music for the anthology Komponistinnen und ihr Werk published by Kassel University Press in 2010, and contributed an essay to an anthology of essays on Kapralova published in 2017 by Chronos Verlag (Zurich). In 2015, she collaborated on a five-hour radio document on Kapralova produced by BBC Radio 3 for the composer‘s centenary. Hartl‘s latest project is a multivolume anthology of Kapralova‘s correspondence (publisher The Kapralova Society). What were the main motivations behind
Now we can see more initiatives focused on
starting The Kapralova Society?
empowering and honoring women, which is great. Is the situation really changing
We wanted to provide a platform for the promotion of
on the scene of classical music?
Kaprálová’s music; soon, however, we found it necessary to extend it to the promotion of women’s achievements in classical
It was not changing until very recently. I have been involved in
music in general. One of the ways we have done it was to
this field (women composers) for about twenty years, and only
publish an open access journal. The Kapralova Society Journal
now I hear some festivals and some orchestras, some of them
has become a platform for a much needed discourse in this field
being major ensembles, making pledges for change to their
of musicological research.
programming. That would be unheard of just a few years ago. Some of these organizations are even promising gender parity
Why is it important to remember Kapralova
(in their programming). While this movement is not widespread
and how did she inspire you?
in any way, it does seem to grow. It is yet to be seen, however, how real and how permanent (if at all) this change will be--it
Because she is an important artist; her music is important.
is not only how many more women will access some of these
Kaprálová should be considered a major representative of her
important platforms but also how much time and space they will
generation and a formidable Czech composer of the first half of
be afforded.
the twentieth century. There is no reason to doubt her art in any way--be it her age or gender--nor to see it as unfinished. She
Do you observe any differences in practice
was already able to develop her own voice during her life.
when it comes to all female orchestras or communities for example?
How do you operate now and what are some of the challenges you face?
I don’t see any difference in terms of musicianship, if that is what you had in mind. I don’t know whether they are more
We have always operated as a non-profit organization governed
collaborative than mixed orchestras. All-female orchestras
and run by volunteers. That is what makes us flexible. There’s no
(in classical music at least) have always existed; they usually
government funding. Some projects are made possible with
formed driven by a need to fill in a gap: a gap in employment or
individual donations, some in partnership with organizations that
in repertoire. We also have quite a few women’s organizations
have access to funding or are willing to take risk and pool their
in this field worldwide that formed to support its members and
own resources. These are also our biggest challenges but they
to advocate for their access to performing, programming and
are not insurmountable. In the case of Kaprálová the quality of
broadcasting. In the Czech Republic, a one such example is the
her music has been the most persuasive argument. All projects
composer group Hudbaby (MusiCrones) which formed in 1997
are donated free labour--writing, editing, producing, translating,
to gain a better access to festivals of new music and to seek
performing--we donate our work because we love what we do
grants to record their music. You will find more about them
and consider it important.
and their music on our website here http://www.kapralova. org/HUDBABY_2.htm and here http://www.kapralova.org/ HUDBABY_CD.htm
LENA KOČIŠOVÁ (AKKAMIAU / hiTHər'too)
Lena Kocisova is an audiovisual artist, experimental musician, performer, concept writer and art and music event manager and coordinator, as well as a resident in Berlin. In 2014 she received a PhD in Audiovisual Performance from the FaVU Brno University of Technology, previously having obtained a degree in pedagogy in 1998 from Ostrava University (CZ). Living and traveling throughout Europe and the United States collecting experiences in art and music club subculture, she has been a member and coordinator of the female: pressure network and festivals such as Perspectives Berlin (2013, 2015), new media festival Multiplace, platform Czech it! and the art crew Anymade Studio. As an art director and producer she has created the projects L to the B (2010) and Zbrojovka site-specific (2011). As Akkamiau she has performed experimental audiovisual shows since 2006. In 2012 she co-founded the audiovisual interactive collective StratoFyzika for which she creates sound compositions inspired by metaphysics. She has launched and performs live with her latest experimental techno project hiTHər'too, with releases on female:pressure, Decadence recordings, SPRINGSTOFF and Establishment records. Akkamiau hosts a monthly radio show “When the Music’s Over” at Colaboradio (Frei Radio Berlin). She has also contributed to Cashmere radio and regularly DJs at local techno events in Berlin, focusing on the emotional power of sound frequencies, presenting a strangely delicate mixture of experimental and dance music. Do you remember any important steps in learning
Do you have any favorite instrument or
new instruments and technologies and who
technology now and why is it important for
helped you or inspired you? How do you tend to
you? What is your relationship with it and how
approach new instruments/technologies?
do you prefer to communicate with it?
My approach to any new software or music hardware is
Somehow it happened that I fell for synthesizers and effects by
spontaneous and curious, with no fear of messing the
Korg. I like them because they have great sounds, their machines
parameters up, in fact I enjoy the discovery without any actual
are well manufactured and intuitive to use. Also they are reliable
knowledge of all the functions. With this method I experience
and I think packed with possibilities if you consider the price.
many more surprises and unpredictability and it hooks me
I recently bought an analog drum machine by Vermona, which
emotionally. I like to explore the possibilities and limits of
has no presets, so it is a very exciting challenge, to get to know
the tool itself so I mostly learn from actual practice, usually
this instrument in a similar way as to how you would learn to
I gain experience with time and by extended working with
play, for example, the violin. Regarding favourite technology,
the instrument or technology. In case I cannot figure out
I’ve been always interested in the impact of sound onto your
some particular issue, I either ask colleagues who have more
body and mind, so I find the spatial distribution of sound a very
knowledge, or I search for tutorials online. Inspiration for new
fascinating field. I work with quadraphonic sound often and
technologies comes when I need to translate my concepts to
have also had the possibility to play at 4DSOUND, which is an
the artwork, I do research for what would fit the best. It's also
omnidirectional sound environment set up. Another technology
very inspiration to be part of workshops. I liked one with Kyoka
which we use often with Stratofyzika is the interactive linking of
a lot. Inspiration also comes to me from different realms, such as
audio, visual and movement sensors, usually connected through
psychology, literature or history.
an osc signal. This interactivity allows us to demonstrate the multisensory essence of audiovisual performance on stage.
DAEDELUS
Alfred Darlington aka Daedelus can be seen in the clubs with a grid-based Monome MIDI controller, usually angled toward the audience so that everyone can see his virtuoso moves. But it is not the only instrument he plays and uses to create and interpret his music. With his art and broad range of interests he can be described as a renaissance man even though he dresses more like a Victorian dandy. His musical style was formed by classical music studies in double bass and rap, as well as his residency in London where he became interested in rave and hardcore. After returning to California, Daedelus never left electronic experiments and has been creating sophisticated fusions of many genres and music traditions ever since. He always stood out among the beat makers of the Los Angeles scene. He has collaborated with Madlib, MF Doom, Kelela, Flying Lotus among many others and released his music on many important labels such as Brainfeeder/Ninja Tune, Plug Research, Anticon or Dome of Doom. Do you remember any important steps in
How do you tend to approach new
learning new instruments and technologies
instruments or technologies?
and who helped you or inspired you? Curiosity in what questions the instrument asks and how quickly Often witnessing a performer enraptured, feeling drawn to their
can I develop an answer. I love opinionated tools; far easier to
passion, and then towards the instrument in their hands. Be
compose across a limited number of keys rather than an infinity,
it through their mastery or stage presence. I had this moment
as long as they are the right notes for what’s needed!
keenly with Suzanne Ciani and a sprawling Buchla rig in Austin, Texas. Their exploration of the space through the synth made
You don’t perform only solo but you also
me reconsider my own hesitancy towards modular, and now I’m
collaborate with various musicians. What is
immersed!
your experience with music collaborations or even improvisation and connecting classical
Do you have any favorite instrument or technology
instruments and electronic instruments or
now and why is it important for you?
different music technologies and approaches?
I can’t point towards any one, but any bit of my rig that helps
Not to be a selfish collaborator, but I don’t really feel like I’m ever
empower my performance is certainly where I spend my time.
just another instrument, nor are they. There is a certain amount
There is action to every instrument yet some are less controllable
of sound that is the question at hand and between however
and I find myself hesitating rather than embracing… I should
many voices we are all just trying to get to that degree of volume,
mention I have had a long love with the grid Monome and still
almost independent of the notes or noises. Still having tools that
find it so compelling, but haven’t found the best way to realize it
allow for adjustment in the moment are key.
yet in my current set-up. You have classical music education but you have What is your relationship with it, how do you
expanded your horizons, freely moving in between
prefer to communicate with it and how important
different paradigms. In the Czech Republic there are
is movement in your live musical expression?
still not that many people that are able to connect with different music traditions. What would be
So time spent is a kind of cue for me. How do the arms regard?
your recommendation to music teachers at schools
What ways do the ears bend to? Does your body address it? Or
when it comes to offering music practise to kids?
is it none of these and unmoored from interaction? I see it as a checklist of sorts for myself and the audience in turn. Even if
Find their joyous voice; hone in on the spark with can either
I’m alone in the studio creating there is always a performance
incite or intrigue; let the noise itself be a teacher. I spent years
taking place even if just for the speakers in attendance.
thinking sound was supposed to be a certain way, and mostly from long dead composers. Once I witnessed a living music that vitality changed my entirety. Top that off with feeling a possibility that I had a contribution to make and I don’t think you could ever take music away from me then on.
VENUS EX MACHINA
Venus Ex Machina is a composer, sound designer and interdisciplinary artist. She has contributed sounds and music to a range of projects including releases on NON Worldwide and Optimo Music, an installation for Hyperdub, and a score for ICA & Channel 4’s short-film series, Random Acts. In 2018, she developed her first “pirate AI” opera as Fellow of the performance laboratory CTM HackLab at HAU2 in Berlin, and also led a workshop on radio transmitter building at Moogfest in North Carolina, titled Wireless Imagination and influenced by her current fascination with the mythical and borderless nature of radio communication. As an educator she has shown a very creative and welcoming approach when teaching a workshop on Audulus as part of Synapse Knowledge organized by MeetFactory and SHAPE Platform. Do you remember any important steps in
How do you tend to approach new
learning new instruments and technologies
instruments ortechnologies?
and who helped you or inspired you? You must switch off your brain in order to free-associate. The Human creativity and expression are a feat of the mind as much
Disney Company have this strategy – you can be either the
as one of the body, so in hindsight, the teachers who stand out
realist, the critic or the dreamer. Never two at a time. I like to
in memory are those who supported my holistic development in
read the manual and figure out my map of a thing, and then
tandem with pure technique. My teachers clocked pretty early on
switch off my brain and fly. That’s where the payback is. There is
that I was my own best master, so for a couple of key years I was
joy in this. Never forget that is why we do it.
given lots of freedom to sit in my own corner and rabbit-hole on whatever I was into. Then I would share it with the other kids ,
What is your background and how did
and sometimes I would take the role of a peer coach. This gave
it influenced your practice?
me lots of confidence early on in feeling able to take things on, probe them and figure them out.
My father was a professor of engineering, my mother a chemist.
My primary instrument was voice. I had an amazing teacher – Dr.
Both of them had a love of the arts, so in my upbringing I took
Denise Borland – whose specialism bridged vocal performance
in as much of that as possible – art, music, literature, languages,
and psychology. I think there is great power in knowing how to
ballet classes and so on. Even so, my upbringing is differentiated
use your voice, especially as a woman. You take a deep breath
from a typical western two point four children narrative because
and you visualise launching balls of fire from your diaphragm.
of my background, and partial upbringing in Zimbabwe where
I’m an eternally curious gadget head and former librarian –
the extended family is dominant and vastly distinct from
I thrive on learning new things – so I’ve studied all different kinds
atomised western existence. My parents also had a complicated
of instruments and tools but lately I have found myself going
career experience in the west because of racism, which led them
back to that. The use of the self.
to relocate to Zimbabwe. Basically I existed in two opposite paradigms – one where we were just regular people capable of anything, and another where racism intervened to alter our
Do you have any favorite instrument or technology
experience.
now and why is it important for you?
Ultimately, I chose to study pure maths because, from my talent
What is your relationship with it and how
and love for it, to the implicit advantage of having parents
do you prefer to communicate with it?
who were scientists, there was nothing in my experience or background that would have discouraged me and I didn’t
I’m studying Alexander Technique. Every modular patching class
necessarily feel as though I was doing anything remarkable or
should start with calisthenics. Get those finger electrons flowing.
special until later on.
We are part of this giant web of energy. Electroacoustic music is
The biggest challenge for me was relocating to Scotland at 16,
our way back to all of that.
where I came up against the narrow expectations of others,
I never travel without my Eventide H9 MAX. Good monitoring
which were mostly shaped by ignorance. My ability to name and
headphones. An audio recorder and some good mics. There
see it as such is what helped me to persevere, and that probably
is too much phallic noise in the world. More quiet. More ears,
informs my interest in deconstructing the psychological barriers
please.
that lead some people to feel excluded.
GABI NGCOBO
Gabi Ngcobo has been engaged in collaborative artistic, curatorial, and educational projects in South Africa and on an international scope since early 2000s. She is a founding member of the Johannesburg based collaborative platforms NGO (Nothing Gets Organised) and Center for Historical Reenactments (CHR 2010–14). NGO focuses on processes of self-organization that take place outside of predetermined structures, definitions, contexts, or forms. CHR responded to the demands of the moment through an exploration of how historical legacies impact and resonate within contemporary art. Ngcobo co-curated the 32nd Bienal de São Paulo, and A Labour of Love, 2015, at Weltkulturen Museum, Frankfurt am Main, DE. She has worked at the Iziko South African National Gallery in Cape Town, SA, and at the Cape Africa Platform where she co-curated the Cape07 Biennale, 2007, Cape Town, SA. This year (2018) she curated Berlin Biennale under a title “We Don’t Need Another Hero” after the hit song by Tina Turner. In her curatorial team she was joined by Nomaduma Rosa Masilela, Serubiri Moses, Thiago de Paula Souza, and Yvette Mutumba, thought the exhibition they addressed “collective psychosis.” How do you approach dealing with big institutions and offering different point of view to them?
When you curated Berlin Biennale you refused to name some of the problems and key ideas
I like to experiment with institutionalism. For example, I have
directly. You avoided the key words that are
started a pseudo institution in South Africa and also ended it,
being used very often which is very interesting
as an experiment with an idea of a dead institution and the fact
for me. Cause usually when we announce some
that the death of an institution should not always lead to a crises.
events we also have to think about how the
I have been in different collectives and the one I co–founded in
audience will understand that. So what is it like
2010 called Centre for Historical Reenactments had a running
to be in between of trying to be clear and deliver
period of 2 years before we decided to end it. At the time we
a message but also trying to to reinvent the ways
still had pending invitations and we had to think of how to honor
how we talk about certain issues or some art.
these invitations as a dead body. So we devised a haunting mechanism, for another two years CHR existed as a ghost. We
Working towards the Berlin had many frustrating moments. But
collaborated with institutions internationally and locally but
these things are bound to make themselves known very early on.
then the haunting had to end as well. So we decided to have
This made the experience of working on the biennale a dance
a performance, an exorcism of the ghost of CHR. Sometimes
of avoidance. I always like to use the concept of “rope-a-dope”,
I feel the exorcism was successful but sometimes I wonder if the
the fighting strategy that Muhammad Ali had to devise when
ghost still lingers.
fighting George Foreman in Kinshasa, Zaire (now Democratic
After that I co-founded a new space with different people.
Republic of Congo) in 1974. It is something that I think about
We actually managed to buy a section of a building. Which
a lot when thinking artistically and curatorially. As soon as my
is actually quite unusual in the context of art spaces in
appointment in Berlin was announced there were a lot of people
Johannesburg. We call that space NGO (Nothing Gets
happy about this, for all the wrong reasons as well people who
Organised). It is a space that is opening up to the idea of
were critical of the previous Berlin Biennale and thought that my
gentrification, at least that is what most people owning units
presence will “fix” whatever they were not happy with. I refused
there want to see. We want to avoid gentrification in our name,
to be the fixer. I had to deal with sentiments that presumed what
although we know it will come eventually. It’s a place to slow
the exhibition was going to be about, before I even started the
down time, to avoid some of the things that happened with
work. These sentiments were based on how people thought they
CHR, where we had to answer to so many calls for collaboration
understood me, based on where I come from and my identity.
within a month. We were invited to Lyon Biennale, New
So terms such as postcolonialism and decolonisation started
Museum in New York and different international platforms. It
to fly around me and people thought that this was going to
was good, cause we could have the voice also locally where
be a moment to learn how to be propper decolonised beings.
our experiments were located. But we didn’t want that with
I refused this position.
NGO. But it is also a place to think about institutions, funding,
I think we all have something to learn from each other, what I was
where the money comes from, etc. It is also a place where we
refusing was to be a service provider. I wanted to be a human being
can retreat so we always have a project or event then close the
coming to a place both known and unknown to me and experiment
space and step back.So these experiments with institutionality
with forms and ways of thinking and the vocabularies of making an
are something that I also take with me when I work with other
exhibition. I wanted to declare a space where I would be a human
institutions when I do projects in different places. As a curator
not a subject. I acknowledge where I come from as much as
I don’t write proposals, I don’t dream of exhibitions. Sometimes
I don’t leave my obsessions at home. There are certain things that
I get asked to do something and then I have to ask whether it
ground me but I’m not going to use my blackness as a theme. So
is interesting enough, whether it has the right set of problems
there were many things in the statements we produced that were
and then I go for it and come up with an idea. But I’m not an
expected but not said, like decolonisation which is a buzzword in
exhibition machine.
Berlin and everywhere else. Sometime I feel that many people don’t
understand that the process of decolonisation is going to be a long
One of your topics was also “We don’t need
process. It’s not a five year plan. It might take us two hundred years,
another hero” which also relates to organizing
or more. But this has to do with the fact that there is a lot of funding
a team or a collective. How to deal with
that look for this word. In five years they will focus on something
organizing a getting things done while not
else and people will just move along towards where the funding is.
having the heroes or just one authority?
To be a decolonial subject is not a nine to five job. It’s not leaving your workplace saying: “Uf, I have done my decolonisation for a day”
Most important thing is, if we need heroes, what kind of heroes
and then going home and it’s business as usual. Decolonisation is
do we need. Often in histories the hero is a man on a horse. A very
how you talk to your children, questioning the food you eat, how
important movement for me now is “#RhodesMustFall”. It was
and whom you love as much as it is working to dismantle ways of
formed in 2015 at The University of Cape Town where students
knowing that are no longer useful, or perhaps never were. It’s not
demanded removal of a statue of British imperialist Cecil Rhodes.
that I don’t like the concept, I just don’t like the way it’s perceived
A month after the movement was formed the statue was removed
by most people. So I wanted to create a space where even though
and the podium where it stood remains open. And to me this is
it’s not there, you know it’s there. I also didn’t want an exhibition
a space of possibilities. I don’t think we have to fill this space with
that shouts on people and tells them what they didn’t know.
a strong black woman necessarily but we can take the time to
I wanted something poetic and inviting that makes people feel
reflect on this view that has been blocked for such a long time with
invited to be part of.
this bronze presence. When women and people of colour and other marginalized groups take on leadership roles, we should remember
Is it possible to make it as though some people
that these are not the examples. It’s not that I’m against authority,
don’t feel just guilty and close before the subject?
perhaps we just need to get rid of the daddy, we have to stop “doing it for daddy”, to borrow from bell hooks. Because, let’s admit, too
But some of the people like feeling guilty. A lot of Germans are
often when women take on positions of power they usually “do it
also addicted to it. They would like the exhibition to be a torture
for the daddy”. We have to look at these toxic ways of leadership
chamber and I’m not going to do that, you can do it to yourself.
and heroisms and rethink what kind of leadership we want for
What is really important is to distribute responsibility because
ourselves, to think about how they give birth to subjectivities
it’s all our responsibility. So when I said in an interview “we are
that are no longer toxic because we have been sick for hundreds
all postcolonial” it was a way to shift this gaze and distribute
of years. So “we don’t need another hero” is an intervention into
the responsibility. We all have to come to the space and think of
a space, it’s not necessarily that nobody gets to lead.
how we are postcolonial. It is about taking a mirror and looking at yourself, but many people don’t want to look in the mirror, or
It’s unfortunate that sometimes trying to take
they want someone to hold it for them. It is important to start
on a toxic leadership role is the only way to gain
with yourself. Some people in the institutions think they are just
success in our society. And it seems that some
doing their job, but they are not doing the job on themselves. So
of the kids of colour see a celebrity career as the
I was interested in creating this conversation in that space and
only way how to get out of their vicious circle...
show how it could look like. I wanted to inhabit the grammar of an exhibition, I don’t have to turn the form upside down,
It is about how we measure success. Often white people don’t give
I quite enjoy making an exhibition that looks like an exhibition
a shit how successful a black person is. Your money doesn’t matter
because it settles a lot of people down and then you can deal
because you are still black. So we have to shift what we think
with the questions. It was part of our strategy, that me and
a successful person is and how success looks like.
my collaborators devised. And of course collaboration is very important part of my work.
We already discussed one important word and that is commodification and we also discuss that
We actually discuss forms of collectives and how
very often. In what way an art can exist? Some
can it operate and how can people collaborate.
people think that music has to come in a form
So what is your experience from dealing with
of an album, a product. In visual arts it can be
a team the people and collaborating?
a painting because the only way how you can be successful it through selling these products.
The first thing I did when I was appointed as curator of the 10th Berlin Biennale... Of course I had anxieties and felt insecure, so,
Yeah, there is a message to be spread. I think it was Martin Luther
I asked for help, this is one of the first things I think people can
King who said: “I can never be what I ought to be until you are what
and should do. So I approached my colleagues and proposed
you ought to be.” If we can think about this… We are not successful
that we form a curatorial team. I needed a team where I didn’t
when the person next to us is not. I’m successful when everybody
have to explain certain things to, to not start from zero, because
is successful. And I like to think through this kind of model. I know
preparing an exhibition of that scale needs time and 18 months
that we live in a world that also doesn’t allow this way of thinking,
is not a huge amount of time.
but it is possible, if we can construct ways of thinking and living and working together, to take that as a kind of motto.
MARYANNE AMACHER (1938 – 2009) When played at the right sound level, which is quite high and exciting, the tones in this music will cause your ears to act as neurophonic instruments that emit sounds that will seem to be issuing directly from your head ... Do not be alarmed! Your ears are not behaving strangely or being damaged! ... these virtual tones are a natural and very real physical aspect of auditory perception, similar to the fusing of two images resulting in a third three dimensional image in binocular perception ... I want to release this music which is produced by the listener. Maryanne Amacher was an outstanding composer and installation artist interested in site specific works and psychoacoustic phenomenon. She was especially interested in “auditory distortion products”, or “Tartini tones” (according to violinist Giuseppe Tartini who discovered them). Amacher called these tones generated by the listener’s ear “ear tones” and explored this phenomenon in her piece called Sound Characters (Making the Third Ear). In 1967 Amacher started a series called “City-Links”. She transmitted sounds from various locations within and among cities through telephone lines and mixed them together. She originally studied piano and composition with Karlheinz Stockhausen and collaborated later with John Cage and Merce Cunningham. She also taught electronic music at Bard College and received multiple awards for her remarkable work.
SUZI ANALOGUE
Suzi Analogue is an incredibly versatile producer, vocalist, and designer whose futuristic, forwardthinking music blends abstract hip-hop, neo-soul, and electronic experimentation. Her recordings often feature blown-out, off-kilter beats in addition to her smooth vocals and positive lyrics, but she’s also embraced drum’n’bass, footwork, and other forms of high-energy club music. True to her name, she releases much of her music on formats such as cassette and vinyl, and she runs a tape label called Never Normal Records. Originally from Baltimore, Maryland, she has resided in numerous cities including Philadelphia, Tokyo, and New York, and she’s traveled to Uganda and the Netherlands to teach music production courses. Do you remember any important steps in
To become a member of The Recording Academy is an honor,
learning new instruments and technologies
meaning that my peers view me as a valuable voice in the
and who helped you or inspired you?
conversation of the future of music. Of course the music industry will continue to explore addressing diversity, but what
No, I am just inspired by the technology itself and learning more
is important to me is that artists, especially those of color, and
about the options to integrate it into my creative process. I let
women are considered for any genre they release in and not
the learning process occur naturally.
just forced to only perform or be celebrated in genres that are marketed a certain way for mass consumption.
Do you have any favorite instrument or technology now and why is it important for you?
You started Never Normal Records and through this label you release not only your music but a variety of
I do not have one favorite instrument or technology, I view
other talented artists. What is the idea behind it?
everything that I own equally. There are some I use more than others for periods at a time, like my Critter 7 Guitari Organelle,
The idea behind Never Normal is giving emerging artists a place
I perform with that piece.
to release what inspires them, and them not having to artistically compromise their creative vision. It is okay to just be yourself, 1
What is your relationship with it and how
of 1, Never Normal.
do you prefer to communicate with it? Are you purposely trying to build and empower With the Organelle, it is a synth, sampler and fx pedal, so
a community? Is collaboration important to you?
I manipulate sounds often and also play synth and resample with it. I think the nature of how and what I create speaks to community. How do you tend to approach new
Humanity is important to me, and us using sound to connect to
instruments or technologies?
the keys of what makes us human and empathetic for human life is a very important conversation to me. Empowering people who
When I approach new music technology, I just keep my mind
have felt disempowered is an important act as well.
open and stay patient. I do not rush to have an end result, rather I just try to learn how to properly use it and communicate with it.
How do you prefer to release your own music? And what does it take to finally say: “yes now
I had a chance to see you getting more and more
it’s done, I’m going to release my music”?
successful and visible. What change for you with more visibility for your art and for yourself?
I try to release my music in any place it wil fit – that is the beauty of music. Whether TV, Tape, MP3, Film, Video Game, there is
I would just say I continue to understand my purpose and my
always a place my music can and has gone. I know when it is
goals more, and the people who support me also see how me
finished, it’s just a feeling that I get that tells me to let it go.
doing these things could be good and offer me support to further myself. I just stay true to my story, and continue to work on being
You are also very famous for your fashion
a good person to myself and others.
taste and cool styling. What role does your body and your image play in your art?
You recently became member of The Recording Academy, what does that mean
My body and image or style is just another conversation that
to you? And w0hat problems of the music
I use without words. It is very much like music to me in that way.
industry do you think should be address?
To be able to let people where I stand without having to use words is something that I like to do, because communication should not always rely on words, and the beauty of human connection allows for so much more!
DAPHNE ORAM (1925 – 2003)
Daphne Oram was a pioneer of musique concréte in UK and one of the first British electronic composers. She learned to play the piano and compose from an early age and later became the co-founder and director of the BBC Radiophonic Workshop which served as a source of incidental music for BBC radio and TV production. In 1957 she created music for Giraudoux’s play Amphitryon 83 using a sine wave oscillator, selfdesigned filters and a tape recorder. It became the first electronic composition for BBC. Oram herself became the first woman to invent and create new musical instruments. One of her inventions was a special technique for making electronic sounds by drawing on a film stock which she called Oramics. The waves on the film strips were read by photo-electric cells and then produced by a tone generator. Her tape recorder techniques, as well as thinking about spatial amplification, became influential in the field. One of her innovative pieces, Still Point, was composed for turntables, orchestra and microphones. It was performed performed 70 years later in 2016 when her book on physics and philosophy of sound, An Individual Note of Music, Sound and Electronics (1972), was re-published.
PAULINE OLIVEROS (1932 – 2016) Deep Listening represents a heightened state of awareness and connects to all that there is. As a composer I make my music through Deep Listening. Pauline Oliveros was a crucial thinker and composer in the field of electronic music and sound art. As a child she took up the accordion, learned to play the tuba and French horn, later on and studying composition at San Francisco State College. In her twenties she got a tape recorder that allowed her to make her first pieces. Oliveros was one of the original members of the influential San Francisco Tape Music Center and later became it’s director. With Lester Ingber, theoretical physicist and Karate master, she pursued research on attentional processes in relation to music. These evolved into her concepts of Deep Listening and Sonic Meditations, suggesting how the audience can have an immersive experience beyond even listening and how sound can enhance our growth and positively change our minds and bodies with expanding consciousness and healing. Deep Listening consists of listening and sounding exercises. It also includes several compositions by Oliveros and other composers written from 1970 onwards. The results are meant to be processed through group discussion in workshops and retreats. One of Oliveros’ key practices was an improvisation that would also become a sort of healing in times of traumatic events happening around the world. Building on this, Sonic Meditations were also a practise of selfcare and women and lesbian empowerment.
TATIANA HEUMAN QEEI Astronautico 2018
Tatiana Heuman’s debut album QEEI is a multi-layered collection of deconstructed pop songs marked by stuttering percussion, chaotic microsamples, and infectious vocal melodies. Heuman describes QEEI as a collection of audible planets within orbit of the same galaxy of emotions. (The album was composed between the gravity that holds Buenos Aires, Puerto Escondido, and Berlin.) QEEI violates borders through glassy ultrasound and entrancing hyperrhythms. Each song is a different “preacher.” QEEI formulates a pop music mangled and contorted to give voice to “contemporary witches”. There is a side of digital brutalism to the music as well as humanistic breathing synthscapes and real human body sounds. Heuman experiments with the plasticity of personality, her “inner territory interacting with its own limits.” The result: “Wars.” NOTES AND QUOTES ON THE ALBUM BY TATIANA HEUMAN For most of the tracks I just played with the sounds and then
I HAVE MADE THESE SONGS
I found the shape. The last thing is building the structure. In this kind of process
in planes, in airports, in my parent’s house in Buenos Aires, in
I feel like a sculptress.
Puerto Escondido, Mexico, in Berlin. Going through moments of intense happiness to absolute loneliness.
Some stuff… Silence is important.
This release has also a lot of water.
Movement is important. Inside the ear and resonating in the
I finish the mixing mostly in Puerto Escondido, where I could feel
entire body.
the sea everyday.
Each sound has a meaning. Each sound affects the other sounds.
I must mention to one of my referents in music Markus Popp
The voice is an instrument.
(Oval). He was an extremely helpful mentor for a stage of this
The voice is not more important than the rest.
process. It has been a journey of almost two years creating,
Lyrics are a consequence of spontaneous sounds.
selecting, cutting and pasting.
Possible genre and how to listen to this?
It was a big decision to make this LP because I was about to say
After so many years being influenced by pop music in my
no to music. But I said to myself ok, I will make an album before
teenage years what I am doing is destroying it a Little. My friend
leaving everything. Now I know that it is not possible to leave
Pablo told me that my genre was probably “deconstructed pop”
anything behind, I feed myself with music.
and I really liked that. But is genre important nowadays? I know it is important to sell… ya? )))
I SEE THIS RELEASE IN MANY WAYS…
It could be a Little difficult to understand this music as songs.
1) Planets made of sound in the same emotional galaxy, maybe
You can not really read a book or have conversations onFacebook
that is Qeei? A galaxy? Or a planet with different countries…
with 5 people at the same time while you are finishing a job
I don’t know … depending on the scale // zoom . But Qeei
application AND listening to this release, no.
is something that is not planned and appears and surprises anybody who experiment it.
So, I don’t know. Just relax, lay in and let yourself go. And I hope
2) Each song is a different preacher. Contemporary witches
you don’t have nightmares. Dance if you can. I think this music is
speaking. Many languages are involved.
totally danceable, but I think I am not the one to judge because
3) My inner territory interacting with its own limits. Wars.
I like to dance to the blender sounds when i make a fruit smoothie.
4) a body 5) a journey
WHY QEEI, WHAT IS QEEI ? & THERE ARE MORE. This release is the transition to something new. I dedicate it to QEEI, my alter ego, my woman cloud and my
TATIANA HEUMAN Multi-disciplinary performance artist and
dancer of darkness.
musician raised in Buenos Aires. She plays the drums in improv
QEEI was my name to go out with my own sounds, alone.
duo called Ricarda Cometa but also works as a composer and
QEEI was to be drifting in the chaos of my emotions for a long
sound artist in the field of contemporary dance. In her solo
time.
work she is able to create frantic dance rhythms but also very
QEEI was no rationality.
catchy avant-gard pop songs. Tatiana Heuman is a member of
QEEI has destroyed me and has healed me.
feminist sonic collaborative platform #Vivas and music collective TRUENO. She is currently based in Berlin.
ÉLIANE RADIGUE (*1932)
Similarly to Else Marie Pade, Éliane Radigue was a spontaneous listener. She studied music, but also collected sounds from her environment that gave her pleasure. Later she was introduced to Pierre Schaeffer in Paris who invited her to join Studio d’Essai at RTF as an intern. Afterwards she resided in New York before going back to Paris to join Pierre Henry to help him with some challenging compositions. She became interested in the phenomenon of microphone feedback, which she researched through the “listening skill”. When working with a tape recorder she aimed for fluidity and to be able to create pieces without cuts and dissonances. Playing several tapes simultaneously she was able to create new harmonics and organic soundscapes. Her interest was mainly the “sound within sound”. When moving again to New York she became a resident in the studio at New York University created by Morton Subotnick and equipped by Don Buchla. There she created the Chry-ptus piece on two tapes that could be played simultaneously or with slight difference to create variation. Her signature instrument then became the Arp 2500 synthesizer. She also experimented with the directionality of sound. Afterwards, she was influenced by Tibetan Buddhism and composed for acoustic instruments.
DELIA DERBYSHIRE (1937 – 2001)
With her original compositions for BBC radio and TV production, Delia Derbyshire was one of the pioneers of electronic music that influenced later generations of musicians. Being a trained mathematician and musician, she joined the newly established BBC Radiophonic Workshop. There she excelled in making otherworldly music pieces from purely electronic sounds, tape manipulation and recording the sounds produced by various objects such as lampshades or bottles, a practise similar to that of musique concréte. Although she became most famous for her work on the theme tune for the Doctor Who series, she was given credit only later on, initially listed as merely an anonymous member of the Radiophonic Workshop. The score was created by cutting, splicing, speeding up and slowing down segments of analogue tape containing recordings of a single plucked string, white noise, and the simple harmonic waveforms of test-tone oscillators which were used for calibrating studio equipment and rooms, not creating music. Delia Derbyshire composed many more pieces, such as music for the TV production The Great Zoos of the World, using only animal sounds or collages of people describing their dreams Inventions for Radio with playwright Barry Barmange. After experiencing too much criticism of her work, she moved on to film and theatre music as well as independent electronic music events. Disappointed by the development in the electronic music field, she left to work at a bookshop and art gallery, coming back to make music in the 90’s again. Her legacy is celebrated by the Delia Derbyshire Day foundation led by Caro C.
DAWLESS JAMMIN’ JADE WII
Musician JAde Wii aka Jammin’ Queen likes to play DAWless. She is not only a musician devoted to hardware of all kinds, she is also an expert on various electronic music instruments offering inspiring advice through videos on her Youtube channel Dawless Jammin’. Her tutorials gained more than 15 000 subscribers. Jade also created a popular Facebook group for other people to share and discuss what can be done without a computer and a Digital Audio Workstation. Do you remember any important steps in
Are reflecting on your roots in music anyhow?
learning new instruments and technologies and who helped you or inspired you?
For some reason the music or genre I make has never been the one I listen to. Before 2016 I was very picky about music,
I think everything I’ve learned about keyboard and guitar and
I had been listening to the same 10 artist for the past 10 years,
how to use them has come from watching youtube videos. When
mostly 70’s rock and old Spanish songs. I have recently allowed
I was around 14 years old I learned a few keyboard songs by
myself to explore music in a new way; I listen to a lot of reggae,
watching others play, pausing the video and seeing what notes
am listening to more electronic music, and I enjoy Lo-fi when
they played. I learned my guitar chords through youtube tutorials
trying to study or read. I am working on two albums right now,
as well. I never really had any formal training in either of those
one Reggae, one Electronic, two very different genres. I wouldn’t
instruments, never learned theory, I wish I did, it’s something
say my roots influence the type of music I make, my method of
I still haven’t given up on trying to learn, just have to find the
composition is in constant flux, I don’t like to tie myself to any
time to do so.
certain genre because that is always changing.
Do you have any favorite instrument or technology
How do you tend to approach new
now and why is it important for you?
instruments or technologies?
After going Dawless and trying numerous workflows I have
Practice, Practice, Practice.
come to the conclusion that Elektron machines are indeed
I’m sure you’ve heard the saying before “Practice makes perfect”,
superior to anything else out there. Yes, they take some time
I’m a true believer of that.
(maybe years) to wrap your head around, specially the Octatrack.
Yes, perfection is a reach, but being comfortable to move around
But these instruments give me the ability to create things
your instrument in a flowing manner not only speeds up the
I normally wouldn’t or which would require a lot of effort to do so
composition process, but really allows you to evolve your music
if done using a DAW.
far beyond 4 bar loops.
What is your relationship with it and how
Are there any new trends in the field of music
do you prefer to communicate with it?
instruments and technologies that you really like and some that you really dislike?
The Elektron workflow is a workflow that grows with you. The more you make music on these machines the more you
I really like that we’re in a time where if you work hard and you
allow yourself to experiment and explore the possibilities of
work good you will be noticed. With social media it’s really easy
each machine in a different way. I feel they are machines of
for a talented person to get recognition. That’s not an exact
programming, which can be tedious, but the results are glorious.
answer to the question, but I think the ease of being able to
It takes more effort to make a simple beat on the Analog Rytm
share your music and creations on the internet is something that
than it does on a TR-8, but once you’ve exhausted everything
pertains to the field of technology. A trend that I don’t like (which
that the TR-8 can do you’re just scratching the surface of what
I have shamelessly taken part in as a noob) is the obsession
the Rytm can do. It’s not ALL Elektron over here though, I still
and compulsion in the purchasing of new hardware. Every few
love to use synths and eurorack to feed into my Octatrack. My
months they release something new, some people don’t even
OB-6 and Montage give me a very large sound palette.
use the gear they currently have and are already on to the next thing. They never give themselves the chance to master anything and are always chasing the perfect setup or perfect synth. I feel this wastes a lot of time and could be avoided by the simple realization that one is being compulsive and really doesn’t much to make music.
You have a vlog called Dawless Jammin’.
Do you feel in anyway as a part of any
Why did you go “Dawless”?
online community? What do you like or dislike about the “synthernet”?
Ah Dawless, The term that started it all. Like many other musicians out there I was introduced to music production with a DAW, first
We really are a strange breed and I think it’s great there’s a place
garageband then logic. It was fun when I was in high school and
where you can go be passionate about your hobby with others
didn’t spend much time on the computer, but after becoming an
alike. I feel it is such a small community in comparison to the
adult (whatever that is) and having to use a computer at work and
music production community which is full of beat makers and
take college classes online the last thing I wanted to do was get
songwriters. The groups are smaller so it’s easy to make friends.
home and fire up logic and hope for something inspiring to come
I dislike people that are rude and have nothing useful to offer
up after the endless scrolling through presets, effects, etc. I didn’t
except a snarky remark or comment. We don’t accept those type
know any other way of making music and I stopped making music
of people into the Dawless Jammin’ group. I want my group to
all together for years because I grew to hate making music that
be a place where the everyday noob can feel comfortable asking
way. I wasn’t ready to give up on music production all together, so
questions and learning from others in the process.
I started researching online and discovered synthesizers and how people did it before computers took over.
Are there any new online platforms that you like to use in your practise and what is your experience with them?
Do you get a lot of feedback from followers and are there any repeating patterns in what people like or
To be honest, I think we’re too connected to the internet. I feel
dislike in terms of gear and explaining how it works?
that time that could be used for music creation is wasted with the use of too many platforms. Like I said, the fb group started
After creating the Dawless Jammin’ fb group, which actually
it all, but I try to use fb less and less, as I do believe it is a big
came before the Youtube channel I realized I wasn’t the only
time waster. Lately I’ve been on Bandcamp a lot, discovering
person that felt this way. A lot of people had lost their enjoyment
new music and artists. I feel it’s better for your mental health to
of music creation because of not knowing there was another
be less connected to the internet and have a deeper connection
way. This is my target audience; the lost musician who wants
with yourself instead.
more possibilities, who is eager to learn, who enjoys discovering and wants another way of doing things. Learning I didn’t need
Do you also teach music in your offline life?
a computer to make sounds or create full tracks was such a big moment in my life that I want everyone feeling what I felt to
Right now I do not, I just don’t have time for it. I think education
know there is another way. The response I get from my followers
is important and I will be applying to graduate school soon, non
is normally very positive, people are very thankful that I take the
music related. This takes up a lot of my free time, but I know it
time to teach some of the things people are afraid to ask.
will be worth it in the future and it allow me to give attention to the things I enjoy in life without stressing about others.
How do you think about your appearance and image? Like any woman, I wish I was 90-60-90 (A Colombian saying about ideal body measurements, I’m Colombian by the way). Yes I wish I was a little thinner, had better posture, but overall I think I’m beautiful, and having this mentality about yourself will take you places. What you think about yourself is far more important than what others think about you. Learning this will allow you to take risks in certain areas of your life that you might regret not taking later on. The older you get the less you care, so look forward to that.
WENDY CARLOS (*1939)
I didn’t decide. It chased me. I loved all the musical, mechanical and dramatic things about the field.
Wendy has built up lyrical sounds nobody ever heard coming out of a digital synthesizer before. Robert Moog
As a kid Wendy Carlos studied piano, as an adult, physics. She later joined the ColumbiaPrinceton Electronic Music Center at Columbia University (the first of its kind in the USA) and studied composition under Vladimir Ussachevsky. Around the time she began working as a sound engineer, she also met Robert Moog. It was her use of a Moog synthesizer on her legendary allBach album Switched on Bach which brought the Moog synthesizer, relatively new at that time, into the spotlight. Switched on Bach, coproduced by Rachel Elkind, was awarded three Grammy Awards in 1968. Wendy Carlos (born Walter Carlos) was one of the first public figures to undergo gender reassignment. Although her transition began shortly after her first release, she did not talk openly about it until 1979. Before that she worked with Stanley Kubrick on the soundtrack for A Clockwork Orange where she introduced the vocoder with Moog and famously covered Beethoven’s 9th Symphony and the Symphonie Fantastique by Berlioz. Her commercial success continued when she scored Disney’s Tron and Kubrick’s The Shining. For her work on The Shining, Carlos invented a continuous controller called Circon to be able to play long haunting melodies. She was aware of the limited possibilities of Moog’s inventions and advised him on the development of the instruments, especially regarding its control section. One of her inventions that never came to life was a Multiphonic Generalized Keyboard.
Marie Čtveráčková aka Mary C Musician, DJ, radio host, music editor and founder of music
education platform Kreaton together with her partner producer and composer Martin Tvrdý with whom she organizes various music workshops. She hosts her weekly show on public Czech Radio Wave focused mostly on rap and various kinds of electronic music and curates music education program Music Ports focused on supporting local young musicians in collaboration with Goethe-Institut Prag. She also co-founded collective ZVUK and together with Bastl Instruments they opened a space for music education in Prague. Together with Alissa DeRubeis, co-founder of the original S1 Synth Library Portland/USA, Mary C started Synth Library Prague which she also runs. She co-curated events in collaboration with Prague clubs MeetFactory or Palác Akropolis and hosted many debates rooted in cultural activism. Together with Martin Tvrdý she released experimental projects under the name Hrubik and the two tour together as Člověk Pokrokový (Man of Progress). MY INSTRUMENT My primary instruments are violin and voice.
Alissa DeRubeis
Originally from Philadelphia, She currently resides in Portland, OR, where she works for 4MS and S1. A co-founder of the S1 Synth Library and Synth Library Prague, Alissa enjoys teaching intros and workshops around the world, facilitating library hours, and patching pre-amps and resonant filters. Her interests include participating in artist and volunteer run non-profits, gender equity, playing music, making food, curating, collaborating, education, improvisation, sharing, and experiments. MY INSTRUMENT My favourite instrument is my voice. It’s hard to pick favourites when it comes to instruments because I’m tempted to pick certain modulars or even a synthesizer, but I have to award my title to the voice for a few reasons. The primary reason I chose my voice is it is always with me. Since I have constant and free access to my voice I have been able to grow and study with it the longest. Also, even though my range is very limited compared to a synthesizer, my ability to control my voice surpasses my ability to make quick changes with my synthesizer. The final reason I would choose my voice is that vocal expression always comforts me. I even sing to myself when I am scared or sad. To express my emotions on other instruments still takes some effort that is less natural feeling to me than crying out in joy or pain.
Nikol Štrobachová aka Bruno
Nikol is a lecturer, student, musician and mother. She was born in Prague, but currently lives in Brno. In 2015, she joined the Bastl Instruments collective and began recording her own videos focusing on modular synthesizers – a series entitled “Patching With Nikol.” Two years later she began teaching groups of women and girls in Brno’s Noise Kitchen, an activity which crystallized into the group Pink Noise, focusing on the education and support of women (primarily) in electronic music. This year, thanks to Alissa DeRubeis, Bastl, Mary C, and others’ support and trust, Nikol began leading workshops focused on beginners around the world. She is also a member of Synth Library Prague.
Tamara Shmidt aka Awali
Singer, multi-instrumentalist, producer, and composer who recently released her third album Ad Astra. Awali worked on and produced the album entirely on her own, from recording in her bedroom music studio to mixing. Her music is an ethereal mix of delicate vocals, synthesizers, and sound experiments, a sophisticated, dreamy mix providing listeners with an interesting and refreshing sound. Awali mainly plays in Czechia and Slovakia. She has played at many venues, including Roxy (Free Mondays) and Palace Akropolis (support act for Jessie Ware and Snow Ghosts), as well as festivals such as Euroconnections, United Islands, Žižkovská noc, and Say No to Art. She is currently actively involved in collaborations with other artists, work on remixes, and discovering new horizons of creative, electronic music work. MY INSTRUMENT My main instrument was always piano. I started playing it as a little girl when I was about three years old. At that time we didn’t have a real piano at home, but my dad built himself a little synth: he found gray and white keys, it was all open so I still remember the green velvet of the inside of the box and funny electronic schemes placed on top of it. I sat in his lap: he played some chords and I played melody (whatever I came up with without knowing anything about music). That was the point, when I first had that feeling of being amazed by the beauty of sounds. Another of my instruments is voice. I think it is an instrument, unique one. And I am happy that I’ve learned to use it. Those are the tools, that help me to experience life to the fullest. It is deeply healing. I love the story about Chopin: imagine young skinny and very sick man, tuberculosis was causing him to cough all the time. George Sand said, that only time, when he wasn’t coughing was while composing and playing... Also, I believe that this is a primary tool for expressing ourselves truly. Words can be often deceiving, however music speaks right to our soul. For me it was also a particular blessing, being able to speak through music: chords, melodies, intervals, progressions... Tiniest details and nuances of feelings through the prism of sound. My first piano teacher used to say that piano sounds like the entire orchestra and with that you can play almost any part, It is so rich in sound, so colorful. Besides, whatever I record, I use midi keyboard, that is connected with DAW with really wide palette of sounds and instruments. So the statement is true not only metaphorically but also literally.
Barbora Polcerová aka Enchanted Lands Project of Prague based artist Barbora Polcerová. She closely collaborates with the Prague cassette label Genot Centre on which she released her acclaimed debut album Feed Goals in 2017. She is currently working on her new album. Enchanted Lands sketches a world of plant life, wind harps and crystalline pads, with the aesthetic expectations and performative selfconstruction of a state of life timeline. These sounds do not have correspondence with any known reality – and yet they offer the listener instant immersion, the feeling of an imagined world where even more extreme sensations are physical reality. MY INSTRUMENT My instrument of choice is my laptop. I use Max/MSP for live playing, various VSTs and Reaktor occasionally for processing samples and Reaper for arranging and layering them. As far as hardware/ gear goes I use it rather sporadically, my favourite piece however is my cheesy plastic sounding synth/sequencer qy70 or cassette 4-track for a fuzzy, warbly sound. I love using software because it gives my sound a certain precision and endless possibilities. I’m self-taught. When I started making music two years ago I got help to grasp the basics from a few more experienced friends, when I learn something new these days it’s mostly through a long stream of trial and error. What I would like to say is that I don’t think producing and performing live necessarily has to be about technical perfection. What I personally find the most important is finding your own voice and aesthetics and creating your own unique world.
Ewelina Chiu aka AI-FEN
Half Polish and half Chinese, born in Lodz, Poland. Her family
As a child I started to play flute, I picked it up and made a sound
immigrated to North America when she was three, and she
on the first try. It wasn’t in tune, just a sound. But making a sound
spent her childhood between Canada, the United States, and
on this thing outside of myself made everyone say I had talent,
Poland. After settling in Prague several years ago, Ewelina formed
and it should be finessed and nurtured. And it was, and I played.
the music duo ba:zel with her husband Daniel Vlček. Since
But when I sang it was out of place, in the car or randomly in
forming ba:zel has developed two distinct faces: a melodic avant
the halls at school, and I was told to shut up. I could sing at
or, as Slovenian artist KUKLA put it, “witch-pop” side and an
church during mass or join the choir, but not just because. So
experimental, improvisational one often developing on the basis
I forgot about my voice for awhile. Then one day I was reminded,
of temporary collaborations with performers, visual artists, and
and since then I’ve become more and more attached to it as an
filmmakers. Ewelina plays the flute, piano, sings, and composes
instrument, a tool, and most of all, a possibility. It’s funny, because
using a variety of sampling methods, synthesizers, drum machines,
all it took was someone saying “Hey, you have a good voice,”
and live recordings. She performs solo under the name AI-FEN.
and wanting to work with it as a source of sound (and I’m utterly grateful to that person, you know who you are!).
MY INSTRUMENT My favourite instrument is my voice, but in a way, for awhile
Over the last year I’ve started sampling my voice extensively
I forgot all about it, misplaced or maybe just mislabeled it. My
and using it to compose the majority of my solo tracks.
voice was a vehicle for making language, sounds that were signs
The amount of technology available to us to create is
meant to create a shared reality. It was a practical tool, but its
overwhelming, and working with one’s own voice offers a way
quintessence, its quality and ability was not considered.
to focus. At the same time, it is often unbearable to hear your voice because it is the sonic expression of who you are
When we sing, we want to have a “good” voice. It should be
at some essential level, and so working with the voice is also
melodious, pleasing to the ears, and of course in tune! If we are
facing off yourself. There are days where my voice seems like
off key as children we are berated and often dismissed as not
the most cumbersome of limitations. On those days I tend
having the fabled “good” voice while, on the other hand, if we
to really play with it using different sampling methods and
are instinctively in key we are said to have it. What I mean to
software. I manipulate it into being a subbass, a glitch, or
say is that often the voice (the good voice) is not considered as
a beat, and this helps to reveal the hidden dimensions in it
a tool to be sharpened and trained (like a musical instrument),
and lift some of the insecurity of being inadequate, technology
but something you either have or don’t. And if you are said not
working like a microscope, or a scalpel.
to have it just once, the voice being such a personal thing and so closely tied to identity, it makes you not want to make a sound (other than to speak, and sometimes not even that).
Hana Lukaščik
Musician mostly from Brno, Ostrava and Orlová... as if it
aside quite a lot of time. The difference in modulars in contrast
mattered. As a child she fell in love with (amateur) theatre art.
with traditional musical instruments (such as the guitar) is that
She hates most theater productions, but nevermind that. Despite
modulars need to be first understood with the mind. Before
this, she is proud to be a shadow member of D’epog (a platform
a person starts playing on modulars, it’s good for them to know
for performative art). She also has some experience with musical
how sound is created, the patterns it makes, and how one
instruments (flute, drums, electronic keyboard, synths) but
can work with it. This is a completely different path than, for
nothing compares to her acquaintance with the modular synth /
example, learning how to play a guitar. When a person wants to
eurorack. She proudly uses it thanks to Bastl Instruments where
start working with modulars on their own, they find themselves
she works as “Hello Kitty” (DIY section).
standing in front of a pile of physics terminology, music lessons, manuals to individual modulars and so on. My own start
MY INSTRUMENT
with modulars I owe mainly to Nikol who, with unbelievable
MODULARS ARE A SCIENCE AND GAME
motivation, was able to transform this horror from a complicated
WORK WITH WHAT YOU HAVE
system into a thing of clarity, simplicity, as well as a game and
When a person wants to create music, they either know ahead
form of entertainment. In the end, that’s one of the interesting
of time exactly what they want to play or they allow themselves
qualities of modulars: they work even if a person doesn’t know
to be carried away by fate, musical instruments or whatever else
much about them and just enjoys connecting cables and
related to music creation. I’ve always seen music as an extremely
thinking up different ways to form sound.
emotional and sensitive experience which, for my rational mind, invariably made it the least understandable of all the arts. I don’t
EFFECT
have the skills or capacity for classical music and as for playing
Without me expecting it, modulars have become the instrument
in a band, I’ve never met the right people to play with. Playing
which is best able to musically express what I feel. Leaving
music from a computer on the other hand, seems to me to be
out my childhood, modulars are the only instrument which I’ve
a bit torn away from reality. But things were put into motion
liked performing live with. I’m grateful for the fact that, thanks
when I started getting to know modular synths. (When you don’t
to modulars, I’ve started to understand music more as well as
know, work with what you have at your disposal. Fate will bring
people and what forms them. Likewise, through modulars I’ve
you something.)
started to understand the world around me a little better.
A COMPLICATED SYSTEM WHICH
I see the power of modulars in their ability to get into the
IS SIMULTANEOUSLY A GAME
essence of things (SOUND) and in depth while being capable
Learning something new is always generally beneficial. But
of tailoring to a person to express ideas and feelings by using
learning to play a new instrument requires for a person to set
individual modules that create a modular synth.
Natálie Pleváková
Composer and sound artist based in Prague. In 2018, she graduated from the Janáček Academy of Music and Performing Arts in Brno. Before that she finished her studies at the Musicology Department of the Faculty of Arts at Masaryk University with a thesis focused on mapping the education in electronic music in Czechia. In her work she focuses on compositional strategies of electronic music in the postdigital era. She creates compositions overlapping with diverse media and likes to collaborate in the theater or AV arts. MY INSTRUMENT I can’t say what my favourite instrument is because I’m still constantly searching for it, a process I really enjoy. The schism between analog/digital isn’t something I concern myself with too much. That being said, about three years ago I started to program using SuperCollider. To this day, it is my favourite method of creating sounds and instruments. Although digital synthesis is what struck me first, the reasons for this were not particularly interesting: I simply didn’t have the money while completing my studies to get a super synth of some kind or start to put together my own modular. Most likely I wouldn’t have even known what to choose. Nonetheless, I think the sore butt from hours of coding has paid off. The instrument I made, which I am continually improving, is one of the ones I currently use the most. Despite this, my relationship with coding is an ambivalent one. This is rather aptly captured by an experience I had at a particular concert in Brno where, during a live coding performance, someone asked me if I was really playing, or just checking my email. For me, this question was kind of a fair one. After all, things like gestures, space, and the entirety of the concert situation in all its physicality and spirituality exist outside of the laptop screen. And so for a change I’ve sometimes used just a keyboard and touchpad laptop during shows, but I’m still searching for the ideal controller. In my opinion, it should function as naturally as possible and as an extension of the person playing it. An advantage of developing one’s own instrument is related to an important aspect I have come across while composing, limitation. In my case limited experience with programming or the result of contextual work with a creative theme. I like indulging in today’s seemingly endless possibilities regarding instruments and sound sources. Every new wave seems to me somehow exceptional and significant. Ultimately, however, the more a person remains moderate regarding input material, the more they can pay attention to composition and creating small, but important relationships between individual modulations of material that is well known to them. And just as with traditional instruments, it makes sense for me to strive towards some kind of virtuosity. Respectively speaking, developing a relationship with an instrument which supports the logic of composition and the intuition of playing.
Ursula Sereghy
Musician and student of biochemistry Charles University
body, from the diaphragm to the delicate mechanics of the lips,
spending time trying to figure out and control anything
differentiating individual sound waves and trying to mute the
that makes sounds. Her primary instrument is a saxophone.
unwanted ones while equalizing tone. In my opinion the ability
Throughout the last year she has been extensively studying
to produce sound with one’s body is essential to maintaining
Ableton Live and synths. After many years of performing with
intimacy while playing. I also have respect toward craft and basic
various jazz bands, she found her new musical way. Her passion
traditions and values, and I cannot express them better than with
for electronic music and urgency to express her ideas lead her
loyalty towards my instrument.
to release first couple of track and future will surely bring many more. Recently she is a member of new hip hop / soul / jazz
Stems
project Metastavy, which is constantly evolving and even to
But it would be too serious to think that way while doing
suprise of the musicians themselves, electronic dance music
something as fun as making sound. Music belongs to people and
influences starts to play more significant role. Earlier this year
one of the main points is fun. That’s why I also use Ableton for
Sereghy worked on and audio installation for Berlin social
recording, synthesis and composing my own ideas.
critique exhibition of Matyáš Maláš, Julius Reichl and Namora Ynrobyva. Her piece was created as a collage of daily sounds of
Branching
the city, rap samples and oddly processed sounds of rain forests.
I like everything new, undiscovered and playful. New sounds and the possibilities of today’s technology and how to work with
MY INSTRUMENT
them get me going. I’m also interested in the combination of
Roots
technology and the human being, not based on a relationship of
Choosing an instrument is one of the basic questions I address
power over a machine, as an intermediary of intention, but on
in my work. One of the aspects and lines of thought concerning
the basis of two entities, one living and one seemingly inanimate
this is to take the instrument as a craft, the ability of the body
forming an unexpected result. For me, synthesizers represent
and soul to control external instruments and project one’s own
the possibilities of exploring these paths. This instrument allows
moods, emotions, and opinions through it. Managing this ability
access to sounds from a different angle of hearing, turning
brings about the necessity to learn to concentrate, to be patient
over one’s sometimes lightly stagnating thoughts on music and
and not to give up. It’s not just about learning to master the
further opening the door to fantasy.
craft, but also about cultivating the personality. And that is why my instrument is the saxophone (tenor, baritone, and soprano).
These three parts together will hopefully be able to support one
Playing this instrument means being able to control your entire
another and create a complex living system.
ITA KILHOF
ITA has always liked to play. She prefers gear to software as she likes to touch things and use her voice. Her background is that of visual and performance art, film and outdoor sports. She loves collabs across media and the style spectrum. She now lives in central Europe with occasional residencies in the UK. She has always been keen on the underground but is still considering moving closer to the surface.
Polina Khatsenka aka mʊdʌki
Belarus born sound artist, producer and digital/vinyl DJ. She now lives and studies new media arts in Czechia in Usti nad Labem at the JEPU, Faculty of Arts and Design, at a time-based media studio. Another activity in sound includes her activity in the phonon~ crew, which organises quadraphonic all-night experimental / ambient music / sound art concerts. She mostly djs underground dance music but also has a further dimension making ambient mixes. This very different kind of dj-ing is perhaps closer to a special sound selection appropriate for sleeping concerts. In sound production m d ki works mostly with her own field-recordings with special content reflecting the sonic situation of a place. Her work is strongly influenced by the aspects and approaches of music/ sound composing common for the 50s-80s, such as deep listening, musique concrete, electroacoustic music, and minimalist, noise and experimental avant-garde music.
Aneta Martínková aka Margo Composer and singer that goes by the name Margo. Her
project originated as part of Prague-based music collective Bad Names and in spring 2018 she released her first single called “A Well Traveled Gentleman Mr. Partesh Having a Drink On the 96 Floor, What a View”. Recently she finished her debut album that is scheduled to be released at the end of the year. Aneta Martínková combines electronic music with acoustic instruments, but when it comes to the form, she refers to her music as to pure singer-songwriting capturing stories of random people.
Sára Vondrášková aka Never Sol Prague based producer, songwriter and singer who introduced
herself on the Czech music scene in 2012 by a song called Lay Down, it was composed for a feature film “Ve Stínu” by David Ondříček. In 2013 she released her debut album “ Under Quiet” in collaboration with producer Jan P. Muchow, which was later re-released by established German label Denovali Records. Recently Never Sol took part in Red Bull Music Academy in Tokyo, collaborated with acclaimed Czech musician Floex and composed original music for a dance performance of Burki&com. She just released her second solo album “CHAMELEO”, that also introduced her as a skillful producer.
TRIGGER – SYSTEM
Music education program conducted by Synth Library Prague and Portland lead by women in music (not only) for women in music. With this project it’s organizers aim to open the topic of diversity and representation in music and sound art in general but also to discuss systems of control ont only in the field of music technology. The program was divided into seven closed mentoring sessions focused mainly on creative process and music technology in which all the participants were involved. The sessions also featured contributions from guest lecturers such as Tatiana Heuman, Beth Custer, Moisés Horta Valenzuela, Monster or Eva Hamouzková but also lectures by paticipants themselves. The public events of the program included three discussions and a lecture on the topic of social change in music, performative lecture of Synth Library co-founders and final concert of all the participants. MOTHERHOOD AND ART CAREER
MUSIC AND VOICES OF QUEER COMMUNITY
“Unconventional doesn’t mean dysfunctional”
Queer is not a genre
Amy Millan on touring with her kids
11/10 2018 Patra Café, Prague
9/16 2018 Synth Library Prague guests: guests:
Oda Haliti – acclaimed DJ, promoter and activists from Kosovo
Nikol Štrobachová – musician, educator, member of Bastl
Monster – DJ, activist and lecturer from Poland, member of
Instruments crew and founder of Pink Noise, female and non-
women empowerment collective Oramics
binary collective focused on modular synths
Gaya – DJ and promoter, co-founder of queer femme music
Tereza Stejskalová – curator, art critic, coordinator of tranzit.
collective Meotar based in Prague
org and co-author of the code of practise “Feminist (Art) Institution”
hosted by Mary C in collaboration
Beata Hlavenková – acclaimed jazz composer, pianist and
with Mezipatra Queer Film Festival
teacher fusing jazz, modern classical music and pop hosted by Mary C
TRIGGER PERFORMATIVE LECTURE Who controls electronic music?
MUSIC AND VOICES OF ROMA COMMUNITY
11/29 2018 American Centre, Prague
“We have to say us, not them.” Zuzana Jurková
Performative lecture presented by Mary C and Alissa DeRubeis
10/28 2018 Žižkostel, Prague
calling for revision of history of electronic music and discussion on the topic of representation, diversity, social change and
guests:
control systems in music.
Zuzana Jurková – head of Ethnomusicology program at Charles University, author and editor of many publications on Romani music, organizer of Summer School “Romani musics” Erika Fečová – singer and composer of mostly soul and r’n’b
TRIGGER LIVE
music, she also teaches at the International conservatory Prague
12/1 Punctum-Krásovka, Prague
Bohumila Sommerová – classically trained singer, collaborator of J. K. Tyl Theatre in Pilsen, she teaches at primary school
Life performances by Trigger-System participants and launch of the Trigger magazine. Special guest: Born in Flamez (no genre,
hosted by Mary C as part of the Roma Pride March
no gender)
TRIGGER MAGAZINE One of the outcomes of the project is also this magazine focused on women empowerment, diversity in music and systems of control not only in the field of electronic music.
Many thanks to all the participants, guest lecturers, inspiring role models and supporters. TRIGGER magazine and the whole program TRIGGER – SYSTEM conducted by SYNTH LIBRARY PRAGUE and PORTLAND was supported by Women’s Empowerment grant of U.S. EMBASSY. Created and published by: TRIGGER COLLECTIVE and SYNTH LIBRARY PRAGUE and PORTLAND Concept & editor: MARY C Graphic design: CARTON CLAN Printed by: TOMOS PRAHA
synth library prague 2018