soundcapsule

soundcapsule #5

sept 18: ensemble offspring, thembi soddell, lawrence english, eugene carchesio

Soundcapsule is a bi-monthly online feature offering free downloads of music by artists we've recently covered in RealTime.

All tracks are copyright the artists.

ensemble offspring, professor bad trip lesson 3 by fausto romitelli

Ensemble Offspring, Professor Bad Trip
photo Oliver Miller

Ensemble Offspring is a new music group performing works ranging from the 20th century masters to new commissions. They formed 15 years ago, originally under the name Spring Ensemble, the resident company for Roger Woodward’s Sydney Spring Festival. The group is led by percussionist Claire Edwardes and composer Damien Ricketson and has a core of regular musicians presenting an ambitious and plentiful program each year. They are well known for their eclectic approach to programming often collaborating across artforms, for example with contemporary performance group Theatre Kantanka (Sounds Absurd, 2010 and Bargain Garden, 2011), glass artist Elaine Miles (Fractured Again, 2010), scratch cinema expert and filmmaker Louise Curham (Waiting to turn into puzzles, 2008), video artists Andrew Wholly (Fractured Again) and Sean Bacon (Professor Bad Trip, 2011), and a host of specialist musicians including Halcyon vocal ensemble, improviser Jim Denley, experimental guitarist Oren Ambarchi, and electronica/noise artist Pimmon.

The track provided here is from their 2011 concert, Professor Bad Trip, highlighting the work of Italian composer Fausto Romitelli. Romitelli was inspired by the comic artist Gianluca Lerici aka Professor Bad Trip and poet Henri Michaux who both explored the effects of drug-induced hallucinations through their work (see our review in RT104).

See also realtime tv’s video interview with Claire Edwardes and Damien Ricketson

Download track: Ensemble Offspring, Professor Bad Trip Lesson 3 (11.9M)
Composer: Fausto Romitelli
Performers: Ensemble Offspring [cond. Roland Peelman]
Details: Recorded live at Carriageworks, Sydney, 18th June 2011
http://ensembleoffspring.com/
© the artists

on the tightrope of audience judgment
matthew lorenzon: ensemble offspring, new radicals
RealTime issue #110 Aug-Sept 2012 pg. 48

contagious matter, infectious stuff
caroline wake: theatre kantanka with ensemble offspring, bargain garden
RealTime issue #107 Feb-March 2012 pg. 36

tripping joy time
felicity clark: ensemble offspring, professor bad trip
RealTime issue #104 Aug-Sept 2011 pg. 47

composed spontaneity
greg hooper: stockhausen: a message from sirius
RealTime issue #91 June-July 2009 pg. 50

between contemplation and delirium
keith gallasch: ensemble offspring & louise curham
RealTime issue #86 Aug-Sept 2008 pg. web

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thembi soddell, artefact performance (excerpt, 2009)

Thembi Soddell, Ausland, Berlin
courtesy the artist

Thembi Soddell is a Melbourne based sound artist and electroacoustic composer working across recording, installation and live performance often collaborating with cellist Anthea Caddy. She is renowned for working with dramatic dynamics that have a disturbingly visceral effect on the listener. Gail Priest described her performance at High Reflections in RT103: “Soddell, hidden from view, created an amazingly evocative soundscape of unspecified but terrifying dread coming towards us slowly from a distance. An intensifying rumble augmented by half-human, half-animal shrieks reaches its zenith and then sucks back down, vacuum-like, to a ringing almost-silence, only to begin again. With a fine balance between augmented field recording and machine noise Soddell perfectly controls this exhilarating journey into her unconscious—or is it our own?”

Her installation Window (2008) has recently been presented as part of Sound Full in Dunedin, described by Sally Ann McIntyre as “somewhat paradoxically leav[ing] its closeted participants in a state of heightened vulnerability and bodily awareness.” (Sept 5 e-dition)

Download track: Thembi Sodell, Artefact Performance (excerpt) (2009) (8.3M)
http://cajid.com/thembi/
© the artist

the sound already present
sally ann mcintyre: sound full, dunedin public art gallery
RealTime issue #110 Aug-Sept 2012 pg. web

part 1: sydney scenes & sounds
gail priest: silent hour, ladyz in noyz, high reflections
RealTime issue #103 June-July 2011 pg. 40

liquid architecture 6: celebrating sound
gail priest
RealTime issue #68 Aug-Sept 2005 pg. 49

education feature: circuitous journeys
gail priest
RealTime issue #62 Aug-Sept 2004 pg. 34

scan 2003: thembi soddell
jonathan marshall
RealTime issue #57 Oct-Nov 2003 pg. 37

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lawrence english, coprinus comatus

Lawrence English
photo Greg Neate

Lawrence English is a Brisbane-based composer, media artist and curator. He is perhaps best known for his label and mulitarts organisation Room40 which has released CDs by a remarkable number of artists, both local and international. He has also presented a vast number of concerts, series and festivals in Brisbane such as MONO, Syncretism and the Open Frame festival. English is also the Brisbane-based director of Liquid Architecture and for the 2012 incarnation, he joined with Philip Samartzis to curate the whole festival focusing on the Antarctic. Of his performance with his trio Monolith (with Werner Dafeldeker and video artist Scott Morrison) Greg Hooper wrote in RT110: “Floes crackle, ice drips, trickles plop and burble. Thin overlays of surface water, wind blown ripples, soft unbreaking waves. Fade out. …One of the best Liquid Architectures I’ve been to (but do I always think that?) and, with Monolith, an exceptional performance that deserves much greater exposure.”

English also recently collaborated with Scott Morrison on a reworking of John Cage’s film for solo light One11, as part of Clocked Out’s The Cage in Us celebrations at the Judith Wright Centre. Drawing on this material and extending it further, English has release a new album through the Line imprint, For / Not for Cage, from which this track has been taken.

Download Track: Lawrence English, Coprinus comatus (11.2M)
From For / Not for Cage (Line 058, release Sept 18, 2012)
www.lineimprint.com
http://lawrenceenglish.com/
© the artist

selected articles

antarctic reveries
greg hooper: liquid architecture 13, brisbane
RealTime issue #110 Aug-Sept 2012 pg. 18

listening anew to john cage
greg hooper, the cage in us, presented by clocked out
RealTime issue #109 June-July 2012 pg. 35

10 years of room40: privileging the ears
danni zuvela: interview, lawrence english
RealTime issue #97 June-July 2010 pg. 39

next wave: warping dreamscapes
simon sellars: lawrence english, melatonin
RealTime issue #62 Aug-Sept 2004 pg. web

earbash reviews
lawrence english. ghost towns
greg hooper

lawrence english, transit
jonathan marshall

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extra bonus track: eugene carchesio, circle music 4

Eugene Carchesio, she sells $ilence by the sea shore 2011
courtesy Milani Gallery

Room40 have also allowed us to giveaway a track from fellow Brisbane-based composer Eugene Carchesio. While perhaps better known as a visual artist, creating complex geometric works, Carchesio has always been active as an underground musician appearing in bands such as The Deadnotes, The Lost Domain and working under pseudo-names such as DNE. Room 40 is releasing his back catalogue over the next year and currently has on offer a free taster from which this track has been selected.

Download track: Eugene Carchesio, Circle Music 4 (15.8M)
From Euguene Carchesio, Taster’s Menu (Room40, drm417)
http://room40.org/store/carchesio_tasters_menu_digital
© the artist