Machine Behaviour
für Algorithmen und 6 Instrumente
[Version 20.08.2021]

recorded live in St.Gallen, mixed by Beat Keller www.lagerstudios.ch

ENSEMBLE ORBITER

Riccarda Caflisch - Flöte
André Meier - Trompete
Simone Keller - Klavier
Martin Lorenz - Vibraphon
Aline Spaltenstein - Kontrabass
Oliver Roth - Modular Synthesizer

Im Stück - „Machine Behaviour“ - geht es darum zu beobachten, wie sich Algorithmen, Daten durch ein nichttriviales System im Medium Musik/Klang artikulieren lassen und dabei dieses artifizielle Verhalten - wie bei einem Lebewesen - zu studieren. Der Algorithmus generiert dabei stets neue Kombinationen, Formen und Abfolgen von Klängen, Gesten und Texturen. Durch das nichttriviale (unvorhersehbare, aber nicht zufällige) Verhalten der „Machine" ergeben sich dabei ganz charakteristische Eigenschaften, welche die Musiker*inne und Hörer*innen erleben und beobachten können. Die Maschine wird so zur eigentlichen „Performerin“ (oder auch Improvisatorin), welche die Noten/Partitur live während der Aufführung generiert und für die Musiker*innen auf den Screens bereitstellt. Für die Instrumentalist*innen bedeutet dies letztendlich, dass sie  zu einer Art „Membran“ dieser Maschine und ihres Codes werden und den Anweisungen folgen.

Machine Behaviour - 20.08.2021 - (mixed by Beat Keller)

Mitschnitt der Uraufführung/Mozart-Festival Schwetzingen -
Niko Friedrich - Eliot Quartett

SUBSONG 3 für Bassettklarinette und Streichquartett (2019/20)

A new addition to my no-input mixer project that I started in 2023. Performed live with a MACKIE 802 mixing desk on Feb 8th, 2024 at Studio kHz. No edits, no overdubs.
https://www.essl.at/works/studies-NIM.html

Studies for No-Input Mixer

Study for No-Input Mixer #8

Info

Study for No-Input Mixer #8 (2024) - Blacksmith

map/territory (2023)
for 4 instruments and electronics

“ […] ‘The map is the territory’ because we don’t have anything else but maps. We only have depictions or representations […|.” (Heinz von Förster)

The piece - an experimental setup - has a generative open form and no predetermined duration. The starting point of this work are 4 individual voices and electronics, each composed as a multi-dimensional matrix. This is broken down into individual electro-acoustic and instrumental fragments by algorithms and then newly reorganized and combined in various ways in each performance in different ways/evaluations - new forms, orders are formed (in several movements). Map is territory, territory is map.

played by ensemble soyuz21 / zurich 2023

map/territory (2023) - evaluation III

experimental/improvisation, trumpet, VCV Rack, electronics.

addendum/3

"Buzzing" composed by George Lewis, world premier performance 
by Marco Blaauw, trumpet, and George Lewis, live electronics, at the festival Wittener Tage für Neue Kammermusik, 4th of May, 2024.

George Lewis "Buzzing", performed by Marco Blaauw and George Lewis

1004/F

Live recording of the premier, St. Pauls Hall, University of Huddersfield, 18th April, 1996. Concert by YON Ensemble.

Floating Poles begins by setting up a regular movement from sparse music to a more compressed equivalent. This flow occurs around ‘poles’, defined harmonically. Later the poles float away from their fixed positions, dragging the associated material with them, leading to an overlap between blocks. The holes that result are filled by low echoes of the original material. Floating Poles was written for Stephen Altoft and first performed by him in Huddersfield on 18th April 1996.

James Saunders is a composer with an interest in group behaviours and decision making. He performs in the duo Parkinson Saunders. He runs the Open Scores Lab at Bath Spa University. See www.james-saunders.com for more information.

Floating Poles by James Saunders

On 12th December of 2002, duo Contour, in collaboration with SUONO MOBILE put on the first and only complete performance of Bryn Harrison's 'Listenings' Cycle at The Warehouse in London.  'Mantra' (Listenings V) the fifth and final movement is for solo trumpet and drone, which Bryn wrote for me in Autumn 1997. I gave the premier in 1998 at the Hebden Bridge Arts Festival, and have played about 20 times in total, internationally.

Listenings III is here https://soundcloud.com/duocontour/listenings-iii-by-bryn-harrison

For details about Bryn Harrison, please see his website: brynharrison.com

Mantra (1997) by Bryn Harrison for trumpet and drone

Manoury. Klangforum 10.4.2025 mp3

Performed by Amy Horvey (trumpet) and Karlheinz Essl (live-electronics)at the Concordia University, Montreal  on 23 Sep 2011.

Sequitur is a series of 14 compositions for various solo instruments and live-electronics written for outstanding soloists. Somehow it can be seen as a reference to Luciano Berio's famous Sequenze cycle of solo pieces which focus on specific playing techniques of the respective instrument. Essl's Sequitur cycle includes pieces for orchestral instruments like flute and violin, but also for voice, electric guitar, toy piano or kalimba.

All Sequitur composition use a software written in MaxMSP which creates an electronic accompaniment from the instrument’s live input; the player is confronted with his own playing, and this creates a situation like moving in a house of mirrors where the identities becomes blurred.

The Sequitur software generates a complex canon on the fly, the temporal structure and density of which being controlled by random operations. This yields different results every time the piece is performed. Although following a precisely notated score, there is always a good portion of surprise for the musician which emphasizes his awareness and attentiveness.

Info: http://www.essl.at/works/sequitur/sequitur-6.html

Machine Behaviour - 20.08.2021 - (mixed by Beat Keller)

André Meier [comp./trp.]