A playlist of avant-garde, indie, and alternative music.

Avant-garde

KAUM  traces

Dariya Maminova`s  Melchior (2021) ein Song für zwei Spieler mit Synthesizern und Stimmsamples Kompositionsauftrag des WDR
Sebastian Berweck & Jan Gerdes
Hammondorgel, Synthesizer und Stimmsamples
Studio Recording Berlin Dec 2021

Dariya Maminova  `Melchior`for two synthesizer and hammond players (2021)

My own arrangement of this iconic Beatles song. Live performance Dec 2021

The Beatles - While My Guitar Gently Weeps/Arrang. Jan Gerdes

My version of Brad Mehldaus arrangement of `Tear drop` by Massive attack. Live performance 2021

Massive Attack - Teardrop/ Arrang. Mehldau/Gerdes

07 Federico Mompou - Impresion Intima No 1

STIMMUNG by Karlheinz Stockhausen performed live @ OPENING Festival 2014


STIMMUNG by Karlheinz Stockhausen

Karlheinz Stockhausen (1928-2007)
Klavierstück IX (1960)

Hayk Melikyan, piano
www.haykmelikyan.com

Karlheinz Stockhausen: Klavierstück IX

György Kurtag: aus Játékok: Spiel mit dem Unendlichen

POOLcast 083 - rand

We are happy to present something very new and unique for our october issue. rand, the duo for urban sensitive music for piano and electronics by Dr.Nojoke and Jan Gerdes, have provided us with an exclusive recording of an improvisation. rand have just released their first album "Peripherie", which they distribute themselves. A project that took over two years of work and is now available as download, CD and limited vinyl edition. This time they demonstrate that they are not only able to record excellent music in the studio, furthermore they are also presenting their vision of the fusion of piano and electronics in an improvised way.

rand merges the pure, acoustic nature of the piano with the twisted world of electronics, often breaking with expectations of normal listening habits. Unpredictably, the two seemingly so different musical and falsely pre-determined spheres can abruptly switch positions. Piano and electronics coexist on an equal level in all areas of the musical process. Rhythm, tonality and dynamics are not reserved for one of the two realms. The apparent boundaries between electronics and piano blur for moments now and then, only to appear tangible again a few moments later. This creates a constant tension that surrounds the recording from beginning to end. So it's worth taking the time to listen actively several times, preferably in different environments and states of mind, alone or together, to feel firsthand what the apparent tension between piano and electronics can trigger. 

Enjoy.

https://soundcloud.com/thepoolberlin/poolcast-083-rand 
https://poolcast.bandcamp.com/track/poolcast-083-rand
https://www.mixcloud.com/ThePoolcasts/poolcast-083-rand 

//

rand - peripherie
https://lnkfi.re/peripherie

rand
https://rand-musik.de/ 
https://rand.bandcamp.com/
https://open.spotify.com/artist/4s62y1IkMxpy3GTFmBaalQ
https://soundcloud.com/rand_gerdes_drnojoke 

//

The POOL Berlin
https://www.thepoolberlin.de/ 
https://facebook.com/thepoolberlin/
https://soundcloud.com/thepoolberlin/
https://poolcast.bandcamp.com/
https://mixcloud.com/ThePoolcasts/
https://pooltracks.bandcamp.com/
https://open.spotify.com/show/5YxJHKoPPflbj9NKleINUz
https://podcasts.apple.com/de/podcast/poolcast/id1462173000
https://overcast.fm/itunes1462173000/poolcast
https://pca.st/tC92
https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/the-pool-berlin/poolcast
https://bit.ly/2LwuUBE
https://amzn.to/2K3elN4

POOLcast 083 - rand

Roaming in a Wood is a song for a quartet comprising two violins, a cello, and a flute. The theme, which glides from the strings to the flute, invokes a feeling of continuous bewilderment in an unknown realm.

Buy the song

Roaming in a wood

CEPRY

A symphonic composition by Kordian Piwowarski
Cepry is a part of the Symfonia Tatrica project.
More information soon.

composed, arranged and produced by Kordian Piwowarski

featuring:
Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra and Tallin Chamber Choir 
recorded at Teldex Scoring Stage 
VST by Orchestral Tools

Mixed by Mania Studio
01.2025

all rights reserved Kordian Piwowarski

SYMFONIA TATRICA - CEPRY

In their latest release, ‘Teer’ (english: tar), rand unveil two uncompromising extended tracks, ‘Teer I – fluid’ and ‘Teer II – rolled’.
Teer is due to be released on 29 August 2025 via their own imprint RAND.

Exuding a technoid and industrial ambience, the EP sees the piano-electro duo of Jan Gerdes and Dr.Nojoke venture into uncharted territories. 
‘Teer’ evokes the atmosphere of urban spaces and overlooked places: the profane and seemingly meaningless transitions of car parks, subways and construction sites, where material textures and surfaces are scanned acoustically.
You can hear machines moving and processing the tar, smoothing the ground and forming layers and bead-like thickenings as it transitions from liquid to solid, with the edges fraying in a coordinated manner.

In ‘Teer I’, the musical material takes on a more fluid and wafting form, driven by pulsating technoid machines, while a lonely, melancholic voice observes from a distance.
'Teer II' is more of a portrait of the rhythmic details of the urban scenario: the motorised, metallic pulsations of the machines at work during various rolling processes form acoustic layers between which a quite sad, hypnotic melody occasionally emerges.

Everything seems deserted and gloomy … with only a few workers behind the machines.

Both pieces were recorded live in one take.
Drawings by Jan Gerdes, photo by Dr.Nojoke


rand - Teer 2 - rolled

rand - Teer 1 - fluid

Impro-Session 5.6.2025 Musikhochschule Mannheim Kammermusiksaal 

Prof.Sidney Corbett-E-Gitarre 
Jan Gerdes- Klavier
Erik Drescher- Flöte

Impro-Session Gerdes/Corbett/Drescher 5.6.2025 Musikhochschule Mannheim

K. H. Stockhausen "Klavierstück V"

for 6 players, TamTam and Live-Electronics

Karlheinz Stockhausen - Mikrophonie 1 (1964) - Tutti157 Auschnitt

The pianist Jan Gerdes is one of the most interesting and versatile musicians of his generation. As a pianist between tradition and the avant-garde he is a master of both the classical–romantic and contemporary repertoire. 

Jan Gerdes studied piano at the colleges of music in Hannover, Detmold and Essen with Kurt Bauer, Nerine Barett and Renate Kretschmar-Fischer, and took master classes with famous pianists such as Anatol Ugorski, Halina Czerny-Stefanska and Edith Picht-Axenfeld. 

Concerts all over the world have taken this award-winning musician to countries in Europe, South America and the Far East. He has given guest performances at the Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival, Maerzmusik Berlin, Rotterdam Gaudeamus Week, Festival Chiffren, Festival Ultraschall Berlin, Musica Viva Straßburg, Stockhausen Courses, Centre Acanthes Metz, Bregenzer Festspiele, Haller Bachtage, Kunstfest Weimar, Beethovenfest Bonn, WDR Musikfest, Weingartener Tage Neuer Musik, Darmstadt Summer Courses and elsewhere, and he has appeared in concert halls such as the Berliner Konzerthaus, the Kölner Philharmonie, Opera de Paris, Essener Philharmonie, Konzerthaus Wien, Freiburger Konzerthaus, Tonhalle Düsseldorf, Alte Oper Frankfurt and Berliner Philharmonie. 

He has made television, radio and CD recordings for NDR, WDR, MDR, HR, RB, ORF, Deutschland Radio Berlin and the Label Ambitus. His solo CD Gelände/Zeichnung with very recent piano music was released in 2008 by Label Zeitklang. Jan Gerdes has worked with a number of leading contemporary composers, including Karlheinz Stockhausen, Helmut Lachenmann, Wolfgang Rihm and Peter Ruzicka, and has given first performances of works by Sidney Corbett, Peter Gahn, Brice Pauset, Moritz Eggert, Alex Nowitz, Marcus Antonius Wesselmann and many others. 

As a traveller between the worlds of classical and new music, electronica and performance, in 2004 he founded the composing and improvising duo EROL, which explores the interface between piano music and electronic club culture. Since 2018 he works on his  electroacoustic project `rand` with Berlin based techno producer Frank Bogdanowitz aka Dr.Nojoke. Their debut album „ Peripherie“ was released in 2022. 

The music-theatre platform solosymphonie-productions, a joint venture with actor Michael Fuchs, develops innovative programs and interdisciplinary projects that juxtapose traditional and modern elements in music, theatre, literature, visual art and dance in a dramaturgy that turns them into a sensory experience. Their successful production 4.48 Psychose, a confrontation of the play by Sarah Kane with contemporary notated and improvised music, was premiered at the Nationaltheater Mannheim.

Jan Gerdes is also working as a composer, as his piano solo project „ Songs and Improvisations“ presents own compositions and improvisations confronting the worlds of classical, contemporary and jazz music. His latest Solo album " Songs and Improvisations" will be released dec 2023 with label XJAZZMUSIC.

Jan Gerdes currently lives in Berlin and is a lecturer for piano and contemporary music at the University of Potsdam. He was teaching contemporary piano at the Hochschule für Musik Hanns Eisler Berlin, Improvisation at the Hochschule für Musik Mannheim and he hold master classes at the Mozarteum Salzburg and at the University of Liverpool. 


Contact:
+49 (0) 30 288 616 22
+49 173 200 56 22 
Paul-Robeson-Str. 50
10439 Berlin - Germany

jan@jan-gerdes.de 
www.jan-gerdes.de

As a composer, guitarist, and poet, Giuseppe Bonaccorso is firmly attached to atonal, avant-garde, and highly experimental music. A countercultural artist, he works out his music through original compositional processes never tied to mainstream culture.
#Guitar #Composition #AvantGarde

K. H. Stockhausen "Klavierstück V"

Jan Gerdes

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