Sonic Arts Research Centre, Queen's University Belfast, 18.01.2018

Two of the leitmotifs running through my work are the effect of time on memory and perception, and the creation (however illusory) of a fragile continuity from discontinuity. My large-scale ‘Traces’ Cycle for solo flute (1991-2006) is perhaps the best illustration of the former tendency, while the latter is typified by Music for 25 Solo Strings (Epitomaria-Glosaria-Commentaria) and åNeM (1996) for solo piano.

Like Music for 25 Solo Strings and åNeM (based respectively on a motet by William Byrd and an organ work by the 17th Century Neapolitan composer Giovanni Maria Trabaci), this piece makes use of pre-existing musical material.  In this case, seven fragmentary and radically differentiated versions of the Andante from C.P.E. Bach’s 4th Württemberg sonata are segmented and interleaved. Their juxtaposition creates the impression of an object viewed from different angles, different distances and different perspectives, prompting a constant revaluation of an original, which remains tantalisingly out of earshot.  

I also like to think that the piece is not simply an acknowledgement of my long-standing interest in C.P.E Bach, but can be seen as a symbol of the welcome critical re-interpretation of his music over the past 50 years, as well as recognising his well-documented interest in philosophy, aesthetics and music theory. 

The piece is dedicated to Pavlos Antoniadis.

James Erber: Elided Dilapidations (after C.P.E. Bach)(2014-2015)

British composer James Erber was born in 1951 in London of an Austrian father and an English mother. After studying Music at the Universities of Sussex (BA, 1973) and Nottingham (MA, 1975), he was appointed Music Editor at Peters Edition, London. He left Peters Edition in 1979 and began work as a freelance editor, writer and translator.  Still largely self-taught as a composer, it was at this period he produced his first acknowledged score, "Seguente" for oboe and piano (1976-1978, revised 1980). The guidance and encouragement he received from Brian Ferneyhough (whom he had met at Peters Edition) prompted him to a serious study of composition, firstly with Jonathan Harvey at the University of Sussex (MPhil in Composition, 1983), then from 1981 to 1982 with Ferneyhough himself at the Musikhochschule, Freiburg-im-Breisgau. In 1984, at Ferneyhough’s suggestion, he made the first of five visits to the Darmstadt Ferienkurse, winning a Stipendienpreis in 1988. From 1982 to 2016, he combined activity as a composer with teaching and lecturing. Since 2016 he has been able to concentrate solely on composition. 
James Erber's work reflects a wide range of interests, including Renaissance and Baroque music, the music of South-East Asia, Jazz, blues, Mediaeval and Renaissance philosophy, Kabbalah, green politics, recent scientific developments, film noir, Jacobean tragedy, the Gothic novel and historical slang.  His music is multi-layered and complex (especially from the point of view of rhythm and form). Its complexity is, however, combined with harmonic clarity and lyricism as well as a tenuous sense of optimism and a concern with intellectual and spiritual continuity.
It has been performed and broadcast widely by soloists such as Pavlos Antoniadis, Antonella Bini, Mario Caroli, Diego Castro Magaš, Matteo Cesari, Franklin Cox, Gianpaolo Antongirolami, Gleb Kanasevich, Carin Levine, Ian Pace, Jonathan Powell, Nancy Ruffer and Michele Selva, as well as by ensembles including 175 East, the Arditti Quartet, Duo Galeano/Javaid, Exposé, ELISION, Lontano and NOISE. James Erber’s music has been recorded on NMC, Metier, Centaur Records (USA) and Convivium Records. Many of his scores are available from Composers Edition. In July 2022, his complete writings on music (1978-2021) were published by Vision Edition under the title "Fragile Continuities".

I'll follow you back when SC lifts the follower limit (!)
Loving listening to everyone's music on here :-))))))))))

Dr Pavlos Antoniadis (PhD University of Strasbourg-IRCAM, MA University of California, San Diego, MA University of Athens) is a pianist, musicologist and technologist from Korydallos, Athens, Greece, currently based in France. He performs complex contemporary and experimental music, studies embodied cognition and develops tools for technology-enhanced learning & performance. He is currently researcher at EUR -ArTeC, Paris 8 and following up at the Berlin Institute of Technology (TU-Audiokommunikation) as a Humboldt Stiftung scholar. He collaborates with the Interaction-Son-Musique-Mouvement team at IRCAM and he is a member of the Laboratory of Excellence GREAM, Université de Strasbourg, where he also taught seminars on computer music and contemporary performance practice.

As a pianist, he has performed in Europe, North & South America and Asia with the new music ensembles Work in Progress-Berlin, Kammerensemble Neue Musik Berlin, Phorminx, ERGON, Accroche Note, as well as a soloist with the Thessaloniki State Symphony Orchestra. He has participated in recordings for Mode (2015 German Recording Critics Award / Deutscheschallplattenkritikspreis) and Wergo records. As a soloist, he has worked with composers Mark Andre, Helmut Lachenmann, Brian Ferneyhough, Wolfgang Rihm, Tristan Murail, Richard Barrett, Walter Zimmermann, and has premiered solo piano works by James Erber, Nicolas Tzortzis, Andrew R. Noble, Luis Antunes Pena, Dominik Karski, Laurentiu Beldean and others. His programming features the most complex contemporary works, extremes of physicality, live electronics, multimedia and musical theatre, often in eclectic dialogue with ancient repertoire from Cabezón to Bartók. He is also active in free improvisation with the composer and improviser Panos Ghikas (London) and has collaborated with the physical theatre group Zero Point (Athens).

As a researcher, Pavlos was a Musical Research Residency fellow at IRCAM in 2014, where under the supervision of Frédéric Bevilacqua and Dominique Fober (Grame, Lyon) he developed GesTCom (Gesture Cutting through Textual Complexity), a sensor-based environment for the gestural control and analysis of complex piano notation, for example of works by Xenakis or Ferneyhough. His research record includes fifteen (15) publications in English, German and French and over fifty (50) talks and lecture-performances in several institutions (HfM Dresden, INMM Darmstadt, IRCAM Paris, Orcim Gent, Goldsmiths London, Trinity Dublin, Aristoteleio Thessaloniki, Cité de la Musique et de la Danse Strasbourg, Hong Kong University, Yamanashi Gakuin University Kofu, Wocmat Taiwan, LEAD Dijon, SARC Belfast, UdK Berlin) and international conferences.

Pavlos holds degrees in piano performance (Piano Diploma, Nakas Athens; Koninklijk Conservatorium Den Haag;  MA, UC San Diego) and musicology (MA, Athens National University, PhD Université de Strasbourg in co-direction with the  IRCAM, under Pierre Michel and Frédéric Bevilacqua). He has studied on LabEx GREAM, IRCAM, Fulbright, UC San Diego, Nakas conservatory, Internationale Ensemble Modern Academie Frankfurt and Impuls Academie Gratz scholarships. His PhD thesis was awarded the "Prix de thèse 2019" from the University of Strasbourg. His main piano teachers were Chryssi Partheniade, Ian Pace, Geoffrey Douglas Madge and Aleck Karis. In ensemble performance, he has followed the seminars of Ensemble Modern and Klangforum Wien.

CONTACT:

katapataptwsi@yahoo.gr

antoniadis@ircam.fr

pavladisanton@gmail.com


http://ismm.ircam.fr/pavlos-antoniadis/

https://pavlosantoniadis.wordpress.com/about/