This is an unbeliveable piece already for me. I love it, your ideas are refreshing and yet you don't seem to be obsessed with it.

for amplified string trio and electromechanical devices

Repertorio Zero
Milano, Piccolo Teatro
04/11/2013

Two references are at the base of Regnum animale. The first is the Medieval tradition of bestiaria, intended as multi-faceted catalogues of miscellaneous beings, among which different relations can be defined. The variety and heterogeneity of the bestiaria i strikingly evident in early examples, that are topsy turvy lists of fantastic creatures, existing animals, stones and plants. A second reference for the work is taxonomy, that is, the systematic description of living organisms that dates back to Linnaeus’ Systema Naturae as the Rationalistic possibility of ordering the polymorphous (and many times teratomorphic) appearance of nature. One of the foundational aspects of taxonomy in the so-called “binomial nomenclature”, that provides for each organism a name specifying its place in relation to other organisms by means of the couple genus et species.
The heterogeneity of bestiaria is at the origin of both the setup and the organization devised for Regnum animale. Th former includes traditional acoustic instruments (string trio, but played with a variety of special techniques), surrounded by an amass of computer-driven, electro-mechanical devices built from discarded and scavenged every- day objects. For what concerns the organisation, indeed the general model is the catalog: Regnum animale is thus a sequence of 28 short pieces, each one dedicated to an imaginary animal. Here the sec- ond model –taxonomy– enters into play: all the pieces have the same duration, and each one has received a name following the binomial nomenclature. Hence, Regnum animale is also a systematic report about the creatures found in a terra incognita.


Mauro Lanza / Andrea Valle - "Regnum Animale" (2013)

What if the secret life of the machines that surround me every day grew suddenly louder, the way a part of the body cries out for attention whenever pain arises? I began to walk through my new and apparently post-pandemic city, where the quiet streets hummed again, and even the air seemed cut with a new intensity and purpose. This track begins with a late night calling, an uneven pulse, that summons a world of ticking gears and levers, underpinned with dark drones and stretched choral verses, as if despair was the necessary beginning of every joy.

Back In The Streets

Combined DIY hydrophone recordings from the workshop sessions "Something to Say" organised by Lakeland Arts at Windermere Jetty Museum, August 2022. Many thanks to Amy, Ian and the team!

Something To Hear Underwater

sound art series based on the poetry collection "Stories Untold"

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people were falling in the streets
shivering in agony, for what they saw would hit them
like a bolt, scalding them from within,
the Great War was now inside them

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I am buried
with you, and the others
in the trenches of shame, all piled up
& covered with sickening laughter.
Our eyeballs are rubbed with injustices,
ears deafen by rumble of terror,
hearts numbed with trepidation,
limbs soaked in repugnant lies,
minds bleached by virtual ordure.
They murder, they rape, they rob.
They bury. Me, you,
and the others.
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this 21-minute long sound work is a forest tale about war, re-imagined from the perspective of the land that witnessed centuries of socio-cultural turmoil. tamed nature versus wilderness, contaminated versus protected land, the Iron Curtain belt saw some significant changes – from being a brutal barrier between East and West strewn with mine fields, to becoming a highly protected European natural heritage.

the somewhat tense, suffocating and dark-sounding atmosphere of this piece reflects my feelings on possible relations between former and present conflicts, and alludes to the harsh consequences necro-politics of the past are imposing on contemporary society.

the stunning forest microbiome researched in this work is now part of the European Green Belt, formerly the Iron Curtain borderlands between Austria and Czech Republic. 

released September 14, 2023

sounds gathered during SHAPE+ musikprotokoll residency, July 2023, kindly hosted by Kulturzentrum – Garage Druzba, Harrachstal.

all sounds recorded, edited & composed by Manja Ristić
hydrophone built by Jez riley French
mastering La Plant Studio

Bandcamp

for what they saw would hit them like a bolt

This work is intended as a meditative companion-piece to an earlier work, https://soundcloud.com/hearingbeings/20211024-night-music-spring, and follows a similar structure. However, it was recorded in an entirely different location (thirty-six kilometres away).

In this piece, the auditory journey of approach towards the distant source has more intervals, and is more gradual, than in the earlier work. Listening to what may be heard along the way is as important as arrival. On this occasion, there is only one Eastern Banjo Frog in the midst of a plenitude of Spotted Marsh Frogs, along with some Brown Tree Frogs and Common Eastern Froglets.

Other than balancing gain levels, the sequence of recordings constituting this work (made during one night at one location) has not been filtered or processed in any way (with the exception only of the final two minutes).

Fixing the volume from the outset to a fairly low level, e.g., around 40 per cent, and certainly not more than 50 per cent, is recommended. What is distant and quiet will gradually become nearer and louder.

Recorded on the land of the Peramangk people.

The track image is a modification of an original photo of an Eastern Banjo Fog (Limnodynastes dumerlii) taken by by Fir0002/Flagstaffotos and made available under a CC BY-NC licence.

@Bandcamp

2023.12.23 Night Dreaming. One Final Banjo Frog. Early Summer.

May 5th, 2017, JACK Quartet - Witten's Johanniskirche (DE). Wittener Tage für neue Kammermusik

Pathos Of Distance, String Quartet No 2

Excerpt from track 1 of 'Knot Invariants', released by Entr'acte April 2012.

Chain Sinnet excerpt

Sarah Nemtsov
"weggeschliffen" (2018)
for amplified string quartet (with some effects)

live recording from January 18th, 2020 - Ultraschall Festival Berlin
Minguet Quartet

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Schwerer werden.
Leichter sein.

(Paul Celan)

***

painting from 2016 (excerpt) by Elisabeth Naomi Reuter

WEGGESCHLIFFEN (2018) string quartet

Composition made for the split release "Angry Ambient Artists Vol.2" published on Forwind label in 2017. It's a part of a diptych with the piece called Habitat. 

https://boomkat.com/products/angry-ambient-artists-vol-2

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AFTERMATH

the Sea They Think They Hear
for soprano, flute, harp, piano, violin, viola and violoncello | 2021

Written for and performed by the Wet Ink Ensemble and Gelsey Bell
Recorded at Scholes Street Studio
Mix and Mastering by Murat Çolak

Text

The ocean, deep blue-green.
What we learn in the middle of the night is that the world makes us flinch. (Michel Serres, The Five Senses: Philosophy of Mingled Bodies)
Sounds an ocean, drinks it in.

Then everything became worse for the wear, damaged, used and used-up and ultimately destroyed.
More and more I made up for what was lost, I slowly improved myself, and I considered myself healed. (Ingeborg Bachmann, Malina)

I found myself trapped in a nightmare, standing alone at the sea. Everyday becoming more and more.
White and yellow and gray and horizonless. (Tove Jansson, The Summer Book)

Mauro Lanza / Andrea Valle - "Regnum Animale" (2013)

MauroLanza

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