NOUVELLES AVENTURES CICLE – KONZERTHAUS WIEN

Berio-Saal
Wiener Konzerthaus
Friday, April 22, 2022

Schallfeld Ensemble
Leonhard Garms, Conductor

The octet version of "les instances" is projecting an electrified sound world emerging from the musical synergies and the coexistence of an amplified ensemble with a synthesized, electronic soundscape. A continuum of interchangeable drives it, phrasal collages comprised of distinct sonic and rhythmical structures, both in the acoustic and the electronic parts. The structure is formulated by repetitive blocks and timbral constructs that engage horizontally and vertically (harmonically) and eventually forge the behavior and the dramaturgy of the music. At the core of my creative thinking lies the notion of repetitive exhaustion and dissolution of sonic material in frameworks of organic sound complexity. I am deeply interested in the impact of recursion on our perception of details and musical events at a micro and macro time level. The piece is heartily dedicated to George E. Lewis.

Les instances - octet version, for amplified ensemble and diffused, synthesised sounds (2019/20)

Konstantinos Baras, a Greek composer with a passion for complex and saturated sound, embarked on his musical journey following a diagnosis of HanDL syndrome at the age of 18. Baras is recognized for creating works that convey intense emotions and delve into the complexities of trauma, employing visceral, chaotic sounds marked by a continuous energy flow and aggressive gestures. 

Utilizing digital signal processing, noise, distortion and live interactivity, Baras extends the timbral profile of traditional instruments and seamlessly blends disjunct materials into unified structures. With interest in site-specificity and interdisciplinary collaboration, he works often with dancers and movement artists and engages creatively with space, lights, and visual effects. 

His continued entanglement with black metal and techno contributes to an arrestingly distinctive sound palette, exploring the potential of repetition and bodily mechanics to intensify a sound’s impact on the listener. Toward that aim, Baras organizes his compositions through various processes of iteration and fragmented circularity, manipulating duration and density, often utilizing repetitive material but subtly altering it with every reappearance. The end result is driving, gripping, and grave.

His music has been performed and commissioned by Ensemble Modern, Ensemble Intercontemporain Moscow Contemporary Ensemble (MCME), Vertixe Sonora Ensemble,Ensemble Multilaterale, among other, with performances in festivals and conferences such as, IRCAM ManiFeste, MIXTUR, Darmstadt, reMusik, ilSuono, Ticino Musica, among others.

Currently pursuing a PhD in Composition at Northwestern University, Baras holds Masters degree from Boston University, and Bachelors degree Aristotle University of Thessaloniki.

Photo (background): "Migdal," dance film by Anima Libera Dance Company. All Rights Reserved to Christos Kapatos.

Niki Harlafti is a Greek, Chicago-based composer. Her work pivots between sensitivity and violence, comedy and drama, musical and theatrical narrativity; it exists in the reflective space between the familiar and the unfamiliar, investing in the disruption and reinvention of recognizable patterns. Lastly, she is passionate about social justice and strives to make art in ways that reflect her values.

She has collaborated with Neue Vocalsolisten Stuttgart, loadbang, ~Nois, CME (director: Alan Pierson), BCE (director: Donald Nally), The Megalopolis Saxophone Orchestra, guitarist Ruben Mattia Santorsa, bassoonist Ben Roidl-Ward, saxophonist Thomas Giles, Oros Ensemble, and others. Her works have been performed at Roulette Intermedium (NYC), LSO St.Luke’s (London), the DiMenna Center (NYC), Constellation (Chicago), Jordan Hall (Boston), Rambert Dance (London), Musikinstitut Darmstadt (DE), IYCA Ticino (CH), June in Buffalo Festival (NY), Ear Taxi (Chicago), ECCE Music Festival (FR), the Onassis Stegi (Athens, GR) and numerous dance film festivals.

Her recent works include "doRon eauTomb," a commission for violin and cello by the Onassis Foundation (Onassis Stegi, GR | 2024), "Tee Khe Theemen?" for five voices, premiered by Neue Vocalsolisten Stuttgart, "The Blood of Others" for bassoon and electronics, premiered by Ben Roidl-Ward (Chicago | 2024), and the original soundtrack for the awarded dance film "Migdal" by Anima Libera Dance Company (GR | 2022).

In search of expressive means that transcend absolute music, she has collaborated with several poets, including Laura Mullen and Sun Yung Shin (U.S.), choreographers Mikaela Kanzafiri (GR) and Nancy Nerantzi (U.K./GR), film maker Christos Kapatos (GR), dramaturg/librettist Antigoni Gaitana (NYC/GR), painter Francisco Ledesma (MX) and other visual artists.

Niki holds a PhD in Music Composition from Northwestern University (Chicago), and a M.M. in Composition and Theory from New England Conservatory of Music (Boston). Her mentors include Hans Thomalla, Stratis Minakakis, Jay Alan Yim, and Anthony Coleman.

composer_compositrice | new music sorceress

Diana Rotaru (b. 1981, Bucharest) has written from chamber and orchestral music to chamber opera and soundtracks for multimedia or dance shows and short films. Her music explores different expressive directions, from hypnagogia or pre-oneiric aesthetics, feminine psyche, humor or imaginary folklore. 

She is also active as a promoter of new music in Romania, as the artistic director of MERIDIAN International Festival and the main coordinator of the Romanian Music Information Center (CIMRO.ro). Since 2019 she is president of the ISCM Romanian National Section. 

Diana Rotaru has won numerous prizes, among which the Romanian Academy’s "George Enescu" Award (2010), the ISCM-IAMIC Young Composer Award (World Music Days, Vilnius, 2008), the Irino Prize (Japan, 2004) or the "George Enescu" Prize ex-aequo (Romania, 2003 and 2005), as well as multiple awards from the Union of Composers and Musicologists in Romania. Her works have been commissioned by Ryoko Aoki (Japan), Ensemble XXI (Dijon), Stockholm Saxophone Quartet, Pärlor för svin (Sweden), Ernst von Siemens Foundation, Takefu International Music Festival, etc. 

She was a resident at the Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris (autumn 2007), on a George Enescu grant from the Romanian Cultural Institute. In April 2011 she was an Artist-in-Residence at Villa Sträuli, Winterthur (Switzerland), at the invitation of Ensemble TaG, who performed her music in two concerts during that period (Verborgen in einer Muschel/ Hidden Inside a Shell – Theater am Gleis and Meet the Artist: Diana Rotaru -Villa Sträuli). In April-June 2015 she was Artist-in-Residence in Vienna, with a grant offered by the Austrian Federal Chancellery & KulturKontakt Vienna. 

Diana Rotaru is currently teaching composition at the National University of Music in Bucharest, where she studied with Ştefan Niculescu and Dan Dediu (2000-2005) and where she has a PhD in Composition (with the dissertation "The Recent Trance and the Principle of Repetition in New Music", 2012). She also studied composition with Frédéric Durieux at the Conservatoire National Superieur de Musique et de Danse de Paris (2005-2006). She participated at different summer composition courses such as Acanthes (Metz, 2008), Voix Nouvelles-Royaumont (2002 and 2006), or the International Bartok Seminary (Szombathely, 2003), thus working with Jonathan Harvey, Savatore Sciarrino, Brian Ferneyhough or Michael Jarrell, among others. In September 2018 she was invited to be an assistant professor to Toshio Hosokawa at the Takefu International Music Festival in Japan.

Akın Kilis was born on June 13, 1998 in Adana. In 2016, he became a composition student at Mimar Sinan Fine Arts University. Here, he worked with Özkan Manav, Hasan Uçarsu, Mehmet Nemutlu, and Ahmet Altınel, and graduated in 2020. In 2020, as part of the Erasmus+ program, he worked with Gordon Kampe at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater Hamburg. At the same time, he also worked with names like Alexander Schubert, Sebastian Sprenger, Roberta Vidic, and Catarina Fourcassie. In the same year, he started his master's degree education at Mimar Sinan Fine Arts University Istanbul State Conservatory as a student of Özkan Manav. In the academic year 2022-2023, he worked with Klaus Lang at Universität für Musik und darstellende Kunst Graz as part of the Erasmus+ program, and had the opportunity to work with names such as Beat Furrer, Franck Bedrossian, and Clemens Gadenstätter multiple times. In the academic year 2023-2024, he will continue his second master's degree education at the same school with Clemens Gadenstätter.
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Some ensembles performed his works and some performed pieces: Ensemble Multilaterale (France) "C Major Trauma", Quatuor Diotima (France) "Bounded Mobility", Ensemble Oerknal (Netherlands) "Parodies of a Ballade", Appasionato Ensemble (Italy) "If We Had Not Get Divided...", Gilgamesh Ensemble (USA) "Epope", Klaipėda Chamber Orchestra (Lithuania) "Brancusi", Klasik Keyifler (Turkey) "Konçerto Pera", Diskant Ensemble (Turkey) "Stepwise to the Tenebrous Aura", Anadolu Wind Quintet (Turkey) "Insomnia".
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Some awards he received in competitions: 2nd Prize at the 9th Mersin International Music Festival Composition Competition (2017), 3rd Prize at the 11th Mersin International Music Festival Composition Competition (2019), Audience Special Award and Honorable Mention at the Süleymanpaşa Municipality Bisanthe Gülsin Onay Piano Composition Competition (2019), Honorable Mention at the IV. International Composition Competition 2020 "Appasionato Ensemble" (2022), 3rd Prize at the 2nd International Balsys Composition Competition 2021, 3rd Prize at the Gilgamesh Composition Competition (2022), 6th Prize at the 2nd International contest of choral composition UAH 2022, 1st Prize at the 4th International Composition Competition New Music Generation, Jury Special Award at the Aima 25th Anniversary Composition Award (2023).
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Names he has worked with so far: Onur Türkmen, Mahir Cetiz, Yiğit Aydın, Michael Ellison, Ülkemin Akbaş, Pieter Snapper, Shih-Hui Chen, Hideki Kozakura, Michael Edward Edgerton, Samir Todeh-Tamimi, Kamran İnce, Gordon Kampe, Klaus Lang, Beat Furrer, Franck Bedrossian, Yann Robin, Francesco Filidei, Clemens Gadenstätter, Klaus Lang, Jean-luc Herve, Pierluigi Billone, Marco Stroppa, Martin Matalon, Mark Andre.
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Festivals he has attended: 10th, 11th, and 13th Journey of Sound: Young Composers Festival (2017, 2018, 2021), The Second Everlasting Hope: Gustav Mahler & Terezin Composers Festival (2018), Bilkent Composition Academy (2017-2019), Istanbul Bilgi University Bilgi New Music Festival (2021), Barcelona Modern Academy, Impuls Composition Academy (2023).
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Seminars he attended: Onur Türkmen, Tolga Yayalar, Mahir Cetiz, Pieter Snapper, Hanna Eimermacher, Noel Zahler, Eivind Buene, Stefan Lienenkamper, Ken Ueno, Michael Edward Edgerton, Hideki Kozakura, Helena Tulve, Kamran İnce, Tolga Tüzün, Leopold Hurt, Moritz Eggert, Franck Bedrossian, Yann Robin, Francesco Filidei, Clemens Gadenstätter, Klaus Lang, Marton Illes, Annesley Black, Min Tzao, Jean-luc Herve, Pierluigi Billone, Clara Iannotta, Bernard Lang, Marco Stroppa, Martin Matalon, Mark Andre.
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A significant portion of his experience in composition has been gained through his relationship with the Istanbul Composers Collective. He considers them as his most valuable school and companions on this journey, especially Mithatcan Öcal, Emre Dündar, Mehmetali Uzunselvi, and Uğurcan Öztekin. The composer expresses gratitude to his dear friends Emircan Pehlivan and Mithatcan Öcal for their music discussions and collaborations.

Stylianos Dimou is a distinguished Greek composer renowned for his expertise in acoustic, electroacoustic, and acousmatic music. In addition to his compositional work, he is an accomplished conductor, accordionist, and electronic music improviser. Dimou’s contributions to the field have earned him numerous awards and recognitions, supported by prestigious international organizations such as the Fulbright Program, the Alexander S. Onassis Public Benefit Foundation, and the Stavros Niarchos Foundation Public Humanities Initiative, Ernst Mach weltweit, Federal Ministry of Culture and Media of Austria, SWR Experimentalstudio, Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, and Cité Internationale des Arts.

Dimou's musical education began with advanced studies in Music Composition at Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece, where he completed his BMus and MMus under the guidance of Prof. Christos Samaras. He further developed his compositional skills at the University of Rochester's Eastman School of Music, earning an MA in Composition while studying with notable composers Ricardo Zohn-Muldoon, Carlos Sanchez-Gutierrez, Robert Morris, and David Liptak, and exploring advanced electronic music with Allan Schindler "(deceased)".

In 2017-18, Dimou participated in the prestigious Cursus program at the Institute for Research and Coordination in Acoustics/Music (IRCAM) in Paris, where he received professional training in Composition and advanced Electronic Music, under the mentorship of Mikhail Malt. He subsequently served as a Composer and Music Researcher at the OeAD organization, affiliated with the University of Music and Performing Arts Graz, Austria.

Dimou’s dedication to artistic excellence led to his selection as Composer in Residence at the Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris during the fall of 2019, an opportunity extended by The Embassy of Greece. He earned his Doctoral Degree from the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences at Columbia University, where he conducted advanced artistic research and pursued graduate studies as a Dean’s Fellow. His doctoral studies were guided by Prof. George Lewis, Prof. Fred Lerdahl, Prof. Georg Friedrich Haas, and Prof. Brad Garton, specializing in Composition, Music Theory, and Computer Music.

Stylianos Dimou is a tenured Associate Professor of Composition at the Grieg Academy, University of Bergen, Norway, within the Faculty of Fine Art, Music, and Design. He specializes in both acoustic and electroacoustic music, with teaching interests that encompass Composition (acoustic, mixed electroacoustic, and acousmatic), Music Technology, Music Theory, and Analysis. Dimou teaches across undergraduate and graduate programs, fostering students' exploration of contemporary compositional practices.

Dimou's research explores the creative symbiosis between human performers and technological systems across various artistic mediums and performance practices. His work emphasizes sonic hybridity and spatial immersion, with a focus on the integration of interactive sound systems, digital signal processing, and multichannel audio. His research delves into the complex structural relationships between chromatic and microtonal aggregations in intricate sonic architectures, with a particular focus on the music of Georges Aperghis. By investigating the intersections of instrumental and electroacoustic elements, Dimou seeks to create cohesive artistic frameworks that expand the boundaries of contemporary music.

Prior to his appointment at the University of Bergen, Dimou served as an Adjunct Faculty member at the University of Peloponnese, Greece - Spring 2024 -, where he taught sound design, interactive sound systems, digital signal processing, and immersive audio. He also held the position of Research Assistant Professor in the Academy of Music at Hong Kong Baptist University - Spring 2021 to Fall 2024 -, where he taught Composition, Music Technology, and Electroacoustic music. His work at these institutions emphasized the integration of technology into music performance, with a particular focus on live interactivity and the creative possibilities offered by technological innovation in the compositional process.

Among Dimou’s most distinguished accolades are the Ulysses Network / IRCAM Award for Artistic Excellence (2018-2019), 1st Prize at the 2nd International Composition Competition "Amici della Musica di Cagliari," and 1st Prize at the International Prize for Composition "Luigi Nono" (3rd edition). He also won 2nd Prize in the 24th Annual Martirano Award, 1st Prize with the Audience’s Prize at the Weimarer Frühjahrstage für zeitgenössische Musik (2012), and the Prize for orchestral music at the 5th [‘tactus] Young Composers Forum (2013). Dimou was a finalist for the Roche Young Commissions at the Lucerne Festival Academy (2013), judged by Pierre Boulez. His academic achievements include the Charles S. Miller Prize (2029) from Columbia University and the Wayne Brewster Barlow Prize from the Eastman School of Music.

https://stylianosdimou.com/biography

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

Les instances - octet version, for amplified ensemble and diffused, synthesised sounds (2019/20)

Stylianós Dimou