Highly original works, paving the way for the future!

“Still Lives” is the third solo full length by the Finnish composer Marja Ahti, following a pair of releases on the Hallow Ground imprint. As a collection, it may be seen as a series of studies on the liminality of the listening act and an investigation into the physicality of sound. Ahti forges vivid electroacoustic environments from field recordings, analog synthesizers, acoustic feedback, magnetic tape and digital processing, resulting in a set of articulate, prickly, and surprising compositions. In the artist’s words, “These pieces could be conceived of as vanitas paintings of a kind – selections of mundane or archetypal objects, sounds that have their own distinct qualities, but exist only by virtue of being temporary events. From another angle, one could think of them as shrines – objects assembled and set in a particular relationship to each other, charging each other in their given constellations.” Marja Ahti (b. 1981) is a musician and composer based in Turku, Finland. Originally from Sweden, Ahti has been a part of the Finnish experimental music scene for more than ten years in different constellations. She is currently active in the duo Ahti & Ahti with her partner and as a member of the Himera artist/organizer collective.

Shrine (Still Life With Glass Bottle, Flower and Microphone)

Live performance for EMS Synthi 100, magnetic tape and computer setup. Performed and recorded at Electronic Studio-Radio Belgrade in 2021.

VIDEO: https://youtu.be/x-j0nUvlogQ
More info: https://www.svetlanamaras.com/radioconcerts.html

Svetlana Maraš©SOKOJ
All rights reserved

Radio Concert No.2

Air, in both its stillness and its movements, is what compels INVASIVA, the latest release by multidisciplinary artist Dorian Wood.

In early 2022, Dorian set out to investigate the root of her anxiety—and how her breathing is both affected by, and complicit to, her mental state—during an artist's residency at Loghaven in Knoxville, Tennessee. Upon touring the campus, she learned of the Whittle House, an abandoned cabin on the grounds that had not been inhabited for many years, set apart by the other nearby, fully-restored cabins. In encountering this site, Dorian connected with the idea of isolation as a catalyst for disrepair. She came to understand how separation could trigger a fear of losing self-awareness and the inability to escape. 
 
INVASIVA is a document of the artist meandering physically and mentally between two forms of confinement: "mandated" and "self-imposed". Like an abandoned house, the composition is filled with a stillness that seems both uninhabited and anticipatory. Gradual shifts in tone build an atmosphere of meditation, and droning notes are sustained like a deeply held breath. And yet, despite the fear of quiet isolation which permeates the piece, INVASIVA swells with slow respiration, revels in the wind, and echoes with gentle reminders of outside life. 
 
The work is one that emulates a contemplative state which is constant threat—and perseveres.  Comprised of the recorded stillness within the Whittle House, and sounds captured in the office lobby of Dorian's breathing specialist in Los Angeles, INVASIVA is a quiet, ethereal triumph over suffocating loneliness. It is a piece that is filled with inhalation, anticipation, reflection,  exhalation, release—it is filled with air.

Invasiva

Dorian Wood - Invasiva (excerpt)

Yoshitake Kawai, Bussei

arbitrary19 | 24 November 2023
CD + DL

Edition of 300
Digipak - Pantone / metallic, 4c print
incl. fold-out insert (text, maps - riso print)

arbitrary presents Terrain Vague – the debut album of Danish group MESMER.

The album is a series of (deconstructed) live-recordings taken from three live concerts. The sounds on this record are taken from two years’ worth of sound research and creative outbursts with inspiration from field trips to the outskirts of Copenhagen. Intrigued by the auditive landscapes of places where nature and culture meet and challenge each other.

Listening to the field-recordings led MESMER to interpret the moods, musical qualities, and inherent energy of the sounds from these areas. Thus, creating melodies, harmonies and rhythmical structures that, together with the field recordings, paved the way for this album.

MESMER consists of the three musicians & composers Emil Jensen, Victor Dybbroe and Anders Filipsen, who have been creating music together over the last 15 years in various groups. MESMER is fascinated by how sound (and its absence) influences us as people and how the different natural and cultural environments create different musical scenarios.

Recorded and produced by Mesmer, 2021 & 2022

Mix: Mads Emil Nielsen

Master: Kassian Troyer

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https://arbitrarymesmer.bandcamp.com/album/terrain-vague

https://arbitraryproject.com/Terrain-Vague

CD + Print

Mesmer - Terrain Vague - 01 _ Intro (arbitrary19)

Fangyi Liu, Dian Qi Xia 電氣夏

Dark Stem - The Gate

From TRACED, Sonic Pieces, Pattern Series, 2017

Boundless Informant

opening track of BÉRANGÈRE MAXIMIN's upcoming album "Land of Waves" . 2xLP / DL

Land of Waves

BÉRANGÈRE MAXIMIN - Day 41

This is one of 3 tracks that were made solely by using the analogue synthesizer EMS Synthi 100. For each track, there was a single patch and the material was recorded live in one go. Rhythmical synchronization of the material was done by using the Synthi's sequencer. Simple live manipulations included putting a pin or two in and out and switching on and off the mixer channels. Additional panning of each individual channel was done on a computer. These tracks demonstrate the effect of extremely simplified musical material produced by using the not-so-simple sound tool (for the reference, try figuring out and programming a Synthi 100 sequencer:)). Tracks are named by the number of sequencer steps used in that piece. Recorded live at Electronic Studio - Radio Belgrade.

2019

From the album STEPS: https://svetlanamaras.bandcamp.com/album/steps

Svetlana Maraš©All rights reserved
©SOKOJ

Punct

Composer and sound artist. Professor of Creative Music Technology and Co-head of Electronic Studio - Basel. Ex Head of Radio Belgrade's Electronic Studio
www.svetlanamaras.com
marasoffice@gmail.com
*********************************
Maraš has presented her work internationally, at venues, festivals and events such as  Ruhr Triennial, CTM (Berlin), Ars Electronica (Linz), House of Electronic Arts (Basel), Ruhr Triennial, Espace Multimedia Gantner (Bourogne), Musikprotokoll (Graz), Heroines of Sound (Berlin), Onassis Cultural Centre (Athens), Museum of Contemporary Art (Belgrade), Ausland (Berlin), Izlog Suvremenog Zvuka (Zagreb), ICMC (New York), International Rostrum of Composers (Wroclaw), ISEA (Dubai), International Music Institute (Darmstadt), Orpheus Institute (Ghent) and many other places. Her music was used in theatre plays, experimental and documentary films, presented at places like MOMA (New York), Aubagne International Film Festival and Bitef theatre (Belgrade).
​
Svetlana Maraš was SHAPE artist for 2020, and co-curator of 4fakultät concert series in Hamburg.

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Svetlana Maraš

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