DVD + CD STEFAN PRINS Augmented Nadar Ensemble Klangforum Wien . Bas Wiegers Stephane Ginsburgh Yaron Deutsch Hiatus Stefan Prins Photo: Laurent Orseau 2 STEFAN PRINS (*1979) DVD 1 Generation Kill (2012) 26:03 7 Third Space (2016–2018) 80:55 Commissioned by SWR/Donaueschinger Musiktage Commissioned by the City of Munich for the Münchener Biennale – Festival für Neues Musik- 2 Mirror Box Extensions (2014/2015) 36:02 theater, financed by the Ernst von Siemens Commissioned by SWR/Donaueschinger Musiktage Musikstiftung Coproduced by Muziekcentrum De Bijloke TT 202:57 Piano Hero #1–4 (2011–2017) Coproduction Muziekcentrum De Bijloke, Ultima Festival Oslo, Internationale Ferienkurse für neue Musik Darmstadt and Institute for Computer Music and Sound Technology (ICST) Zürich 3 Piano Hero #1 08:16 Commissioned by Frederik Croene 4 Piano Hero #2 16:21 Commissioned by Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival 5 Piano Hero #3 22:11 Commissioned by BOZAR, Muziekcentrum De Bijloke and Ultima Oslo 6 Piano Hero #4 13:09 Commissioned by Muziekcentrum De Bijloke 3 DVD Nadar Ensemble 7 Klangforum Wien 1 2 Marieke Berendsen, Olivier Vivarès, clarinets violin and scenography Gerald Preinfalk, saxophones 1 2 Pieter Matthynssens, cello Anders Nyqvist, trumpet 1 2 Yves Goemaere, percussion Ivo Nilsson, trombone 1 2 Kobe Van Cauwenberghe, Florian Müller, keyboard electric guitar, electric guitar avatar Krassimir Sterev, accordion 1 2 Elisa Medinilla, piano and Yaron Deutsch, electric guitar keyboard, game controller Lukas Schiske, percussion 1 2 Thomas Moore, trombone, Dimitrios Polisoidis, viola game controller Uli Fussenegger, double bass 1 2 Wannes Gonnissen, sound Florian Bogner, sound 1 Dries Tack, game controller Peter Böhm, sound 1 Katrien Gaelens, game controller Bas Wiegers, conductor 2 Bertel Schollaert, saxophone 7 Dancers (Hiatus) Daniel Linehan, choreography 3 4 5 6 Stephane Ginsburgh, Gorka Gurratxaga Arruti piano and keyboard Renan Martins de Oliveira 3 4 5 6 Florian Bogner, sound, Anne Pajunen live-electronics Victor Pérez Armero 3 4 5 6 Stefan Prins, live-electronics Alexander Standard 3 4 6 Frederik Croene, piano on Louise Tanoto inside-piano videos Katie Vickers 4 DVD Recording dates: Track 7 1 2 June 2014 Concept & Music: Stefan Prins 2 21–22 August 2018 Concept & Choreography: Daniel Linehan 3 4 5 6 28–29 August 2018 Scenography: 88888 7 5 June 2018 Production: Hiatus, Klangforum Wien in Recording venues: collaboration with ICST Zürich 1 Theater Studio, deSingel International Coproduction: Münchener Biennale für Arts Campus, Antwerp Neues Musiktheater, deSingel International 2 3 4 5 6 Concert Hall, Arts Campus Antwerp, Charleroi Danse Muziekcentrum De Bijloke, Gent Costume Design: Frédérick Denis 7 Carl Orff Saal, Gasteig, Munich Lighting Design: Ralf Nonn Video recording and editing: Sound design: Florian Bogner & Peter Böhm 1 2 3 4 5 6 Kobe Wens Dramaturgy: Alain Franco 7 Lauran Kansy and Outside eye: Michael Holland Rebecca Meining (recording), Baltasar Thomas (editing) Audio recording engineer: 1 2 Wannes Gonnissen 3 4 5 6 Florian Bogner 7 Florian Bogner, Peter Böhm Audio mixing and editing: 1 2 3 4 5 6 Stefan Prins 7 Florian Bogner Audio mixing and mastering: 1 2 3 4 5 6 Stefano Bechini/ Green Brain Studio 7 Florian Bogner Sound projection: 3 4 5 6 7 Florian Bogner Additional programming: 3 4 5 6 Jan Schacher 5 Nadar Ensemble performing Photo: Generation Kill Anna van Kooij 6 STEFAN PRINS (*1979) CD 1 Not I (2007/2018) 17:53 Commissioned by De Nieuwe Reeks Leuven 2 Third Space (2016–2018) 42:15 Commissioned by the City of Munich for the Münchener Biennale – Festival für Neues Musiktheater, financed by the Ernst von Siemens Musikstiftung 3 Infiltrationen 3.0 (2009/2016) 20:10 Commissioned by Bl!ndman Strings TT 80:18 7 CD 1 Yaron Deutsch, electric guitar Recording dates: 1 Stefan Prins, live-electronics 1 22–23 November 2018 2 6 June 2018 2 Klangforum Wien 3 3–4 September 2018 Olivier Vivarès, clarinets Recording venues: Gerald Preinfalk, saxophones 1 Studio Entropya, Perugia Anders Nyqvist, trumpet 2 Carl Orff Saal/Gasteig, Munich Ivo Nilsson, trombone 3 Studio Champdaction, Antwerp Florian Müller, keyboard Audio recording engineer: Krassimir Sterev, accordion 1 Stefano Bechini/Green Brain Studio Yaron Deutsch, electric guitar 2 Florian Bogner, Peter Böhm Lukas Schiske, percussion 3 Wannes Gonnissen Dimitrios Polisoidis, viola Audio mixing and editing: Uli Fussenegger, double bass 1 Yaron Deutsch Florian Bogner, sound 2 3 Stefan Prins Peter Böhm, sound Audio mixing and mastering: Bas Wiegers, conductor 1 2 3 Stefano Bechini / Green Brain Studio 3 Nadar Ensemble Marieke Berendsen, violin Diamanda La Berge-Dramm, violin Vincent Hepp, viola Peter Matthynssens, cello Wannes Gonnissen, sound Johannes Westendorp, FX pedals Kris Delacourt, FX pedals Stefan Prins, live-electronics 8 Infiltrationen 3.0 Photo: Stefan Prins 9 tuosity: narrative delivered at high speed, but in such a fragmentary way that meaning is almost erased. Details burst out, randomly, seemingly uncon- trollably, each a single frame caught in the light, a point of a life. Narrative – that graceful arc of cause and effect – is replaced by a desperate accumula- tion of moments. In Prins’s Not I an electric guitar is at- tached to an amplifier, but between At the start of Stefan Prins and Daniel the instrument and the amp is an ad- Linehan’s Third Space, a conductor is ditional digital sound processor. Con- alone, the only physical presence on trolled by a second musician, this an otherwise empty stage. He stands, “black box” interrupts the direct ampli- facing us, in front of a large black scrim. fication of the guitar so that what one The musicians he conducts are invis- hears is frequently not what one sees ible, while the movements of danc- being played. The social contracts of ers, filmed individually and in close-up, western art music are made void: be- are projected behind him. The music tween player and audience (you will groans and hums, with occasional jag- hear whatever I play); between com- ged sparks of noise. As the dancers poser and performer (my written in- stretch and move on camera we can structions will enable you to perform make out every involuntary twitch of my work to the best of your abilities). their muscles. The space is charged, The guitarist is alone, constructing like a giant electrical circuit. herself within an ever-changing sonic space. In Samuel Beckett’s Not I a mouth is alone, the only visible thing in an oth- Prins’s music is made of codes. Not the erwise pitch black space. It belongs digital codes of computers and signal to a woman, who is re-telling her life processors – although it is also made story as a way to cling onto identi- of these – but the pacts and contracts ty. She employs a kind of broken vir- of reciprocity and understanding that 10 hold individuals, societies, and eco- inside of a piano (recorded by the Bel- possibility of flow, or of a shaped musi- systems in dynamic equilibrium. Such gian pianist Frederik Croene) are trig- cal argument, is profoundly challenged. codes are cracked, questioned, even gered by a MIDI keyboard. It becomes In Generation Kill the critique of real- made absurd. Instruments and voices clear that these derive from a series ity is made explicitly political for the act one sound but produce another; of continuous improvisations, but like first time. Screens and projections in notation systems change at will; play- Beckett’s Not I we are only shown dis- front of the four instrumentalists show ers appear in places they cannot be, ordered fragments. Over the course them live and pre-recorded simultane- doing things our ears tell us they can’t of the work’s four sections those du- ously and congruently. Over this is laid be doing; stage becomes auditorium; alities are folded over and over un- a sort of meta-performance, in which private becomes public. til even the reality of listening itself is the actions of the instrumentalists are implicated in the work’s critique. The themselves transformed by four more It begins with sounds that are dis- peculiar spatiality of this process, by players – facing the same way as us, placed at least one step away from the which parallel worlds seem possible in towards the screens; complicit with norm. Clarinets have cigarette papers every dimension, recalls Leibniz’s im- us as receivers – who control the play- under their keys and a laminated card age of matter in his Pacidus to Philale- back that we see and hear by means clipped to their bells; double bass- thes: “caverns endlessly contained in of PlayStation controllers that reverse, es have crushed drink cans between other caverns: no matter how small, speed-up, or otherwise alter the pro- their strings; brass players use plastic each body contains a world pierced jections. In his description of the piece, party whistles instead of mouthpiec- with irregular passages”. Prins draws on metaphors of social es. Nothing is as it seems, or as it was media (particularly in relation to the originally meant to be. The soundworld In Infiltrationen 3.0 the score itself be- revolutions of the Arab Spring of 2011), is noisy, cut with sharp edges and un- comes the alternate-world genera- CCTV surveillance, and drone war- familiar spectra. Cage’s prepared pi- tor. The third version of a piece origi- fare. The title is taken from the 2004 ano is a predecessor, but Prins takes nally written for electric guitar quartet, book and 2008 HBO miniseries by the Cage’s alienating, distorting effect and objects, and live electronics, Infiltra­ American journalist Evan Wright and applies it to every element of his mu- tionen 3.0 features not only the unpre- inspired by his observation that the sic from sounds to staging.