Ear Transplant kick off their second season at Dansekapellet with a double bill of multimedia works by Matthew Grouse and Esthir Lemi, written for soloists Anna Jalving (violin) and Katerina Anagnositdou (percussion) respectively. There will be a short intermission between the two works.
No Crash for Cymbals - Esthir Lemi (world premiere)
Lemi explores the performativity of cymbals as a solo instrument, one usually heard as part of a larger percussion setup within the orchestra, as well as the performer's physical relationship with and on them. During the performance, percussionist Katerina Anagnostidou investigates the full range of sound-producing movements and the spectrum of sounds that can be drawn from the instrument without resorting to a hard-struck crash.
The aim is to explore, in particular, the realm of extremely fragile and airy pianissimo sounds, working against the stereotypical use of the instrument, the crash, which is deliberately avoided here. It is precisely this mode of sound production that demands an entirely new bodily relationship to the instrument, and to physical performativity more broadly, as the performer stands alone before an audience. The choice of cymbals is motivated not only by their sonic possibilities, but by a desire to connect with their long-standing presence throughout music history and their ritualistic character.
BUMPS - Matthew Grouse
In BUMPS, the collaboration between Matthew and Anna has spanned the birth of Anna's second child. Through intricate musical transcriptions of speech from home recordings, as well as conversations that reveal the process of making the work together, the pair investigate what it means for Anna to balance a life as a freelance artist whilst being a mother of two small kids. How can one get lost in music as they used to while there's always the sound of screaming or laughing children only metres away? Is this something to block out or embrace in one's sonic environment?
As a recurring theme in Grouse's work, he follows the performers he works with as a documentary subject. Their lives inside and outside the music therefore become the material that he composes with. A playful blurring between reality and fiction is often the result but at the core of these works sits a framing of seemingly ignorable, everyday realities as artistic material with a rich and fragile inner life.
Much of the musical material in BUMPS takes its starting point in the prologue to ‘Ordo Virtutum’, the first ever music dramatic work, written by 12th century composer, mystic and abbess Hildegard of Bingen, who for Anna simultaneously represents an iconic feminine strength and power, whilst also being an intimidating polymath figure that feels impossible to measure up to. Throughout the piece, in a series of absurd reenactments, Matthew grapples with the question "how can I make a piece about motherhood as a man without children and what on Earth have I got myself into by trying to answer this question?".
In a recent Information (DK publication) review of the work's performance at Hindsgavl Festival, Valdemar Lønsted said: "Jalving recited hymns by Hildegard (von Bingen), played and sang 'Jeg ved en Lærkerede'; she treated the violin as if it were her baby, cuddling it, patting it to make it burp over her shoulder. It was told with gentle humour and intelligence [...] Anna Jalving is a magnificent performer, in whom lightness, humour, wisdom, determination and defiance came across so naturally"
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Tickets:
80kr. standard / 50kr. under 26 or student
Available at the above Billetto link - remaining tickets are sold on the door via mobilepay or cash
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Performers:
Katerina Anagnostidou - Percussion
Anna Jalving - violin / voice
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Ear Transplant are grateful to the following foundations for supporting this concert: KODA Kultur, Art Music Denmark, Knud Højgaards Fond, Dansk Musiker Forbund, William Demant Fonden, Hoffmann og Husmans Fond, Aage og Johanne Louis-Hansens Fond, Beckett Fonden.