Paul Rooney working with Barrow Trumpeter Gary Abbott during his residency at Octopus HQ Piel View House in Barrow Park. Paul produced a text and music piece, titled “Spit Valve” and available from us as a book and CD.
Paul Rooney talks about his work and his plans for the Barrow Park piece to Foundation Students at Barrow Sixth Form College.
Icelandic celist/composer Hildur Guðnadóttir joined us for a research and development residency at Lanternhouse in Ulverston during September 2010. Best known for her collaborations with Múm and guest appearances with Pan Sonic, Hildur has a rich catalogue of collaborations and projects behind her. As a composer she has written music for plays, dance performances and films, pieces for chamber orchestras, various instruments, voices and electronics. She also recently co-composed a live soundtrack to Derek Jarman’s 1980 film In The Shadow of The Sun with legends Throbbing Gristle. Her album Without Sinking was one of the most widely praised records of 2009 and this event was an extremely rare chance for Cumbrian audiences to hear Hildur perform her music live in an intimate venue.
Hildur presented new work and a set drawn from her albums ‘Without Sinking’ and ‘Mount A’ alongside performances from Octopus and Leicester based duo Daidhonau (www.myspace.com/daidono). You can hear some of Hildur’s music plus live sets from the Lanternhouse show over at the Phantom Circuit podcast:
Phantom Circuit #56 (8th Dec. 2010) by Phantom Circuit on Mixcloud
Octopus would like to thank Lanternhouse, Grizedale Arts and Phantom Circuit for supporting this event.
FON’s residency programme provides dedicated time and workspace for artists to develop new site-derived work individually and/or in collaboration with each other, resulting in a public performance or presentation in local community buildings and public sites. Antye Greie (AGF / the Lappetites / AGF Delay) in August to undertake a week long research and development residency as part of our 2010 programme, supported by the Goethe Institut Manchester, Grizedale Arts and Lanternhouse.
The residencies are designed around each artists’ individual artistic practice and in Antye’s case, this involved exploring possibilities for performing in a completely rural context, leaving behind traditional music venues (and electricity) in an attempt to combine digital music and live performance with the natural environment. Joined by Octopus members Glenn Boulter and Fern Oxley, Antye approached this in a number of different ways, with one example being a multi channel installation that used battery powered radios and transmitters to turn an area of forest into a performance space. This resulted in an entirely unique and subtle experience wherein Antye’s music delicately interacted with the sounds of creaking trees, birds and streams to create an immersive environment.
This and other experiments were documented with sound, video and photography by Ulverston based artists Mary Stark and Ellie Chaney. Work in progress can be found at AGF’s website:
http://www.wilderness.poemproducer.com/
The results of the week were presented back as part of a public event at Lanternhouse Ulverston with support from Octopus and digital artist Stanza (www.stanza.co.uk) and alongside Grizedale Arts‘ potato cafe at the Coniston Horticultural Show, where Antye’s daughter Lumi swept the board with her decorated egg, garden in a biscuit tin lid and wildflower display.
AGF live at Lanternhouse 28/08/10 from Octopus Collective on Vimeo.
Multi-talented Japanese musician / sound artist / composer Haco joined us as one of four artists in residence at FON 2009. Haco’s multi-channel installation piece ‘Barrow Vibrations’ made use of field recordings from around Barrow Docks and the surrounding area and invited listeners to add bass tones from a vintage electronic organ. Haco also gave a talk and demonstration of her ‘Stereo Bugscope’ piece at Lanternhouse Ulverston as part of her residency. Haco is a composer, vocalist and electroacoustic performer, and a founding member of After Dinner (1981-1991) and Hoahio. Haco has created numerous recordings both as producer and engineer. As a musician, she has given performances throughout Japan and internationally. With her unique sensibility, Haco has developed a practice based on principles of post-punk, electroacoustics, the avant-garde, improvisation, post-rock, environmental sound, and technology. In 2005, her CD “Stereo Bugscope 00″ was awarded a prize in the digital music category at Prix Ars Electronica in Austria.
Susan Matthew joined us in Barrow as one of 4 artists in residence at the festival, working towards a live piano and electronics set with Cumbria based sound artist Shaun Blezard (Clutter). The resulting piece, Silence Alight, has since toured the UK.
Susan Matthews is a UK based avant-garde experimental composer, known for her intense, ambitious, hypnotic harmonies and industrial noise creations. She began composing experimental music, described as ‘…dazzling abstractions of grace and beauty’, in 1999 and has developed a comprehensive CV of achievements, including gallery works, festival inclusions and radio airplay, both home and abroad.
In 2005 she founded the independent record label Siren Wire Recordings through which she has released nine commercial albums and seven eps. She has also recorded music for Earth Monkey Productions, Tursa and DA/73. An ardent collaborator she has successfully worked with many artists including Tony Wakeford (UK), Clutter (UK), Rainier Lericolais (FR), Alistair Crosbie (UK), Yokna Patofa (JP), Nick Grey (Monaco), Fabrizio Modonese Palumbo (IT).
She is the accompanist for the Kidwelly Festival Choir and performs regularly with them in official town ceremonies and fund raising events for local charities. She recently completed a soundtrack for the feature film ‘Grasp’, contributed guest vocals to ‘Not All of Me Will Die’ by Tony Wakeford(Eastern Front) and is currently putting the finishing touches to a remix album of her work to be released by Tursa.
Hear more of Susan’s work at:
Clutter works between the fields of electroacoustic improvisation, ambient electronics and music concrete and has been doing this since 2001.
He has produced work for albums as well as installations, films, dance and theatre under the Clutter name and as Shaun Blezard.
Mobile Radio in action with Haco perfoming thier FON commission MORSONATA. Susan Matthews joined them for part of the show. It was broadcast live on the 23rd October 2009 from 20:00 – 21:00 in London on Resonance 104.4FM, also available on the internet at: resonancefm.com.
Photo: Jack Boulter
We were very happy to work with Morse code operators Bill Jenkins and Mike Cumming. They bravely got stuck into Kurt Schwitters’ Ursonate for us. The text is extremely repetitive; we used it to create rhythms in code. This will form the backbone of the Mobile Radio work tonight titled ‘MORSONATA’.
Mobile Radio recording our jingle in the ladies with Susan Matthews.
Photo: Haco
Mobile Radio have been collecting stories and sounds for our live show tonight. On Wednesday a local actor, Damo, stepped in to help us dramatise a day in the life of a submariner, a prisoner of war.
