new media center_kuda.org

NOISM 2024 Concert series #1

February 10^th, 2024 at 20:00h

Rusinski kulturni centar MATKA

Jovana Subotića 8, Novi Sad

entrance fee: 400 dinars

Perform:

Giancarlo Nicolai electric ukulele / objects / effects

Eric Ruffing analogue synthesizer / tapes / field recordings

Tassos Tataroglou m-d trumpet / electronics / concept

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Ilia Belorukov alto saxophone / electronics

Anna Belorukova dance

The trio Nicolai/Ruffing/Tataroglou from Basel/Switzerland was formed during the Covid pandemic in 2020 and has been working in the field of free improvisation and experimental music ever since. As a part of their improvisation practice, they consistently explore the fields between open composition and conceptual improvisation. In February 2024 they are touring Italy, Serbia, North Macedonia and Greece. Their program on tour consists two pieces, Leuchtfeuer by Tassos Tataroglou and Sankyoku by Eric Ruffing. In Novi Sad trio will be extended to quintet with Ilia Belorukov and Anna Belorukova to perform Leuchtfeuer composition. https://incounterpoint.info/nowandthen/trio-with-eric-ruffing-giancarlo-nicolai/

Leuchtfeuer for Improvisation-trio and Tape / Tassos Tataroglou, duration 45 min.
Leuchtfeuer is a conceptual piece where non-idiomatic improvisation is structured through external sources. Lighthouses, for centuries symbols of the importance of communication, are asked now to fulfill a similar function in a new context: to enrich communication between the improvisers and help to create new macrostructures in the musical narrative. Flashing patterns from 6 lighthouses from the Mediterranean and Baltic Seas were analyzed and transformed into sound motifs by the trio. Every motif along with field recordings made on ships at the North Sea by Eric Ruffing are part of the Tape. Lighthouse signals are coded signals, meaning that they can be seen from a great distance by ships and identified as location markers, therefore each lighthouse sends a unique signal, similar to the Morse code that can be interpreted by sailors. Nowadays, 8 different types of signals are used in relation to the amount of light / darkness and the kind of pattern they send. In Leuchtfeuer are used signals from Flashing Lighthouses, which have a periodic signal with a length of 3 to 30 seconds and a predetermined number of flashes at specific times. For instance, the lighthouse at the Old Fortress on the island of Corfu in Greece has a period of 6 seconds with a total of two flashes, one on the 1st and one on the 3rd second of the period:

The order of the lighthouse signals and the field recordings used in the piece is decided every time before the performance through a random generator and therefore every concert remains improvised. The irregularities of the lighthouse signals, on the one hand, complicate planning and increase unpredictability, and on the other hand, the periodic arrangement in each signal leads to a discrete macrostructure. Or perhaps it creates a field of tension in which new possibilities keep opening up?

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三曲 Sankyoku for Shakuhachi, El. Ukulele & Electronics / Eric Ruffing, duration 20 min.
The term Sankyoku refers to a traditional form of Japanese chamber music since the late 17th century and means something like “music for three”. The bamboo flute Shakuhachi, with its (far eastern) idiomatic gesture, fuses with (western) contemporary-experimental sounds or is contrasted with them. Sound fragments from the Honkyoku tradition and improvised shakuhachi sequences meet an improvisational electric ukulele and an electronically abstract sound world, which also contains playbacks of pre-produced shakuhachi sound recordings and concrete sounds. The form, time scale and expressive density of the joint improvisation are structured by a central principle of Japanese traditional music and general arts, the jo-ha-kyū, which is also reflected in the flower and tea ceremony.

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Giancarlo Nicolai electric ukulele, objects, effects
*1957 in Bern/CH, lives in Basel, son of Italian parents, guitarist, composer and improviser since 1977. Degrees from the Swiss Jazz School Bern, the Musicians Institute of Technology Los Angeles/USA, the Swiss Academy for Music and Music Education and the Music Academy Basel. Student of Joe Pass, jazz master class with Joe Diorio and Jerry Bergonzi, seminars for guitar with Mike Stern and Chico Perez and for composition with Ennio Morricone. Improvisation with Fred Frith and Alfred Zimmerlin. Long-time partner of Peter Schärli and John Tchicai, tours in Western and Eastern Europe. Numerous recordings, e.g. on the British label Leo Records. Current projects: Trio "puun tiet" with Anna-Kaisa Meklin (viola da gamba) and Christoph Schiller (spinet), Trio Meklin/Nicolai/Weiss with Sandra Weiss (bassoon, sax) and Basel’s Unorthodox Jukebox Orchestra. www.giancarlo.nicolai.ch/home.html

Eric Ruffing analogue synthesizer, tapes, field recordings
*1960 in Frankfurt am Main/DE, has lived in Basel/Switzerland since 2005 and worked there as a social and special education teacher/music therapist from 1993 to 2022. Students in Albert Mangelsdorff's improvisation class at the Frankfurt Dr. Hoch’s Conservatory. He works with the modular synthesizer EMS Synthi 'A', in combination with the EMS Keyboard Controller DK-1, Theremin and other voltage-controlling devices, and he is dedicated in experimental, electro-acoustic and contemporary improvised music. From 2011 to 2023, he was responsible for music programme of the “Forum for Improvised Music + Dance-Performance-Multimedia (FIM) Basel”. Member of the Unorthodox Jukebox Orchestra (Basel), GONG improvisation orchestra (Aarau) and Insub Meta Orchestra (Geneva), concert tours in Germany, France, Norway, Poland, Russia, Sweden, Serbia, Switzerland, Czech Republic, Hungary. www.ericruffing.ch

Tassos Tataroglou microtone-duplex trumpet, shakuhachi, electronics
*1985 in Thessaloniki/GR, is an improvisor/composer, multi-instrumentalist and choir director. He has lived in Basel since 2013. He studied classical trumpet, music theory and pedagogics in Greece. Postgraduate studies in contemporary improvisation with Fred Frith and Alfred Zimmerlin at the Basel University of Music. Further studies in choral conducting at the Basel Academy of Music as well as Shakuhachi studies with Seian Genshin (Kyoto), Marek Kimei Matvija (Prague) and Ueli Fuyûru Derendinger (Basel). In 2017 he designed the m-d trumpet, through which he expanded the trumpet's tonal and timbral possibilities in the field of electro-acoustic music significantly. His long-time research on the manipulation of feedback loops led him to develop a unique way to use the trumpet as a musical instrument as well as an analogue controller of a synthesizer simultaneously. Member of the Insub Meta Orchestra (Geneva) and the Unorthodox Jukebox Orchestra (Basel). He has performed at numerous festivals and venues across Europe and Russia. In June 2023 he presented his research on the performance of Honkyoku (traditional japanese music for solo shakuhachi) with the m-d trumpet at the International Shakuhachi Festival of Prague (CZ). He has recorded four personal albums and made numerous other contributions. His arrangement of Tsuru no Sugomori - Renpoken in western staff notation has been highly appreciated by shakuhachi experts around the world as well as by academic institutions. https://incounterpoint.info

Ilia Belorukov alto saxophone, electronics
Musician from Saint Petersburg, Russia, now based in Novi Sad, Serbia. He works in improvised, noise and electroacoustic music. Ilia practices an experimental approach to sound extraction using saxophone, modular synthesizers and other instruments. His works have been released on labels such as Clean Feed, SOFA, Moving Furniture, Astral Spirits, Notice Recordings, Raw Tonk, Mikroton and many others. He founded the Intonema label and was one of curators of Spina!Rec label. He has organized events in Saint Petersburg and elsewhere in Russia, and co-curated the Teni Zvuka and Spina!Fest festivals. Recent activities included writing reviews and articles for Jazzist website and as musicworm on Telegram channel as well as working as mixing and mastering engineer for own projects and different musicians and labels. Since 2022, member of kuda.org.  www.belorukov.blogspot.com

Anna Belorukova dance
Choreographer from Saint Petersburg, Russia. Anna graduated from the Rimsky-Korsakov St. Petersburg State Conservatory (the department of Ballet stage direction), then continued education at Vaganova Ballet Academy (first in history Masters Choreography degree course «Sci-creation laboratory of contemporary dance forms composition»). In 2001 Anna began practice contemporary dance and still engaged in it. Now she work as a teacher at the Boris Eifman Dance Academy and at the Dance House «Kannon Dance» School (guest teacher at the festivals) and as a dancer at the FoxesFluff – the creative union of professional performers experimenting in various aspects of contemporary dance and music.  Their work was shown at various venues in St. Petersburg, Moscow, Helsinki, Bilbao, Tallinn. Since 2022, member of kuda.org. https://www.instagram.com/an_annia

The visit of the trio Nicolai/Ruffing/Tataroglou in Novi Sad, as part of the concert series program 2024 NOISM - New forms of research in contemporary music, is supported by Fondation Nicati-de Luze Switzerland and FONDATION SUISA Switzerland, Intonema, Ruthenian cultural center MATKA and kuda.org.

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