Michael Oliva and Musicians
Colourscape, Clapham Common,
18th September 2022, 12:30pm-4:30pm.
Composer Michael Oliva and a talented band of musicians, present an afternoon of his latest composition, collaborations and improvisations on the theme of Universal Harmony or “The Music of the Spheres”
A mash up of ambient music, installation and performance. An afternoon of lyrical sounds, immersive Ambisonic sound and musical magic. All housed in the extraordinary Colourscape light sculpture at the annual Eye Music Festival.
12 musicians improvise to a series of Tanpura based electronic drones and bells (the Classical Indian string drone instrument). The music uses a large scale structure from 60s experimental music (think Stockhausen in Mexico or John Cale in “Theater of Eternal Music” – before he joined Velvet Underground). There’s a fusion of Western and Indian classical forms and sounds, produced by musicians from both traditions, as well as Ancient and Modern, from Baroque to the latest from the London Techno scene.
Michael developed the piece over the last year with the musicians as part of the Tanpura with… project, using improvisation over synthesised tracks to create a series of reverberating musical pieces that are like looking at the same sculpture from different angles. The structure compels the player to listen constantly but liberates their freedom of expression. Computer processed sounds from the Tanpura allow us to imagine a “Harmony of the Worlds”.
The concert will use the Ambisonic speaker array inside Colourscape to create swirling sounds consonant with ideas about the ‘motions of the heavens’. The players will be stationed throughout the coloured spaces, representing planets and stars, distributed in the space by their positions and the rotations of their sounds, but also in time and history by the structure of the work. The lights and moods of Colourscape envelop the work in an unearthly glow.
The Players
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Michael Oliva
Electronics, Computer, Composition In addition he runs madestrange opera, a company dedicated to producing new forms of the genre for modern audiences. With madestrange he has premiered his multimedia operas Black & Blue at BAC in 2004, Midsummer in 2005 and The Girl Who Liked to be Thrown Around – presented as a work in progress in Scotland in 2006 and in full production at the Tete a Tete Opera Festival, London in 2007, and the Grimeborn Opera Festival 2008. In 2010 he completed a new Requiem for the choir Mosaic, which was premiered at St Alban’s Cathedral, and then completed a new full length opera Singularity, premiered at the Royal College of Music in 2015 . Michael also taught composition with electronics at the Royal College of Music from 1998 to 2021, where he was ‘Area Leader for Electroacoustic Music’, and ran the termly “From the Soundhouse” concerts of electronic music, exploring both classic repertoire pieces and new works by up and coming composers and students. He also lectured regularly in music technology at Imperial College, London, and researches and publishes on the use of interactive audio and video systems in performance. michaeloliva.bandcamp.com |
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Jane Chapman
Harpsichord |
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Ansuman Biswas
Tabla and Percussion |
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Hannah MarshallCello |
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Jason KalidasBansuri |
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Nick DreyBaroque Cello |
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Jenny AmesViola |
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Richard BoothbyViola da Gamba He has helped to enrich the viol-consort repertory with new music from today’s composers, from Elvis Costello to George Benjamin. With the Purcell Quartet he recorded nearly 50 albums for Hyperion and Chandos; and with Fretwork he recorded over 30 albums. His record of the complete solo lyra viol music of William Lawes on Harmonia Mundi was greeted with high critical praise; and he has recently record the rediscovered fantasias for solo viol by Telemann. He is professor of Viola da Gamba at the Royal College in London. |
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Lawrence CasserleyPercussion and Electronics |
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Pedro Merchán CorreasBassoon Resident at leading underground club night KAOS and part of Khemia Records. LAW334 has performed in many venues across London such as Corsica Studios, Electrowerkz, Fire, Lightbox or Cell 200, and club nights like B L A N C, Jaded, TeknoKolor and The Judgement Hall. soundcloud.com/law334 |
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Simon DesorgherFlutes |
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Matt SaundersSound Projection |