Amazing Sounds magazine (English version)
Amazings
| About us | Archive |
Newsletter by email
Reviewing alternative music since 1996. Space
Sequencer Music, Ambient, Innovative Electronic, Contemporary Instrumental
Music...
Most Recent Reviews and Articles:
BARBARA MONK FELDMAN
A Canadian composer specialized in New Music as well as in electronic music, Barbara Monk Feldman completed her musical education at the Acadia and McGill Universities, in Canada, with Donald Steven and Bengt Hambraeus, and did postgraduate studies at the State University of New York, Buffalo (USA).
It was at this university where she would be awarded an Edgar Varese Fellowship, which would allow her to study composition with Morton Feldman (1984-1987), specializing in this field.
Having received several important commissions by prestigious institutions such as The Queen's University, Belfast, Salon Concerts, New York, McGill University, Montreal and The Canada Council, her music has been performed by several well known artists, among these Frederic Rzewski, Yvar Mikhashoff, Aki Takahashi, The Arditti Quartet, Jan Williams and the Montreal Chamber Orchestra, in such countries as Belgium, Canada, Northern Ireland, Italy, England, Germany, the Netherlands and the USA.
Also, the music created by this artist has been recorded under different labels, among them WDR, Hessicher Rundfunk (Germany), Belgium Radio, the BBC and the CBC (Canada).
Among other interesting events, Barbara Feldman has participated as Guest Lecturer/Visiting Artist at the Internationale Ferienkurse fur Neue Musik in Darmstadt, (W.
Germany), the College Music Society (Toronto), the Sonorities Festival (Belfast), York University (Toronto), the University of California (San Diego) and at the Dartington International Summer School (Dartington, England).
She is a member of several associations, among them SOCAN, Canadian League of Composers, and Association of Canadian Women Composers.
Among her chamber compositions mention must be made, for instance, of "Pure Difference" (1990), composed for clarinet, bassoon, percussion, DX7 synthesizer, piano, and violin; "False Doors" (1989); etc.
And among her keyboard works, most notable is her piece "The I and Thou" (1988).
(SIGRID BAUMANN)
JANET DANIELSON
Canadian composer and musical educator Janet Danielson, settled in Vancouver, (Canada), gets her musical education at the University of Victoria.
After being awarded the Canadian League of Composers National Award for Young Canadian Composers, she moves to England for a year, where she studies composition with Cornelius Cardew.
She then completes a Master of Fine Arts degree in Music Composition at the California Institute of the Arts, specializing in Musical Composition, under the auspices of Harold Budd, Earle Brown, and Morton Subotnick.
Danielson has devoted her career to composing, specially in the New Music field, besides developing an important task in the areas of music arrangements and education.
In 1990 she participates in the International Ferienkurse fur Neue Musik in Darmstadt (Germany).
Also, she represents her country at the Asia-Pacific Festival and Conference, held in New Zealand.
In 1995 she is invited to Amsterdam, where she presents her work, participating at the Gaudeamus International Composers' Workshop.
Janet Danielson's music has been performed at an international level by several prestigious performers and orchestras, and her works have been broadcast on several radio stations from different countries, among them Belgium, Great Britain, the United States, and Canada.
Furthermore, this composer has collaborated with British choreographer Janet Randall on a TV production, broadcast by ITV-Midlands.
Also, some of her works for chamber ensemble, among them "Vignette", "Coda", and "Diatessaron", have been broadcast by the CBS at a national level on the program "Two New Hours".
She has taught at the University of British Columbia, and she is currently teaching sessions at the Simon Fraser University.
After having been appointed president of the Vancouver New Music for four years, she holds the post of Associate Artistic Director in this institution.
She is a member of several associations, among these the Association of Canadian Women Composers, Canadian Music Centre, and SOCAN.
Her music has been described by the specialized press as "a combination of sensual textures and the somber devotional quality of Arvo Part's compositions".
Among her works mention must be made of the following, besides the ones mentioned before: Orchestra: "Set for the Sun" (1982); Chamber: "At the Round Earth's Imagined Corners" (1987); Vocal: "Circe: Beware!" (1991); Choral: "Oread" (1992); Electroacoustic: "Ophelia" (1974).
(SIGRID BAUMANN)
KIM ERICKSON
Canadian composer Kim Erickson was born in Ontario.
Brought up within an eminently musical environment, as her family used to organize musical sessions in which each member sang by ear, accompanied by different instruments, she learns the piano first, and later the flute.
During her student years at highschool she gets interested in the theatre and acting activities. It is then when she composes her first works, for a children theater production.
In 1979 she gets her degree in music at the Carleton University in Ottawa, specializing in composition under David Piper and Patrick Cardy, as well as in piano with Philip Adamson and Ross Pratt.
During her studies she earns her living with her work as a vocalist for folk, blues, and jazz, and also she writes and performs her own songs.
After being awarded a Dutch Government Fellowship, Erickson moves to this country from 1979 to 1981, where she studies and composes computer music at the Institute of Sonology in Utrecht.
She also starts vocal studies with Annechien Menso in Amsterdam, and takes lessons in French melody with Dutch baritone Bernard Kruysen.
Nowadays, Kim Erickson has continued with her vocal studies in Montreal with Dixie Ross Neil.
Kim has developed an important task in the field of performance, musical composition and as a music director for theatre companies in several places from her country, among them Thunder Bay, Ottawa, and Edmonton.
Her interests include from the classical dance and music of the South Indian cultures, to the culture and music of Ukrainia and the Eastern European countries.
She is the founder and conductor of a female folkloric choir as well as a multi-cultural choir, she usually sings with the Lakehead Unitarian Fellowship, and has often performed as a soloist voice with the Thunder Bay Symphony Orchestra in several occasions.
Her activities range from piano and voice teaching to musical therapy.
She currently teaches aural skills at Lakehead University.
Given the multiple influences she received in the musical arena from her early childhood, which included from the Broadway musicals to the classical repertoire to folk tunes, no wonder her music reflects such an eclectic background, so that in her compositions the listener can appreciate the integration of such diverse stylistic elements and media as she feels necessary, often ignoring the frontiers between what is popular and what is serious, although her music is certainly pervaded by an intrinsic spiritual essence th at unifies the whole.
Her works have been performed in Canada and in Holland, among other countries.
Among her works mention must be made of the following: Theatre: "Alone" (1985); "The Body Image Project" (1992); Chamber: "Crossings over" (1980); Vocal: "Only the Pure of Heart/ Your Eyes as Bright as Stars/ Only the pure" (gospel version, 1994); "Fireweed" (1983); "Burn" (1990); Choral: "Celebrate!" (1989); Electroacoustics: "Singles" (1981).
(EMMA DORS)
ANNE DEANE
American composer Anne Deane receives her musical education at the Peabody Institute (1981), and later on at the Oberlin Conservatory (1985).
Deciding to complete her musical studies at the University of California, where she currently is finishing her Doctorate, Deane is particularly interested in the possibilities offered by the newest computer technologies to create novel, unusual soundscapes, and has developed a fruitful activity in this field, especially in her applications of these technologies to oral poetry, in what can be defined as "animated poetry readings".
Her works range from orchestral music to vocal, acoustic and computer chamber music.
She is a member of several associations, among them ASCAP, The International Alliance for Women in Music, American Music Center, American Composers Forum, Society of University Composers, etc.
Besides composing music, she is interested in the educational world, and is a lecturer on computer music at the University of California (Santa Barbara).
She was Arts Administrator at the Music Academy of the West, Santa Barbara Dance Theatre, The Philadelphia Orchestra, Opera Theatre of Saint Louis and ODC San Francisco.
Currently appointed as Director of Development and Public Relations for The Walden School, Ltd., a summer school aimed at young composers aged 9-18, at the Dublin School in Dublin, New Hampshire, where she promotes New Music among the young generations, among her works mention must be made of the following: Accoustic Chamber Music Works:"Voyeur", (1996) soprano and piano; "Crossing to Elysian Fields", (1994) string quartet; "In the Fullness", (1994) soprano, tenor and piano; "Sweet Tea", (1985) two sopranos and piano; "Love Songs" (1993) soprano, cello and piano; "Glacius Fantasy" (1984), soloist piano; "Hegira-Siezed" (1983) violin and piano; "Hegira II" (1993) violin and piano. Computer/Electronic Works: "Voyeur", (1996) soprano and piano; "Positive Thinking",(1993) flauta, computer generated tape; "Tides", (1991) electronic tape and actor/dancer. Text by Theresa Francomacaro; "March 23", (1989) electronic tape, four actors and a dancer. Text by Blair Thomas; "Incidental music for dance", (1985); "Edmund", (1985). Incidental music (Oberlin College); "Rain Dance and Defecollage", (1984). "TBD", (1996), etc.
(SIGRID BAUMANN)
POZZI ESCOT
Music theorist and composer Pozzi Escot is a well known character in the world of the European New Music who has participated in several international events, among them La Biennale (Venice), IRCAM (Paris), BBC (London), Internationales Musikinstitut (Darmstadt), and the Studio fur Neue Musik-Munich.
She received her musical education in The Juilliard School, and later at the Hochschule fur Musik und darstellende Kunst (Hamburgo).
Her works have been performed in several countries, among them the USA, as well as by prestigious orchestras and performers, such as the Chicago University Chamber Players, the New York Philharmonic, Arthur Weisberg, Claremont String Quartet, Bethany Beardslee, Mathew Raimondi, and Robert Henry.
She has been awarded several prizes and grants, among them those by the Ford Foundation, Reemstma Foundation, Bunting Institute, and the Rockefeller Foundation, besides her having been selected as Outstanding Educator of America.
She is the publisher of the music journal "Sonus" and is the president of the International Society of Hildegard von Bingen Studies.
Among her various activities, besides composition, she also organizes lectures and publishes several works.
Various of her pieces have been released under different labels, among them Delos, Spectrum, Neuma, Leo, and Music & Arts.
(SIGRID BAUMANN)
MARIAN INGOLDSBY
Irish composer Marian Ingoldsby is a native of Carrick-on-Suir, Co. Tipperary.
After studying Composition with Gerald Barry at the University College of Cork, she moves to London, where she continues with her musical studies tutored by Paul Patterson.
After graduating, Ingoldsby develops a pedagogical career, working as a professor for some years at the Music Departments of the Waterford Regional Technical College and the University College Cork.
Among the several commissions this composer has received mention must be made of the ones by the Opera Theatre Company and the Presteigne International Festival of Music and the Arts, from Wales, besides those by the National Symphony Orchestra/Ulster Orchestra, Music Network, Cork International Choral Festival, the Irish Chamber Orchestra and the Irish Peace Institute.
The musical production by Marian Ingoldsby includes several fields, among them choral music, songs, chamber music, piano pieces and an opera, "Hot Food with Strangers" (1991).
Likewise, this artist has been awarded several prizes and grants by prestigious institutions, such as an Arts Council of Ireland Travel Grant (1988), the New Music for Sligo Composition Prize (1990), the Macaulay Fellowship (1995), and the Elizabeth Maconchy Composition Fellowship, from the University of York (1996).
Among her works, most noteworthy are the following: "KeyStrokes" (1986); "Written in Early Spring" (1987); "Undulations" (1988); "However Long that Dark" (1994); "Waterscape" (1994); "Peace" (1995); "It's a Woman's World" (1995); "To a Child" (1986); etc.
(SIMONETTA VALLI)
MARIA ESCRIBANO
Spanish composer María Escribano (1954–2002) studies piano and composition at the Conservatorio de Madrid (Spain), specializing in the techniques for composition of New Music with composers Cristobal Halffter, Luis De Pablo, Carmelo Bernaola and Tomas Marco, and carries out several courses on the analysis of New Music with Rodolfo Halffter, Mauricio Kagel, Giorgy Ligeti and Arturo Tamayo among others.
In 1978 she is awarded a grant on creativity by the Fundación Juan March, which allows her to work in France as a composer, pianist and actress for the company Roy Hart Theatre.
In 1981 and 1982 she gives several concerts of Open Music together with German flutist Sputz Ronnefeld in Germany and in Spain.
In 1982 she founds the center for artistic creativity Agada, together with Manuel Azquinezer.
She has participated in numerous festivals, both at a national and at an international level, besides giving several monographic concerts with her own work, both in her native country and overseas.
The author of such works as "L'histoire d'un son", or "Sortilegio", the latter being a concert which premiered in 1993 together with another three works for soloist piano, plus three pieces for piano and tape, among her recordings mention must be made of her eighteen tales of the collection "Cuentos y canciones de la Media Lunita" ("Tales and Songs of the Half-Little Moon"), recorded in Spanish and Catalan; "Jondo", a work composed for a quartet of saxos, piano and percussion, under the label RTVE-Música, commissioned by the Festival de Alicante; another two works by her have been likewise released in the collection "Las Mujeres y la Música" ("Women and Music") by the label RTVE.
Several of her compositions have been released in the collection of CDs "Compositoras Madrileñas" ("Women Composers from Madrid"), by Radio Nacional de España, Radio 2, in collaboration with the Dirección General de la Mujer de la Comunidad de Madrid (General Department for the Woman in the Community of Madrid).
Among her chamber works most noteworthy are "Muñecas de mimbre"; "Concierto para Inma", composed for flute, clarinet, cello, piano and percussion; "Sin Seso", commissioned by the Festivale de Montepulciano; "Paisajes", commissioned by the Festival Ciudad de Benidorm; "Madrid de Noche", commissioned by the Consorcio Madrid Capital de la Cultura; the theatre plays "Cantos de Lorca" and "Lady Macbeth"; etc.
(SIGRID BAUMANN)
SUSAN FRYKBERG
Composer Susan Frykberg, born in New Zealand in 1954, specializes in electroacoustic and experimental music, after completing her musical education at the Simon Fraser University in 1990.
Among other prestigious professors, she has been tutored in her studies by such figures as John Rimmer, Barry Vercoe, Barry Connyngham, Iannis Xenakis and Barry Truax, who in a way have influenced her understanding of musical composition.
Susan Fryberg has developed a fruitful educational activity as a professor of electroacoustic / acoustic communication at the SFU.
In her works she usually combines her feminist ideas with theatrical performance techniques.
The artist, one of whose objectives is to find "a world in which women's music can be heard", both at a literal and at a metaphorical level, has created various theatrical "environments" where the history of the lives of women, frequently of a mythological character, provide the "context" for her particular music.
Frykberg has been commissioned several pieces by prestigious institutions, among them the Ontario Arts Council, the New Zealand Arts Council and the Canada Council.
Many of her works have been broadcast in several American radio station, such as CBC, as well as at an international level, specially her collection "Transonances".
The music composed by Susan Fryberg after the birth of her son, Esha, is mostly characterized by the effort the author has put into transmitting to the listener her joy and the awesome nature of the faculty to give life, the happiness of motherhood, translating these deep feelings into an adequate musical language.
This composer is a member of different associations, among them SOCAN, Canadian Electroacoustic Community, and the World Forum of Acoustic Ecology.
Among her works mention must be made of the following: Musical Theatre and Multi-media: "Caroline Herschel is Minding the Heavens" (1988); "Desires" (1990); "First Mother Earth Giver" (1989); "Layers of Self" (1992); Cámara: "Heralding Change" (1981); Vocal: "Insect Life" (1993); Electroacoustic: "Birth/Rebirth/Bearing Me" (1992); "Hums" (1990); etc.
(SIGRID BAUMANN)
ZURIÑE F. GERENABARRENA
A Basque composer born in Vitoria (Spain), in 1965, she has composed several movie soundtracks, besides having participated in diverse multimedia projects.
She has also produced various videos and has collaborated with her music in the production of numerous theater plays.
Together with other young composers within the field of the New Music of our days, she participates on November 12, 1996, in an unusual concert at the Auditorio Nacional de Madrid, sponsored by the newspaper El País (Tentaciones) and the Centro de Difusión de la Música Contemporánea. In this concert Zuriñe contributes with her work "Gurdizarra" ("Osa Mayor"), composed for flute, oboe, clarinet, violin, viola, cello and percussion.
Aware of her character as a composer within a clearly minoritary style, a field that on the other hand does not lead to fame and international recognition in actual fact, and of course to money, she considers that the current musical panorama may certainly look chaotic, because of the tendency to break with tradition and to fuse completely different styles in an indiscriminated way.
Anyhow, she believes that the official institutions in her country of origin are not precisely open to supporting the young composers of New Music and the alternative musics in general, in spite of all the private efforts to promote these kinds of musics, and in her opinion it would be necessary for them to give their support at the very least to the schools of music in general.
(ARIADNA MARTIN)
ELLEN FULLMAN
American composer Ellen Fullman was born in Memphis, Tennessee, in 1957.
Specialized in ceramics and sculpture at the Kansas City Art Institute, she felt attracted by multimedia art, while at the same time she explored her creativity writing songs.
She developed both activities - songwriting and the building of large sound producing
stage sets - in Minneapolis/St. Paul, where she lived for two years.
In 1985 she was artist-in-residence at Het Apollohuis, which allowed her to record an album, "The Long String Instrument".
The piece giving name to the album is an experimental work in which the artist records an acoustic musical instrument built with a wooden box resonator with long strings that extend from it and reach waist height, the strings being played with rosin covered hands. Another of the pieces included in this album, "In the Water Drip Drum", consists in the recording of water dripping into an amplified aluminum pan whose position is regulated by a foot pedal. The rhythm of the dripping is regulated by miniature valves and it is the performer the one who regulates the pitch of the drum as well.
Another work by this artist, where she explores microtonality, is her experimental work "Body Music".
(LUISA VALLS)
MARY GARDINER
Canadian composer Mary Gardiner receives her musical education at the University of Toronto, specializing in piano after getting an A.R.C.T. in piano as a solo performer.
She also gets a teaching certificate from the Faculty of Education.
Devoting her activity to the teaching of music and English at a highschool for a few years, she decides to abandon this path to raise her two children and pursue other interests within the musical field, among which mention must be made of her work as a performer, not to mention her good work in the terrains of musical accompaniment, private teaching, composition, and the conducting of a church choir, as well as her work as a conductor for workshops aimed at music teachers and her participation in several festivals.
In her works the artist reflects her multiple interests, ranging from literature to folklore, to the cultures of the native peoples, aboriginals, and nature.
Being so fond of New Music, she has worked a lot to promote this genre among the younger generations, above all by means of the creation and performances of pieces specially written for students.
After becoming the president of the Alliance for Canadian New Music Projects (sponsor of the Contemporary Showcase, a music festival of Canadian composers for all kinds of students), her influence on the attitudes of teachers, performers, students and different musical organizations in her country with respect to the Canadian New Music has certainly been remarkable.
Among other associations, Mary Gardiner is a member of SOCAN, the Association of Canadian Women Composers, and the Ontario Registered Music Teachers' Association.
Among her works, mention must be made of the following: Music Theatre and Multi-media: "The Legend of the First Rabbit" (1987); Chamber: "SPIRIT*ESSENCE" (1991); Keyboards: "A long time ago in the future" (1986); "Two for D" (1991); Vocal: "De profundis" (1985); Choral: "Gloria" (1976).
(SIGRID BAUMANN)
HELEN HALL
Canadian composer and filmmaker Helen Hall, settled in Montreal, receives an eclectic musical education ranging from the purest forms of jazz to classical music, a fact she reflects in her compositions.
As a composer, she loves to explore the frontiers of music utilizing all available media, both acoustic and electronic, computer music and, in a few words, everything the new musical technologies have to offer to the creative mind.
No wonder she has, therefore, a wide musical production, which enters all the fields within her reach, from her vocal works to her instrumental pieces, to electroacoustic, dance, theatre, movie soundtracks, television and multimedia art.
Furthermore, the artist has been working for several years in the interdisciplinary fields connecting music with the arts and the physical sciences.
This interest is likewise reflected in her first film,"Powerlines", a fifty-minute documentary in which the artist explores electromagnetic pollution, while combining documentary images, computer generated images, dance and music, with unparalelled mastery.
During the last six years, Helen Hall has centered in research within the field of musical theatre, developing a new form of theatre based on music.
Hellen Hall has also developed an educational task, teaching at the National Theatre School of Canada since 1990.
Her music has been performed by prestigious orchestras and broadcast on several radio stations both in North America and in Europe.
Also, she has been commisioned several works by important institutions such as for instance S.O.I.L. (Brussels), Le Grand Ensemble de Saxophones de Montreal, ARRAYMUSIC ("Young Composers in Residence" program), Hemispheres Orchestra (sponsored by the Canada Council), etc.
She is a member of different associations, among them SOCAN.
Essential works: Musical Theatre and Multi-media: "Body Weather" (1994-1996); "Powerlines" (1993-1996); Chamber: "Fluvial" (1988); "Interra" (1986); "Rites of Decimation" (1992); Vocal: "Aerial Roots" (1989-90); "Une Aussi Longue Histoire" (1992); Electroacoustic: "Of Radiant Streams" (1985).
(LUISA VALLS)
MARA HELMUTH
American composer Mara Helmut specializes in the creation of computer music, besides developing an interest toward electronic and acoustic music.
Among her works mention must be made of the following: "Ah!" (1995); "Chimeplay" (1994, composed by means of algorithms and sampled sounds for her wedding); "Dragon of the Nebula" (1991, a granular synthesis composition); "Meeting the Free Dreamer" (1992); "Mellipse" (1989, revised in 1995); Live computer works: "Fantasy for ISPW" (1994); Instrumental and computer works: "Move!" (1996); "Evolutions" (1994); Installations: "Sound Colors" (1995, of an interactive character with audience participation).
Besides devoting her time to composition, Helmut has developed a fruitful educational task in the field of computer generated music, teaching at the College-Conservatory of Music Center for Computer Music, Division of Composition, History and Theory at the University of Cincinnati, where she conducts a course aimed at composers on the creation of sound, instrument software and note-generating algorithms, besides other musical processes.
On all these topics, Mara Helmut has written several papers.
She is a member of ASCAP and of the International Alliance for Women in Music, among other associations.
(ARIADNA MARTIN)
UBAKA HILL
Ubaka Hill is a well known drummist, teacher, performer and visual artist from New Jersey (USA).
She began as a professional drummer with a jazz band in 1974, and since then she has been collaborating with various creative artists.
She has been the co-founder of several drummist groups.
Also, several of her works have been recorded in collaboration with different artists and she has created several soundtracks for educational and creative videos.
Her drumming technique is innovative indeed, and is based on the creative tradition of jazz together with the spirit of social change.
Her favourite instruments range from the conga to the djembe, to the various ethnic instruments found in different cultures.
Rooted in the rhythmic traditions of Northern and Western Africa, Latin America, the Caribbean, American jazz, and the Shamanistic traditions, all this intertwined with poetry and song, the artist applies an intuitive approach to her art, utilizing percussion as a tool for liberation, healing, community building and personal joy.
Ubaka Hill is furthermore an excellent teacher, extending her task in this field to the collective of deaf people, teaching them drumming.
The artist has conducted several workshops on the art and the spirit of drumming throughout North and South America.
Hill has performed in hospitals, music festivals, universities, etc., participating as well in conferences, children's programs, community centers, and so on.
Among her objectives most noteworthy is the task she is carrying out to preserve and divulge the work of women drummers, from the sacred to the secular.
To this end she has founded the Drumming Institute in Brooklyn, New York, where she is its director, developing several workshops and performances aimed at all ages, besides providing information and resources to the drumming community.
Ubaka Hill also publishes a newsletter, Drumsong/Drumming Womyn's News: Views and Attitudes.
(EMMA DORS)
THE GREAT KAT
Katherine Thomas, better known as The Great Kat, has stirred up strong controversy since the beginning of her career.
Scandal accompanies her in her bloody releases as well as her provocative live performances. Accused of being a blasphemous artist, obsessed against Classical Music, her career has been marked by a strange personal as well as an artistic metamorphosis.
Her musical education began at age seven, with the piano, starting the violin at age nine.
After being awarded several prizes in numerous competitions, Kat was granted a full scholarship at the Juilliard School in New York City, where she graduated with honors. Kat has been on international tours as a classical soloist with the violin.
Nevertheless, at a certain point in her life, she decided that "classical music is dead", felt herself being seduced by the darkest, most violent sector of Heavy Metal, and started a wild crusade of outrages against Classical Music and everything it usually is associated with from a cultural viewpoint.
Adopting the role of a sort of goddess moved by an intense sadism that requires absolute submission on the part of her followers, she has endeavored to create peculiar versions of classical pieces, whose structure she alters until they become transformed into themes where the electric guitar roars in a furious manner, almost always completed with her voice, which shocks the audience.
The aggressive lyrics of these peculiar pieces clearly reflect the ultraviolent character of the music by this woman, and are an outstanding component of her artistic arsenal.
(AMAZING SOUNDS)
ANNA ELIZABETH HINKLE-TURNER
This American composer, web software specialist and video artist works in the Dallas/Fort Worth area (USA).
The artist has created her own studio, utilizing basically Macintosh computers and a MIDI musical equipment.
Anna Elizabeth Hinkle-Turner is also the producer of several radio programs, specializing in electronic, acoustic and computer music.
This composer receives her basic musical education at the Trinity University, San Antonio, Texas, and later on at the University of Illinois, doctorating in Musical Composition, besides studying Ethnomusicology.
Anna Elizabeth later studies electroacoustic music in depth at the Trinity University, as well as experimental music following several courses at the University of Illinois, and at the Studios fur Electronische Musik, Westdeutscher Rundfunk, in Koln (Germany).
On the other hand, she has developed a fruitful task in the field of musical research, particularly in the field of American women composers and musical technology, as well as the utilization of creative art in the path towards personal self-fulfilment.
She is a member of the International Alliance for Women in Music, the Society for Electro-Acoustic Music in the United States (SEAMUS), the Association for Technology in Music Instruction, the Society of Composers, Inc., the International Computer Music Association, the American Music Center, the College Music Society, and the American Composers' Forum, among other associations.
Besides composing, the artist has developed a wide educational work having been appointed for several important posts, as for instance her appointment as Director of the Music Technology Center and Visiting Professor for Composition and Theory at the Florida International University School of Music (1996-1997); She has also been Specialist of Assisted Computer Instruction at the University of Illinois Library System; Visiting Director at The Experimental (Electronic) Music Studios, School of Music, of the University of Iowa; Assistant Professor at the Department of Composition of the Oberlin College Conservatory of Music, etc.
Among her most recent works and performances mention must be made of the following: "Full Circle" (1997), a CD-ROM work. "An Object of" (1997); "Saliva" (1996); "A Parable of Pre-existing Conditions" (1994); "Antigone's Peace" (1994); "What Would Ruth Do?" (1993); "Lucifer's Choice" (1992-93).
She is currently involved in several research projects, like for instance her CD-ROM: "An Introduction to Electro-Acoustic Music", an interactive text for the teaching of this subject, among others.
Hinkle-Turner has been awarded several prizes and grants, like for instance, in 1993, a "Meet the Composer Grant"; in 1992, an Oberlin College Research Grant for her work "Electronic Music by Women"; in 1991 she is the winner of the article contest for the Journal of the International League of Women Composers.
Likewise, she has participated in several conferences and festivals both at a national and at an international level, and has published several books and articles on music, musical technology and women composers of our days.
Several of her works have been recorded and broadcast on different labels and radio stations, like for instance "American Made" (1989) and "Women and Technology: A Radio Concert" (1991).
(SIGRID BAUMANN)
ALICE HO
Born in Hong Kong, this composer emigrates to Canada in 1982.
After completing her basic musical education at Indiana University and specializing at the University of Toronto, she has been an active composer and pianist, performing as a soloist for chamber groups and several orchestras.
A great enthusiast of New Music, she develops a wide activity in this genre, besides promoting Chinese and Canadian New Music.
In this sense, Alice Ho has recorded a solo piano concert with works by three Chinese composers of New Music for the CBC program "Two New Hours".
She has performed in Hong Kong during the Canada Festival (1991), as well as the Metro Toronto Week in Hong Kong (1993), and she has also given a concert at the Academy for the Performing Arts of Hong Kong (1993).
In 1994 she gives more recitals as a solo performer with her own works and also those by other Canadian composers at the Music Gallery and at the Toronto Canadian Chinese Artists Centre.
Her compositions have been performed and broadcast in different countries, among these Canada, USA, Great Britain, Japan, Hong Kong, and Korea.
She has received numerous awards and prizes by different prestigious institutions, among these the Du Maurier Arts Ltd.
New Music Festival Canadian Composers Competition (1994), Percussive Arts Society Composition Competition (1992), Tribune Nationale des Jeunes Compositeurs (1985), PRO Young Composers of Canada Composition Competition (1983), the International League of Women Composers Composition Competition (1982), and the Mu Phi Epsilon Original Composition Competition (1980).
Among the diverse commissions issued to Alice Ho mention must be made of the ones by the Ontario Arts Council and the Toronto Arts Council, among others.
Her orchestral works have been performed by prestigious orchestras such as the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra, the Hamilton Philharmonic Orchestra, the Han Feng Chamber Orchestra, and the Toronto Chinese Youth Orchestra.
Alice Ho is a member of several associations, among them the Canadian League of Composers y la Association of Canadian Women Composers.
Among her works mention must be made of the following: Orchestra: "Escapade" (1987); "Ice Path" (1993); Keyboards: "Arc" (1986); "Fire of Imagination" (1991); "Musical Tableaux" (1990-94); Chamber: "Caprice" (1994); "Chain of Being" (1994, revised in 1995); Vocal: "Three Songs : Based on Three Chinese Poems" (1980).
(SIGRID BAUMANN)
PATRICIA JUENGER
Composer Patricia Juenger, born in 1951, with double nationality (Austrian and Swiss), specializes in Composition, piano, organ and as a conductor in Wien, Frankfurt am Main and Paris, and settles in Switzerland, attracted by the beauty of this small European country.
Juenger chooses to devote her creative skills to electronic music, electroacoustic music, multimedia installations and the avantgarde interactive arts.
Among her works mention must be made of the following: "Symphonie vom Tod" (1978), recorded, like most of her creations, at the studio ANIGMA acoustic arts; "Gesang des Poseidon" (1979); "Images des Beaux Temps" (1980); "Balances" (1981); "Etude on getting crazy" (1983); "Water Walk" (1983); "Muttertagsfeier oder Die Zerstueckelung des weiblichen Koerpers" (1984); "Alban Berg hoert Wimbledon" (1984); "Ueber allen Wipfeln ist Ruh' " (1984), under the label Polygram; "Va banque" (1985); "B-Ton-Transit" (1986); "Between Constant & Instant" (1986); "Sehr geehrter Herr - ein Requiem" (1986); "Erziehung eines Vampirs" (1986); "Als koennten wir uns einrichten" (1987); "The Pattern is only Resemblance" (1988), a multimedia performance that would participate in the Ars Electronica Festival in 1988, in collaboration with Su Widl, Valie Export, and Peter Weibel; "Warten auf ein Wunder" (1988)"; "Die Klavierspielerin" (1988), in collaboration with Eva Csapo, among other artists; "Valse eternelle - ein Brief" (1989), inspired on the letters by Franz Kafka to Milena Jesenska, in an imagined re-creation of the answers this wonderful woman would have given to the Czeh writer; "Messa dei Padroni" (1990); "Ionian White" (1993); "Till the end of the bow and again" (1993); "Valse rituelle" (1994); "Island / Departure / Island" (1995); "Oceanographics" (1995); "A wild patience has taken me this far" (1996); "Transmitter - First to Second Nature -: Vom Flussbett zur Flutung" (1996), a multimedia interactive multimedia that goes from analog to virtual to installations and open air performances.
This artist also worked on the folloqwing projects: "Pick - Up - Opus"; "Poem & MetaPoem"; "Raskolnikow"; "Rimbaud dead".
(ARIADNA MARTIN)
CAROLINE K
Co-founder of the band "Nocturnal Emissions", in 1980, Caroline K (1957–2008) begins her musical career in the field of experimental and innovative music on the line of post-modern creativity, and soon makes herself well known as a pioneer in the kind of musical collage that later would become the property of those who devoted their tastes to hip-hop, acid house and similar styles.
The band would release eight albums, besides performing in numerous live concerts in several European tours, displaying a plentiful productive activity in the release of tapes, videos and 16 mm. movies.
The band also participates in different art exhibitions, among them one at the prestigious Tate Gallery, and soon after they found the label "Sterile Records".
The members of "Nocturnal Emissions" are the creators of what is known as "scratch video".
Caroline becomes a shocking percussionist.
The artist learns how to play the Australian didgeridoo having as her teacher an aboriginal, besides taking care of the keyboard arrangements with the band.
In 1984 Caroline leaves the band to engage in her own solo career. To this end, the artist creates her own studio, which at the same time allows her to contribute to the launching of other independent music bands.
Her first solo album, "Now Wait...", proves her mastery with the didgeridoo, besides her skill with the keyboards, samplers, percussion, tape and masterful vocals. This album contains a remarkable amount of ideological paganism that invites the listener to actively pay attention, not to mention the noteworthy erotic contents of the first part, which makes this work into, according to some reviews, a "powerful sexual stimulant".
Another of her productions, launched in 1985, contributes to the fight for the forbidden single "Class War", and reaches the headlines of the main newspapers, besides the fact that it becomes a hit in the top lists of the country.
The music of this controversial artist is challenging, cheeky, innovative and refreshing indeed.
(LUISA VALLS)
LUCRECIA R. KASILAG
This Asian composer from the Philippines can be defined as a pioneer in the field of the World Music genre, given her originality and musical innovation, which her creativity and her work in the arena of the research in native Asian music have meant, in a masterful combination with Western music, throughout her fruitful career.
Interested in music since her early childhood, Lucrecia R. Kasilag (1918-2008) doctorates in music at the University of Manila en 1936, in 1950 at the University of Rochester in the United States, and in 1981 at the New York University, among others.
The fact that her family held a musical tradition would shape her professional career.
Kasilag has taught music at several educational centers, has organized a variety of musical events both in her country and abroad, and has been appointed to several posts of importance in the Asian musical scene.
Chosen as President and Artistic Director of the Cultural Center, she has been in charge of the administration and programming of the great theatre of this institution, in ballet, opera, and symphonic music among other fields, besides organizing a theatre for folkroric events of the National Gallery of the Arts and of the University School of the Arts and the Culture of the Philippines.
Furthermore, she is the president of the League of Philippine Composers, the League of Asian Composers, as well as having been appointed Director of the Center for the Folkloric Arts Bayanihan, and has been the president of the National Council of Music in the Philipphines, vice president of the Society of Authors and Composers, president of the Cultural Committee of the UNESCO, member of the International Committee for the Development of Women in Philippines Society, etc.
Also, she is the only woman appointed as permanent member of the International Music Council on a personal basis.
Her musical activity has led her to participate in numerous international events as a member of different juries in contests held in many countries both in Asia and in Europe.
In 1949 she was the first woman to obtain a Fullbright grant to study in the USA.
In 1950 the Rockefeller Foundation awarded her a student grant, and she gets a residence as a composer at the University of Hawaii, where her creativity, blending East and West, is her most remarkable trait.
In 1970 she gets another special student grant from Germany which allows her to attend the year of the centennial of Beethoven.
A pioneer in the research on the use and cataloguing of Asian traditional native instruments, her activity in this sense has led her to possessing one of the most complete private collections of this kind of instruments.
She is one of the few musicians able to play any musical instrument, and she does not hesitate to use this knowledge in her music, together with Western instruments.
Among her works, mention must be made of "Ekologie 1: On a Day-off", composed for electronic tape and native Asian instruments, and several improvisations for Muslim gamelan, a typical instrument of the ancestral Muslim community in the Philippines.
Also, this composer includes in her repertoire over two hundred religious works, oratorios, the opera "Jose, Aking Anak" (1976), several ballets and theatre pieces for traditional groups of dancers, soloists and native instruments, orchestral pieces, instrumental works, etc.
Thanks to her work in the area of ethnomusicology, the musical heritage of uncountable tribes and ethnic groups integrating the native population of the Philippine Islands has been recorded on tape and film, and thus recovered.
Kasilag has also written many essays on her ethnomusicological finds.
Having received numerous awards for her work in a great deal of countries all over the world, including Spain (Orden de Alfonso X el Sabio, 1977), France (1978), Germany and China, among others, she celebrated her golden wedding as a composer in 1990, and still continued to compose: Her oratorio "The Spiritual Canticle" premiered in 1991, this being a theatrical multimedia work based on texts by Saint John of the Cross, the patron saint of the Philippine Islands, written for soprano, baritone, dancers, narrators, choir and orchestra.
Kasilag has been a guest of the University of Taipei, where she has been teaching the notation, history and cataloguing of ancient Asian musical instruments.
She has also travelled to Japan to conduct some of her works, and has toured the USA on a cycle of university lectures on ethnomusicology.
(SIMONETTA VALLI)
CONNIE KIELTYKA
New York composer, sound engineer and production consultant Connie Kieltyka has collaborated with numerous radio producers and prestigious New Music and alternative musics composers such as Tom Lopez, John Cage, Pauline Oliveros, and Steve Reich, besides having participated in live broadcasts for the radio station WNYC-FM from New York, and the Ars Electronica festival in Linz, Austria.
In 1986 Kieltyka joins the Godfrey Reggio/Phillip Glass film team as a sound recorder during the production of the film "Powaqqatsi", recorded in a six-month period in a worldwide setting, where several countries on our planet are visited.
Among her compositions, mention must be made of her radio piece "World Sounds", based on the sounds she recorded during this trip. This work, released in 1989, consists in a digital journey to the soundscapes of the Third World countries. The piece starts in Kenya, and slowly moves on to the jungle and to a small village where the ritual drums of initiation beat into the night. The journey continues with the sounds of dawn and on into the morning, then moving on to Nairobi and its urban environment. In the second section of this piece, the author illustrates the issue of transport, showing the listener how fast it is possible to move around nowadays, going from a remote location to another in a short time, from the Brazilian jungle to Hong Kong, from Hong Kong to Nepal, etc.
In a few words, Connie Kieltyka puts the world at our feet, taking us to an unusual trip throughout the sounds of our planet in an original, interesting way indeed.
(SIGRID BAUMANN)
MARI KIMURA
Japanese composer Mari Kimura has specialized in the violin and composition, tutored by prestigious professors.
After graduating with honors at the Toho School of Music in Japan, she completes her musical studies at Boston University and the University of Columbia, besides obtaining a doctorate in performance at Juilliard.
This artist utilizes basically the acoustic and electronic/MIDI violin, stretching the limits of this instrument in the performance of her own works and those of other composers.
Among her performances mention must be made of the ones carried out at the Banff Centre For the Arts, The Festival of Electroacoustic Music in Sweden, the Asian Contemporary Music Festival in Seul, the International Symposium of Electronic Art (ISAE) in Helsinki, and the International Bartok Festival in Hungary.
Kimura is furthermore an expert in improvisation, and has toured several countries in collaboration with prestigious improvisers such as the well known American artists Henry Kaiser and Elliot Sharp.
Among her productions mention must be made of her album "Acoustics," where her improvisations with Henry Kaiser, John Oswald and Jim O'Rourke are also included, released under the label Victo.
(ARIADNA MARTIN)
CHRISTINA KUBISCH
This German artist born in Bremen in 1948 completes her musical education in the Academy of the Arts in Stuttgart, in 1967.
Between the years 1968 and 1973 she continues with her musical studies, first in the Academy of Music in Hamburg, and later at the Academy of Jazz of the city of Graz and the Academy of Music in Zurich, where she learns to play the flute tutored by André Jaunet.
Specialized in this instrument, she also gets a degree in musical education.
The following year she completes post-graduate studies at the Conservatory of Milano, where she studies Composition with Franco Donatoni, a well known electronic musician.
Up to the year 1975 Christina develops a prolific musical career as a performer of soloist flute, specializing in Contemporary music besides her own compositions.
From 1976 on, Kubisch participates in different live events, integrating visual and musical elements in what turns out to be true "video-concerts", and also partakes in some tours on the European continent and the United States, presenting her spectacular multimeda installations.
From 1980 on, the artist prepares new performances where she develops her peculiar musical environments and sonic spaces, both in closed halls and in open air installations, taking advantage of all the spaces where her creativity allows her to develop her multimedia compositions: parks, factories, forests, shipyards, etc.
Christina also composes music for theatre plays and movie soundtracks since 1984, among which mention must be made of a commission by Reinhild Hoffmann, another one for the Studio Azzurro in Milano, and yet another one for VEDUTE.
Christina, settled in Milano since 1978, teaches electronic music in this city.
Among the albums this artist has released we can mention, for instance, her composition "Two & Two", released under the label Multhipla Records; "Tempo Liquido", a work released by the label Cramps Records, and "On Air", this one being a self produced work in a cassette.
Christine Kubisch also gives different solo recitals, besides her continued participation in several multimedia live performances.
Likewise, the artist collaborates in different exhibitions, even if she prefers to choose where, when and in which conditions she is ready to offer her collaboration, an activity she keeps doing from 1974 to 1985.
Among these, mention could be made of her participation in "Enviromedia Milano", "Experimental Intermedia Foundation" in New York, the Biennale in Paris, at the Musée d'Art Moderne, the Palais des Beaux Arts in Brussels, the exhibition"Für Augen und Ohren" ("For Eyes and Ears") in the Academy of the Arts in Berlin, "Sis Dies d'Art Actual" (Six Days of Current Art) in Barcelona, etc.
Christina participates in the Festival Ars Electronica 1987 with her work "The Sound Meadow", of an interactive character, consisting in a series of hidden electronic wires on the grass which form a sonic labyrinth, as they carry different sounds integrated in several structures.
Each structure contains sounds from nature, some of which are genuine, while others have been re-created by computer and / or synthesizers.
By means of the use of magnetic induction techniques, these sounds become audible through magnetic earphones with which the listener can receive the different audio stimuli which are translated into varied sonic fields received as if an "artificial ear" were available to the listener, according to the respective density of the movement, speed and proximity to the electric wires, thus generating new combinations of "sounds of nature" each time.
The artist plays with the concepts of "electronic nature" or "natural electronics".
The sensation thus caused induces the listener to believe that when we take off our headpieces we can continue to listen to the musical voices of nature.
From all this, we can definitely say that this artist experiments with sound and the technological applications that allow her to explore the interactive arts in all their glory.
(ARIADNA MARTIN)
MAYAKO KUBO
Japanese artist Mayako Kubo has specialized in working the sound from certainly innovative perspectives.
Her radio works include "Mothers Children Lovers People", an independent production developed in Germany in 1988; "I Am 99 Years Old" (1989), a work where she develops a collage of a multi-layered, multi-textured nature, which has two main narrative threads: On the one hand, the voices of several people can be heard stating their ages from 99 to 1 and back to 99 years of age once again; and on the other hand, excerpts from interviews speaking about the volatile dynamics of family life and the relationships with different relatives.
Even if this is a musically "fractured" work, this piece constitutes a unique listening experience, which does not lack of a certain pristine clarity, as it provides us with a pure sense of our humanity as well as the common aspects we all share as human beings, no matter the various origins or the different circumstances of our lives.
This piece was produced for the radio station Sender Freies Berlin, in Germany; Another creation on this same line worth mentioning is "Father! Song of a Lost Figure" (SFB/SR, Germany, 1992).
Mayako Kubo tends to draw her inspiration from the working of family relationships, the experience of Japanese immigrants in Europe and the critical discussion of current Japanese society in our days.
(SIGRID BAUMANN)
JOANN KUCHERA-MORIN
Composer JoAnn Kuchera-Morin, obtained her Ph.D. in music at the Eastman School of Music in 1984, and currently is Associated Professor of Composition and Director of the Center for Computer Music Research and Composition at the University of California, Santa Barbara.
Among her works, mention must be made of the following: "Diju", for double bass and computer-generated tape; "Speira", for solo flute (1992); "Concerto For Clarinet and Clarinets", a composition for solo clarinet and computer-generated tape (1991); "Dreampaths", a cantata commissioned for soprano Elizabeth Mannion, computer-generated tape and five singers; "Yugen", for solo clarinet (1990); "Tachyons", for string orchestra.
Her works have been performed in several countries, and the artist has also participated in different events, among which mention must be made of the International Computer Music Conference in Montreal, Canada.
(ARIADNA MARTIN)
KIOKO KURODA
Free improviser born in Japan, Kyoko Kuroda, specializes in the piano, an instrument she learns to play from an early age.
Born in Tokyo in 1957, she receives a classical musical education up to her seventeenth birthday.
Once she begins university studies, Kuroda discovers her fascination for Japanese traditional theatre, Noh, and the artist becomes so involved in the Noh music that its influence pervades her entire production from then on.
Kioko Kuroda develops a new musical stage in her career devoting herself to jazz in 1982, while at the same time studying with pianist Aki Takase during the following two years.
From 1984 on, Kuroda begins to give live performances, in collaboration with bass player Yoshio Ikeda in 1985.
A year later she founds her own quartet, BAHR, together with Atsushi Ikeda (saxo), Shinichi Kato (bass) and Masayuki Kume (percussion).
The band, led by Kuroda, develops an intense musical activity for about a year and a half, performing her own compositions in several jazz clubs such as the prestigious Shinjuku Pit Inn.
From autumn 1987 to winter 1990, Kuroda leads the workshop she calls ORT. Among its participants such prestigious musicians as Atsushi Ikeda (saxo), Makoto Oka (saxo and flute), Yoichi Murata (trombonist) and Yoshihide Otomo (guitar), as well as several theatre actresses can be found. The objective of this workshop is to develop a kind of music capable of transcending genres, opening a new path for the infinite possibilities offered by the musical activity.
The live performance given by ORT in 1988 is released in a casette, and a version of this is recorded in a studio in 1990 and included in a sampler, "Now's the Time Workshop, Vol. 1".
In 1988 Kuroda organizes the series "Brecht a la Machine", performed by herself, together with Otomo (saxo), and Junji Hirose, who plays the instruments he himself makes, besides Masami Shinoda. A live performance of this series is likewise released in a cassette.
Several members of ORT and "Brecht a la Machine" participate together in a concert in December, 1990, together with Kazutoki Umezu (saxo) as a guest artist.
In 1989 Kuroda begins her solo career, from then on developing her personal musical
style, a style which goes beyond jazz and includes, besides the piano, the synthesizer, voice, poetry readings and all the advantages that current technology has to offer. It is in this time when she releases her first solo cassette, "Singing, Playing and Dancing", which compiles several of her live performances from January, April and July 1989, besides her CD "Something Keeps Me Alive", recorded in 1991.
Kuroda forms a trio in 1993, which, from 1994 on consists of herself as the leader of the band, Keita Itoh (bass) and Yoshihiro Okada at the drums.
Kuroda has collaborated with various musicians throughout her career.
In 1988 she performs different compositions with Shinoda forming a duo, whose live performances are released in a cassette; She also collaborates with Tenko, in 1991, resulting into his CD, "At the Top of Mt. Brocken", and the sampler "Bunt" in CD format.
In 1989 she collaboraes with saxo player Akira Sakata and his band Mitochondria, though she later leaves this formation.
All the same, she continues to occasionally collaborate with Sakata in various duos or trios.
Likewise, she collaborates with Sachi Hayasaka's band, Stir Up, touring Germany in 1992 and in 1994, with performances at the Nuremberg Ost-West Jazz Festival and the Moers New Jazz Festival (1992), as well as the Leverkusen Jazz Festival (1994).
Besides playing with Japanese musicians as a member of Stir Up, among them Takeo Moriyama, Kiyohiko Semba, Tomohiro Yahiro, Asuka Kaneko and Tatsuya Satoh, Kioko Kuroda collaborates as well with non-Japanese musicians, such as Ned Rosenberg or Korean alto sax player Kang Tae Hwan and Korean percussionist Kim Dae Hwan.
Other such collaborations include Lauren Newton, John Rose, in his Shopping Project, John Zorn, in his projects Cobra and Bezique, besides her participation in the multinational Free World Big Band, led by guitarist Kalle Laar and percussionist Takashi Kazamaki.
Together with Stir Up, Kuroda participates in a video directed by Yoichi Sai.
From 1991 on, Kuroda collaborates with vocalist Koichi Makigami, joining his band Hikashu. After participating in his recording studio, in the Makigami Ultra Japanese Pop Song Session, his CD Koroshi no Blues is released, and Kuroda collaborates in the Voice Circus of Makigami in the Hakushu Summer Festival in 1994.
Kuroda also collaborates with Otomo in his project Mosquito Paper Session, and participates in several improvisations for silent movies, among them "Tokkan kozo" (A Straightforward Boy), directed by Yasujiro Ozu, "Kimi to wakarete" (Apart from You), directed by Mikio Naruse, "La Roue", directed by Abel Gance, "A Trip to the Moon", directed by Georges Melies, and "The Kid", directed byr Charles Chaplin.
With her own band, Kuroda performs music for the silent movies "Seven Chances", directed by Buster Keaton, and "Umarete wa mita keredo" (I was Born, But...), directed by Ozu, in a series called "Silent Movies and Jazz".
Kuroda has also conducted a number of theatrical plays, being in charge of the musical aspects, both in Japan and overseas, among which mention must be made of the Trunk Theater, where she is the musical director and a performer.
She has also developed a new ORT workshop, in which she has released a new CD called "ORT OPERA: Ortopera Ensemble Vol. 1", for voice, percussion, computer, sampler and guitar. Premiered on September, 1996, this work counted with the collaboration of Yuki Maeda, Kumiko Takara, and Yasuhiro Otani.
(SIMONETTA VALLI)
PILAR JURADO
Born in Madrid in 1968, Pilar Jurado studies singing and composition.
Her rich soprano voice and her musical creativity, besides her interest in experimentation, grant her a successful career in the field of New Music.
Together with Zuriñe Guerenabarrena and other young Spanish composers, she participates in the concert sponsored by the Centro de Difusión de la Música Contemporánea and the newspaper El País de las Tentaciones, held on November 12, 1996, at the Auditorio Nacional de Madrid, participating with her work "Tentaciones de cristal", inspired on a poem by Vicente Huidrobo, and composed for a soprano, flute, oboe, clarinet, violin, viola, cello, piano and percussion.
Certain that music is a vocation, she believes that one can make a living out of it if besides composing one engages other activities such as teaching or acting as a performer.
In her opinion, classical New Music is a very minoritary choice that demands patience on the part of the composer, since to be able to listen to their compositions they depend on some intermediary performers, unlike other artists who at once see the result of their creativity.
She understands music as an art, as the language of the feelings, and she does not appear to approve of innovation per se, merely to search for novelty, for what is different, since in this way one risks forgetting about the feelings.
Nevertheless, it is necessary to innovate in music, although one should start from the synthesis of the current trends, since nowadays she thinks it is no longer possible to create anything new.
She believes that the artists must take out what they have within.
In her opinion, creative music does not have the desirable difusion on the part of institutional organisations, despite the fact that in her home town the panorama of the alternative musics is far better than in the rest of Spain.
Even so, she claims that the composers must strive to promote the New Music, as it is currently relegated to the category of a refuge for instrumentists who cannot find other places to go to.
She states that at times it is the very attitude of the composers what limits their field of action in this sense, therefore their attitude should change if they really wish to improve the situation.
Also, Pilar complains about the scarcity of governmental support to New Music composers in her country, a fact that strongly affects the difusion of these musics at the same level as that which can be found in other countries.
(SIGRID BAUMANN)
MELISSA HUI
Melissa Hui, born in Hong Kong in 1966, emigrates with her family to Vancouver, and studies at Yale University (D.M.A., M.M.A.), the California Institute of the Arts (M.F.A.) and the University of British Columbia (B.Mus.).
Specializing in New Music, she has been commissioned a variety of works by such prestigious institutions as the Nouvel Ensemble Moderne (Montreal), the Vancouver New Music Society, the Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, the Oregon Symphony, ASCAP, as well as the orchestras from Vancouver, Winnipeg, Saskatoon, Kitchener-Waterloo, and the National Arts Centre.
Her works have been performed by the Esprit Orchestra (Toronto), the Taiwan Symphony Orchestra, the Nevada Symphony Orchestra, as well as a variety of chamber ensembles in North America, Europe and Asia.
Among the different prizes and grants she has been awarded for her outstanding work as a composer, mention must be made of the ones by the Canada Council and the Meet the Composer grants, besides the prizes from PROCAN (1988), Vancouver New Music Society (1989), CAPAC (1988, 1989), SOCAN (1991, 1994), The Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra Composers Competition (1992), The Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble Music Lives! Composers Forum (1992), The Taiwan Symphony Orchestra (1993), The Nouvel Ensemble Moderne International Forum (1993), and the CBC Young Composers Competition (1994).
In 1992 her trumpet concert "Two Sides to the Wind" was selected to represent Canada at the International Rostrum of Composers in Paris.
Among the works she has released we can find "Speaking in Tongues", a series of nine miniatures for fifteen instruments, performed by the Nouvel Ensemble Moderne, under the label UMMUS; "San Rocco", released by the label Centrediscs (1995).
"Solstice", for chamber orchestra, under the label CRI's Emergency Music (1996), as a part of a series by the Common Sense Composers Collective.
Other works by Melissa Hui include "Inner Voices", "Aljira", "Shall We Go?" (1995-96), "Between you" (1992), "Common Ground" (1993), "Foreign Affairs" (1994); "Shadow Play" (1988), "Changes" (1990).
Melissa Hui also worked on other commissions by the Hammerhead Consort, the series of New Music Concerts, and UMMUS.
Besides her work as a composer, this artist has taught at the Mannes College and the Wilfrid Laurier University.
Currently Melissa Hui is Assistant Professor of Composition and Music Theory at Stanford University.
(SIGRID BAUMANN)
JAN HANFORD
Jan Hanford, specialized in electronic music of a cosmic-melodic nature near to pop, was born on August 16th., 1953, in Pennsylvania, USA, and began to study music at age seven.
She graduated in composition and piano at the University of Philadelphia, and felt a deep attraction for Baroque music, and most especially for the music by Bach and Scarlatti.
She also explains that she has likewise been influenced by the music created by the Beatles and pop in general.
In 1978 she created her own studio, where she began to produce her own music, which she then distributed herself to all her friends in tape form.
Her music reaches a private radio station first, WXPN, from her home town; and a program in yet another radio station, this time in Public Radio, called "Sound Passages", also play her music.
In 1990 Jan widens her studio and begins to produce the kind of music that will lead her to release her first CD, "Vespers", under the label AD Music, after contacting her in 1995 via Internet, in a chance communication with its director, David Mantripp.
As a result, two of her compositions, "Missing" and "Intimate", appear in the AD sampler of this year, previous to the release of her album "Vespers".
Drawing her inspiration from a variety of sources, among which she includes Johann Sebastian Bach and Doris Lessing, this CD is a delightful example of her art.
Her love of Bach and Lessing prompts her to create her own webs in Internet devoted to them.
The peculiar style Hanford reflects in her music is a combination of dance rhythms with elements of Trance, Ambient and Classical music.
Her melodies have been described as "memorable", and are characterized by a peculiar counterpoint including multiple constructions which nevertheless have some minimalist resonances combining into a subtly melancholy way.
Despite a noticeable mathematical precision in her production, her music expresses the emotions in a surprising way, and in her creations she alternates the sensitive atmospheres with other more lively ones, soft, or ambient in color.
Besides her musical activities, Jan is very active indeed in Internet, as a designer and with her own pages in the net.
Also it is she herself the one in charge of the web page for the label AD Music Ltd World Wide Web Site.
Jan is also a great reader and she loves the science fiction series "Star Trek".
(ARIADNA MARTIN)
ANN GHANDAR
Australian composer Ann Ghandar is born in Adelaide in 1943, and soon proves to have a special gift for music, as since she was two years old she was able to pick tunes at the piano.
At age ten she composes incidental music for a play, commisioned by one of her teachers, and she continues to do so for the next ten years. Among these incidental pieces most noteworthy are the ones she wrote for several Shakespeare plays.
At age 15 her first album is released, containing several of these incidental works at the piano.
Up to then Ghandar has been self-taught in the field of composition.
In the early seventies, nevertheless, she studies composition with Richard Meale and Jonathan Harvey.
While she pursues her musical education in further depth, the composer studies English Literature until 1969, and graduates with honors at the University of Adelaide, likewise being awarded the John Howard Clark Prize.
At the same time she studies the piano with Lance Dossor, and the violin with Beryl Kimber.
After graduating in Music at the Canberra School of Music, she gets a post as a tutor in English at the University of Adelaide and the Flinders University.
Later on she becomes the founding member of the Music Department at the University of New England, where she has been teaching Composition since 1974.
Married to Mostafa Ghandar, Ann discovers through her husband the intrinsic wealth of Middle Eastern music, which allows her to explore her creative skills, while at the same time she becomes interested in such instruments typical of the Arab culture as the 'ud (Arabian lute), and the qanun (Arabian zither, a predecessor of the harpsichord), which she studies both at Cairo and Los Angeles.
From all this a fusion of musical tendencies will sprout, which can be labelled within the fields of Global Music and New Music.
The artist will likewise apply her new knowledge to the teaching of composition.
A pioneer in the performance of Messiaen's works ("Quatre Etudes Rhythmiques") as well as Charles Ives' compositions ("Concord Sonata" and "First Sonata") in Australia, Gandhar has performed both at a national and at an international level at such prestigious institutions as the Joan Sutherland Performing Arts Centre in Sydney for the ABC FM radio, the Cairo Opera House, the Schoenberg Hall at the University of California in Los Angeles, and the Oriental Hall At the American University of Cairo.
Among her works, mention must be made of her orchestral piece "Sea Suite", premiered at Melbourne, and "Photophoresis" a piano work premiered at the Carnegie Hall, in New York.
Her most recent compositions reflect a greater simplicity of structure, having a more refined character, inspired on the influences of the Middle Eastern music she has learned to appreciate, while at the same time portraying the joy she feels for music itself, in such a way that her works evoke in the listener colors and images which have no match in beauty.
(ARIADNA MARTIN)
CONCHA JEREZ
This composer born in Madrid, (Spain) is a multimedia artist specialized in visual installations and sonic spaces whose creativity has been displayed in several exhibitions both at an individual level and in collaboration with group shows and performances in different countries, developing her activity in such places as Western Europe, Japan, Mexico and the USA.
Among her works mention must be made of her permanent collections at the Staatsgalerie in Stuttgart, Germany, and those at the Modernen Kunstmuseum in Norrkoping, Sweden, as well as her collaboration with José Iges in "La Ciudad De Agua" (1994), a sonic homage to the Alhambra de Granada, the ancient palace of the Arab kings in the Spain of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, with its gardens and fountains, where both artists collaborate in order to reproduce the sound of the water, the voices of the tourist guides and the visitors, as well as the texts and the Arab poems of the times represented at the monument, having as a result a work of an intrinsic beauty and serenity that does not become a mere production of "acoustic tourism" as this kind of works of a lesser quality has sometimes been called by some critics, but rather it is a true a work of art that intends to rebuild the monument by means of sound, in the same way as the Moorish mosaics that decorate the place were carefully set in those ancient times.
(ARIADNA MARTIN)
JIN HI KIM
Korean composer Jin Hi Kim receives the traditional musical education of her country of origin, and emigrates to the United States in 1980.
A pioneer of the fusion of traditional music and New Music, her favourite instrument is the komungo (a traditional, six-stringed Korean instrument).
Besides devoting her work to composition, Jin Hi Kim is an expert musical improviser.
As a solo performer and a composer, she has given several concerts in different countries, among them the USA, Canada, Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands and South America.
She has also collaborated with various well known artists in the arena of contemporary improvisation, such as Elliott Sharp, Malcom Goldstein, and Henry Kaiser.
Likewise, this composer has been commissioned a variety of works by such prestigious institutions as the Kronos Quartet, the California EAR Unit, and other renowned ensembles and soloists all over the world.
(SIMONETTA VALLI)
Craig Padilla / Zero Ohms - WHEN THE EARTH IS FAR AWAY - Lotuspike
Mythos - QUASAR - Sky Records / Sireena Records
Bertrand Loreau - JOURNEY THROUGH THE PAST - Spheric Music
Paz del Castillo - ELEVEN DROPS - Neuronium Records
Paul Ellis - FROM OUT OF THE VAST COMES NEARNESS - Lotuspike
Keller & Schonwalder - LONG DISTANCES - Manikin Records
Various - SOUNDS FROM THE CIRCLE III (CD in MP3 format)
Bruno Sanfilippo - SUBLIMINAL PULSE - Spotted Peccary
Schonwalder & Rothe - FILTER-KAFFE 101 - SynGate
Johan Agebjorn - THE MOUNTAIN LAKE - Lotuspike
John Luther Adams - FOUR THOUSAND HOLES - Cold Blue Music
Knitting by Twilight - WEATHERING - It's twilight time
Mythos - SUPERKRAUT, LIVE AT STAGGE'S HOTEL 1976 - Sireena Records
Time Being - A DIMENSION REFLECTED - Lotuspike
Nattefrost - DYING SUN, SCARLET MOON - Groove Unlimited
Edward Artemiev - MOOD-PICTURES - Electroshock Records
Ron Boots & Synth.nl - REFUGE EN VERRE - Groove Unlimited
Neuronium - ETYKAGNOSTYKA - Neuronium Records
Ann Licater - DOORWAY TO A DREAM - Cul de Sac Mystic Productions
Various - E-DAY 2010 - Groove Unlimited
The Amnis Initiative - DISTANT DREAMS - Lime Mixed Media
Gert Emmens - THE NEAREST FARAWAY PLACE VOL. 3 - Groove Unlimited
Al Conti - NORTHERN SEAS - Shadowside Music Publishing
Cadenced Haven - PEREGRINATION - Groove Unlimited
Rainbow Serpent & Isgaard - STRANGER - Manikin Records
Orgia Pravednikov - FOR THESE WHO SEE DREAMS VOL. 1 - Electroshock Records
Broekhuis, Keller & Schonwalder - REPELEN - Manikin Records (CD+DVD)
David Helpling & Jon Jenkins - THE CROSSING - Spotted Peccary
Various - CHRISTMAS AD, THE FIRST SNOW - AD Music
Gert Emmens - METAMORPHOSIS - Groove Unlimited
Darshan Ambient - A DAY WITHIN DAYS - Lotuspike
MorPheuSz - DAYS OF DELIRIUM & NOCTURNAL NIGHTMARES - Groove Unlimited
Human Metronome - THE CHILD SET FREE - Resonating Earth
Create - WE LIVE BY THE MACHINES - Groove Unlimited
Deborah Martin - DEEP ROOTS, HIDDEN WATER - Spotted Peccary
Picture Palace Music - MIDSUMMER - Groove Unlimited
Lexa - GENERACION KAMIKAZE - LaineREC'Studio
Various - E-LIVE 2010 - Groove Unlimited
Neuronium - HYDRO 2 - Neuronium Records
Nattefrost - LIVE IN GERMANY 2008 & 2009 - Groove Unlimited
Michele de Wilton - MYTHS & LEGENDS
Edward Artemiev - INVITATION TO REMINISCENCES - Electroshock Records
Michel Huygen - KRUNG THEP - Neuronium Records
Ynet - MICRO MACRO - Electroshock Records
Antanas Jasenka - POINT CIRCLE - Electroshock Records
Bionulor - BIONULOR
Valery Siver & Kirill Trepakov - MUSIC FROM THE RUSSIAN PAGES - Electroshock Records
Michel Huygen - SONAR (LIVE CONCERT IN BARCELONA) - Neuronium Records
Dmitry Mazurov - CREATURE ON A LAVATORY PAN - Electroshock Records
Anatoly Pereslegin - XENOPHOBIA - Electroshock Records
Knitting by Twilight - RIDING THE WAY BACK - It's twilight time
J.C. Combs - SAFE PASSAGE - Electroshock Records
Elektra - EUDEMONIA - Blowpipe
Joseph Loibant - THE GRAND SPACE - At-Mooss Records
Michel Huygen - NEUROHYSTERYA - Neuronium Records
Milica Paranosic - GIVE TO GROW - Electroshock Records
Jeff Greinke - VIRGA - Lotuspike / Brain Laughter
Michel Huygen - ZEN DRIVING - Neuronium Records
Simon Wickham-Smith - MULTIPLE TONGUES - Electroshock Records
Deborah Martin & Erik Wollo - BETWEEN WORLDS - Brain Laughter / Spotted Peccary Music Group
Roman Stolyar - MISSA APOCRYPH - Electroshock Records
Alexander Volodin - UNFINISHED JOURNEY - Electroshock Records
Gary Dibenedetto - TWIN TOWERS - Electroshock Records
Ever Orchid - DRYAD ANTHOUSAI - Fire Lines Records
Erik Wollo - GATEWAY - Projekt
Steve Roach - SIGH OF AGES - Projekt
Rudy Adrian - DISTANT STARS - Lotuspike / Brain Laughter
Ron Boots & Frank Dorittke & Harold van der Heijden - DERBY! - Groove Unlimited
Andreas Akwara - QUANTUM - AA Music / Groove Unlimited
Robert Schroeder - 30 YEARS AFTER - NEWS-music / Spheric Music
Synth.nl - OCEANOGRAPHY - Groove Unlimited
Mythos - GALLERY CONCERTS - MellowJet-Records
Between Interval - THE EDGE OF A FAIRYTALE - Brain Laughter / Spotted Peccary Music Group
Terra Ambient - WANDERLUST - Lotuspike / Brain Laughter
CAZENAVE - SER - Astral
GUILL & JEM - TWO SECONDS - Astral
DARSHAN AMBIENT - FROM PALE HANDS TO WEARY SKIES - Lotuspike / Brain Laughter / Spotted Peccary Music Group
ROBERT RICH & IAN BODDY - REACT - DiN
CRAIG PADILLA & SKIP MURPHY - ANALOG DESTINATION - Groove Unlimited
VOLT - HjVj - Groove Unlimited
CREATE - LOST ON AN ISLAND OF ADVENTURE - Groove Unlimited
RON BOOTS - SEE BEYOND TIMES, LOOK BEYOND WORDS - Groove Unlimited
ROBERT SCOTT THOMPSON - POESIS ATHESIS - Lens Records
BRUNO SANFILIPPO & MATHIAS GRASSOW - AMBESSENCE - AD21 Music
JOSEPH LOIBANT - IO - At-Mooss Records
MIDNIGHT SYNDICATE - THE DEAD MATTER: CEMETERY GATES - Linfaldia Records / Entity Productions
IAN TESCEE - A TRAVELER'S GUIDE TO MARS
MICHEL HUYGEN - IRAWADI - Neuronium Records
MICHEL HUYGEN - MAGIC SAMUI - Neuronium Records
NEURONIUM - NIHILOPHOBIA - Neuronium Records
JOSEPH LOIBANT & TOMAS C. GILSANZ - IN OTHER DIMENSIONS (video) - At-Mooss Records
ROBERT FOX - EVERGREEN - AD Music / Notting Hill Music Publishing
URIEL - CULTURE SHIFT - AD Music
CHAS SMITH - NAKADAI - Cold Blue Music
DANIEL LENTZ - POINT CONCEPTION - Cold Blue Music
JOSEPH LOIBANT - DUAL PHASE - At-Mooss Records
JOSEPH LOIBANT - IN GRAVITATION (CD + DVD) - At-Mooss Records
PSICODREAMICS - FANTASYNTH - Witches on the Radiowaves Records
CRAIG PADILLA - ZERO OHMS - SKIP MURPHY - BEYOND THE PORTAL - Lotuspike / Brain Laughter / Spotted Peccary Music Group / O3E
Subscribing to the Amazing Sounds Newsletter you
can now receive at your e-mail the contents list of our magazine.
How to subscribe?
It's easy. Use this link:
http://launch.groups.yahoo.com/group/amaze/
Amazing Sounds is a
professional webzine devoted to the alternative musics. Its access is
free and it is only
financed by means of its sponsors. Should your firm wish to insert
advertisements in its
pages,
please contact us at
You can purchase much of the
reviewed material thanks to our partnership with Amazon:
Now, you can
purchase much of the
reviewed material thanks to our partnership with GEMM:
Last Modified: December 31,
2014.
What's New | Features
| Services |
News
| Galleries | Hot
Links
| Mailorder
| You can contact us via: |
|
Amazing Sounds
Jordi M. Colome
Apartado de Correos 727 (P.O. Box)
08220 Tarrasa, Barcelona
SPAIN
Advertisements
posicionamiento seo
Copyright © 1996-2015 Amazing Sounds.
All Rights Reserved.
D. L. B-8306-2009
ISSN 2013-3561
All the
texts and graphics are
the copyright of their authors.
Reproduction in whole or in part by any
means feasible
without previous written permission is prohibited.
