workshop coming up: Melody Makers

Melodies are the storytellers of music. Just start singing a few notes and instantly there is a feeling/atmosphere, the beginning and clear promise of a much longer story. Melodies are also playful creatures, meaning that in bigger numbers they tend to swirl around each other, being looped and copied and transposed, creating ever-new relations and identities with each other, transforming to totally different music or ending in beautiful silences.
In this Genetic Choir workshop, we look at how we use melodies in improvisation singing. Voice work and rhythm will feature along the way, but the focus is on weaving melodies and story. How do you go about it, as an improvisation singer? How do you make it personal and how does ‘meaning’ evolve? But also: how do you work together with other singers?
The Genetic Choir approach ensures that you don’t need any particular background to be able to join this workshop. Any level of experience and/or musical styles are welcome.

Genetic Choir workshop - Melody Makers

29th & 30th of June 2013 – informatie in het Nederlands, klik hier

10:00-17:00 both days  -  110,- Euro (excl. VAT)

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photo by Oxyman

[GFDL, CC-BY-2.5], via Wikimedia Commons

May Music

A recent session of the Genetic Choir yielded the piece of music below. Enjoy!

In our ambition in publishing a new recording every month, this more contemporary piece contrasts nicely with the April Melodies of last month.

Composition 1304071 – Pas ce soir

  

Upcoming Genetic Choir Events:

22 June 2013 – Genetic Choir @ Lange nacht van kort vreemd proza, Utrecht

26 June 2013 – Genetic Choir @ Tabula Rasa, Amsterdam

29/30 June 2013 – workshop Genetic Choir / theme: “Melody Makers”

Soharoza + Chór Kobiet

In the category ‘Interesting Choir Concepts’: watch below.

Both examples are not improvisation, but just a cool way of using the possibilities of ‘choir’ – maybe also inspirational for our own – improvisation – concepts and setups.

SOHAROZA from Hungary, here with a very nice flashlight piece:

The things they write about themselves is very close to a description of the Genetic Choir  , but I cannot find any of their improvisation work on their website. (though lots of other interesting choir work)

http://soharoza.hu/?page_id=1736126

  

And here the Choir of Women that Martine found:

CHÓR KOBIET from Poland

They are opening the Spring Festival in Utrecht on 17 May 2013

 

April Melodies

To prove that we can also end up with a slightly more mainstream a capella sound when singing from nothing, listen to this piece that appeared as the opening composition of a concert we did last summer. (Although ‘mainstream a capella people’ will probably still find this music rather curious, I believe. Oh sweet relativity!)

Composition 1206011 – Overture PuntWG

The Genetic Choir is publishing every first day of the month a new composition, drawn from our previous concerts and performances. Have a look at all the other music on our Audio Page.

If you are interested to experience being part of the choir and how this type of music is being created, there is an open Genetic Choir workshop planned on

29+30 June 2013

with the theme “Melody Makers”. Click here for more information.

Genetic Choir goes Poetry

On 20th of April 2013, the Genetic Choir will perform musical pieces inspired on “short, weird prose” in Utrecht.

It’s a whole evening of Dutch absurdist prose and poetry (“absurdism in all it’s directions and far corners”), according to the website of the Vorlesebühne, who is hosting the event.

Below some more information in Dutch. The Genetic Choir is going to sing six or seven instant compositions as interludes between the writer’s performances.

20 april 2013, 20:00 uur
De Vorlesebühne met “De Braakzaamheid van de Vliesvleugeligen”

Lokatie:

Houtzaagmolen De Ster, Molenpark 3, Utrecht

Wezens met een dik vel en de poten in de modder kunnen tegen een stootje, wezens met een dunne huid en lange tenen kukelen al om bij windkracht 3. Maar aan de andere kant kan grote gevoeligheid ook weer heel speciale windeieren opleveren. Wie een windei kan uitblazen (zonder dat de schaal breekt), die wint de harten van het volk als de beste anti-populist.

met: Paulien Cornelisse, Ariadne Verstegen, Kasper C. Jansen, Bernhard Christiansen, Sylvia Hubers

muziek: Genetic Choir

De molen is open vanaf 19.30 uur

entree: 9/6 euro – reserveringen: info@bernhardchristiansen.nl

David Bowie – live remixed the Genetic Choir way

This months’ sound treat of the Genetic Choir is a cut-up remix of Bowie’s famous song ‘Space Oddity’ put through the human meat-mill of the Genetic Choir ensemble. Tell singers to choose their own little fragment from the song and to use it as the starting point for the composition, and this is what you get. Oh yes, and nobody was allowed to use the words “Ground Control” or “Major Tom” 

As the soundmixing-machine is human and instant, each version is different – and the source material that the music starts from is spanning the whole range of ‘almost the original’ to very free interpretations… Enjoy.

Composition 1302235 – SpaceOddity (no Major Tom)

We performed another version of this piece yesterday night on the lovely first evening of the Axolot Aquarium, titled “Space Odyssey”, next to two other compositions. It was a great night, thanks to all musicians and audience! (the Axolot Aquarium is going to be a regular event of manifold styles of music + performance in Amsterdam, every two months. Check it out!)

 

 

 

Space Odyssey Concert next Thursday!

In the coming week, the Genetic Choir will be part of an exciting evening of new and classical music, fusion rock and jazz:

— Thursday, 28th of February 2013 from 19:00 —

Axolot Aquarium #1: Space Odyssey

in Dokhuis Gallery, Plantage Doklaan 8-12, Amsterdam

THE GENETIC CHOIR will sing three instant compositions, spreadout through the evening. The ladies of the neotenic aXolot collective (recorders) are collaborating with us. There is food at low price, video art and an ecclectic mix of musicians.

19:00-1:00 – Thursday 28th of February 2013   / food from 19:00, music from 20:00

facebook link: http://www.facebook.com/events/437027349699001/

This is the bill:

AXOLOT with a.o. transdisciplinary, contemporary acoustic and electronic music visualized by Marjolijn Zwakman and a special Dutch premiere of a tripomatic composition by Michiel Mensingh.

THE GENETIC CHOIR – vocal instant composition

KIM-JOSÉ BODE & ANA LADAS: dance/music improvisation

THE WEST SIDE TRIO: classical Jazz Weirdness Brilliance
Vera van der Bie- violin/ Isabella Petersen – viola/ Annie Tangberg – Cello

DODÓ KIS TRIO: fusion rock
Dodó Kis – EWI, Bernhard Höllinger – bass, Aron Nyuri – drums

AXONAUT: trespassing contemporary Jazz
Cesar Latorre – piano/Rafael Morales Aguin – bass/ Marcos Baggiani-drums

DJ JUHA: Half Finnish, half DJ. Interested in ubiquitous culture and urban rhythms. Likes Richie Jackson sliding down escalators.

MANUEL DAHM: aquatic media installation

The Dokhuis is offering a very tasty vegan dish for a low price and there will be classic and (a special aXolot) cocktails!
RESTAURANT RESERVATIONS: +31 6 17 39 72 82
http://www.facebook.com/dokhuis.galerie

Be there or be square! 

Improvisation & Sound textures this weekend

One last spot available in the workshop coming weekend:

16+17 February 2013:  Genetic Choir workshop + Resonance / Sound Textures

10:00-17:00 both days / 110,- excl. BTW (130,90 Euro)

Saturday will be the general Genetic Choir work: Discover and explore the wider possibilities of your voice, gain freedom in improvising and working together with other singers: Voice work, melodies, resonance & rhythm…

  
On Sunday a deeper investigation into Resonance and Sound Textures: Whether singing in harmony or in disharmonical blissful sound textures, how can we work with sound ‘quality’ and resonance? How can we hear sound more subtely and make the collective sound stronger? How to play with the ‘edges of sound’ individually and in interaction with your fellow singers, while singing improvisation pieces? (more info on the theme, see also the previous workshop post “Resonant Voices” (click here)

All levels of experience are welcome!

Send us your details via the contact page if you’d like to be part of the workshop:  click here

Proef-workshop in Alkmaar + concert

If you always wanted to get an idea of how it is to improvise with the Genetic Choir, but didn’t like to spend a whole day or a weekend on a workshop, here’s your chance!

As part of the Toon&Taal Festival in Alkmaar, there will be a Genetic Choir taster workshop this Sunday, at 14:00.

The workshop lasts 45 minutes. At 15:00, we give a concert in the same theatre.

Your ticket for the workshop is directly the ticket for the concert.

All info&reservations on this website: http://www.provadja.nl/producties/toon-taal-workshop-improvisatiezang-genetic-choir-sings-tanja-smit?show_id=22819

More info on the workshop content? Click here.

More info on the concert? Look here for content, and here for tickets.

 

February song

Here a composition for this chilly, empty time of the year…  

This is another piece that we actually recorded in the heat of summer last year, thanks to an invitation of Dennis Maij (www.terra-preta.nl) to work in his studio. (more recorded music can be found here)

Moreover, it is one of the pieces we started making based on graphic scores. Here on a drawing made by Tanja Smit (www.tanjasmit.com). She creates drawings based on printed texts in books and newspaper-articles. This drawing – “Olin” – happens to be based on a Finnish text. For more information about Tanja and her collaboration with the Genetic Choir look here.

We are going to sing a concert based on more of her drawings on 10th of February 2013. For more information and reservations, click here or look at the previous post on this blog (below).

Extra Concert with Graphic Scores

After our performance last week in LOOS, the Genetic Choir will sing another concert with the Graphic Scores of Tanja Smit in February!

The ‘Toon & Taal Festival’ in Alkmaar has invited us to give a matinee concert on Sunday, 10th of February at 15:00 in Provadja. You can also follow a workshop prior to the concert.

14:00 workshop voice-improvisation
15:00 concert starts

Provadja, Verdronkenoord 12, 1811 BE Alkmaar
tickets/reservations: (072) 520 20 22

Genetic Choir sings Tanja Smit – voices and text-images

“Het Genetic Choir maakt composities uit fragmenten van de werkelijkheid. De muziek ontstaat op het moment met het publiek en gebruikt wat is voor handen: de architectuur van de zaal, de aanwezigheid van de mensen, toevallige geluiden, geuren, vormen. Ook meegenomen materiaal kan de basis vormen voor de composities: een schilderij, een woord, iets te eten.
Tanja Smit maakt tekeningen op teksten die ze vindt in boeken en kranten. De beelden die daarbij ontstaan zijn visuele analyses van de tekststructuur. Het lijken partituren die erom vragen gezongen te worden. Een samenwerking lag op de loer. Zowel Smit als het Genetic Choir verkennen in hun werk patronen die onder de oppervlakte van de werkelijkheid liggen en creëren zo nieuwe ervaringen van woorden, beelden en muziek.”

Information about this concert in English? Look here.

www.genetic-choir.org / www.tanjasmit.com

“Songs” workshop this weekend

The coming weekend, the Genetic Choir will spend two days exploring known songs as part of ensemble improvisations.

You can still join, if you like:

workshop: “The well-known song”

12+13 January 2013
133,10 Euro (110,- excl. VAT) – Amsterdam
Saturday  14:30 – 21:30   /   Sunday  11:00-18:00

How to work with musical ‘quotes’ and well-known songs as part of Genetic Choir improvisations? When quoting known music in improvisation, it can be fun but also deadly. How can a known piece of music be used in group improvisation in a respectful but also refreshing way?  Can our Genetic Choir strategies of doubling/mutating/putting next to each other/etc.  be used in these special cases?
So bring a favourite song and you will experience how your singing and the interpretation of the song will become stronger through the confrontation with the Genetic Choir way of working.
On Sunday, we will also record the new compositions that we create.

Go to the contact page, or the workshop content page to give yourself up for a workshop. If you have any questions, just ask them.

New Year Symphony

A new track for the new year:

Composition 1206163 – New Year Symphony

The Genetic Choir publishes monthly a new instantly composed composition. Subscribe if you’d like to stay tuned.

Previously released:  Listen to more music on our Audio page

Concert at Ephémère / LOOS – 10th of January 2013

A Genetic Choir concert in collaboration with fine artist Tanja Smit is coming up:

10th of January 2013, 20:30 in LOOS, Den Haag

Studio LOOS
De Constant Rebequeplein 20B
2518RA Den Haag – http://www.studioloos.com/

We are performing in the Ephémère series, so there will be some other new music sets the same evening.

More info about this concert? – click here

Hope to see you there!

Upcoming Genetic Choir workshops

8 December 2012: "Rhythm is the thing"

A one-day investigation into rhythm in the Genetic Choir context: What is rhythm (essentially)? And how to work with that essence of rhythm, even if you are not good in counting?  This Saturday, we’ll create intricate symphonies made of rhythm-carpets and beatbox-glory!
In Amsterdam – more info: click here
  

21 December 2012: "Improvisation im Chor"

A workshop for ‘big choir’ Genetic Choir work in Hannover, Germany. Hosted by the department Jazz/Rock/Pop of the High School of Music, Theatre and Media.
See for more information: hannover-workshops.de and/or hmtm-hannover.de

 

12/13 January 2013: "The well-known song"

How to work with musical ‘quotes’ and well-known songs as part of Genetic Choir improvisations? When quoting known music in improvisation, it can be fun but also deadly. How can a known piece of music be used in group improvisation in a respectful but also refreshing way?  Can our Genetic Choir strategies of doubling/mutating/putting next to each other/etc.  be used in these special cases?
So bring a favourite song and you will experience how your singing and the interpretation of the song will become stronger through the confrontation with the Genetic Choir way of working.
On Sunday, we will also record the new compositions that we create.
In Amsterdam – more info: click here
 

16+17 February 2013:  GC workshop + Resonance / Sound Textures

Saturday will be the general Genetic Choir work: Discover and explore the wider possibilities of your voice, gain freedom in improvising and working together with other singers: Voice work, melodies, resonance & rhythm…
On Sunday a deeper investigation into Resonance and Sound Textures: Whether singing in harmony or in disharmonical blissful sound textures, how can we work with sound ‘quality’ and resonance? How can we hear sound more subtely and make the collective sound stronger? How to play with the ‘edges of sound’ individually and in interaction with your fellow singers, while singing improvisation pieces?
In Amsterdam – more info: click here

  

Go to the contact page, or the workshop content page to give yourself up for a workshop. If you have any questions, just ask them.

Genetic Choir Christmas Carol

As we enjoy playing the game of inventing new labels for recordings made under completely different circumstances, listen now to the Genetic Choir release of this month: a song for the contemplative side of the festive season.

Earphones highly recommended to catch the spaciousness of the recording location! (applies to almost all music on our Audio page)

Composition 1206244 – piano JvV

Performed and instantly composed during a concert in the Metaalkathedraal, Utrecht on 24-06-2012, in collaboration with composer/pianist Jeroen van Veen.

Previous releases of Genetic Choir music:

Composition 1206243

Composition 1206167

…and of course even more on our audio page: click here

Screaming Men Choir online

Just for the fans of exceptional, weird choirs of new music: You might already know about the Finnish choir of Screaming Men, Mieskuoro Huutajat (they are quite famous).

What I just found out is that the brilliant documentary about them, made by Mika Ronkainen, is now watchable in its full length for free, on the website of the International Documentary Festival (IDFA)

If you haven’t seen it, you should. 

Screaming Men – full documentary on Idfa.nl – click here

website of Mieskuoro Huutajat: www.huutajat.org

Zing Magazine reviews Genetic Choir workshop

Twan Geurts, writer for Zing Magazine (a Dutch journal for singers) was on a Genetic Choir workshop this autumn and writes about it in the october issue of the Magazine:

You can read it here: Zing Magazine op workshopbezoek

Upcoming workshops are full, save for one last place in the 24/25 november weekend.

But there is still room in the workshops that are planned for the beginning of 2013…

  

Workshops 2013 !

12/13 january – The well-known-song (special themed workshop for experienced improvisers)

16/17 February 2013 – Genetic Choir workshop / resonance and textures

9/10 March 2013 – Genetic Choir workshop / graphic scores

Look at the Workshop Calendar for more dates and detailed info on the workshops.

November Music

This months’ Genetic Choir music we actually recorded in the heat of summer: On a joint concert with minimalist composer and pianist Jeroen van Veen in the Metaalkathedraal Utrecht.

For this particular piece, Jeroen played samples on his keyboard that were taking from the various ways one can ‘destroy a piano’ (literally)…

It resulted in kind of a November music:  melancholic at first and rather stormy/bewitched later. Enjoy!

Composition 1206243 – JvV samples

Every first day of the month, we will publish a new piece of Genetic Choir music on this website. Click here for the other compositions on the Audio page.

Composing for the Metropole Orchestra

This might interest you, dear instant composition singers:

Today everyone can compose a few bars of music for the Metropole Orkest, and there is a good chance they will play your music live as part of the Twitter Symphony they are playing today (which will take about 8 hours…)  Look here: www.tweetphony.nl    They will even twitter you back if they have played your composition and give you a link to the video-registration of the piece you have created!

So, go ahead.

If you make a composition an twitter it to them, let me know about it via my Twitter account @instantcomposer  so that I can gather all the little compositions made by you  (maybe together, that can become an open score for our next concert      )

Greetings, Thomas