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Program
James Annett: Signals, gestures and flow
for viola, flute(s), saxophone(s), percussions and electronics
This collaborative performance takes as a point of departure the idea of the "sensory / social environment". This concept was influenced by the work of Pauline Oliveros, George Lewis and Bessel Van Der Kolk. I am asking what constitutes this environment with respect to locale, intention and accident? From whose perspective is it legible? What kinds of socialities and interactions are engendered within it? In writing my software, I wanted an instrument which I could perform with but that would also provide a sonic environment for other musicians to inhabit and shape. From the beginning, my conception was in spatial and choreographic terms. This live@CIRMMT performance, which uses multi-channel sound, thus realizes a significant component of the project.
The improvising soloists have collaborated together in past performances including the IMOO Festival. This work showcases a piece of software written by the composer. It is the product of independent research conducted at IRCAM, CCRMA and alongside members of the FluCoMa project over the past three years. The work features sonic material derived from recordings of each of the soloists arranged specifically for this performance.
Performers:
- James Annett, viola & laptop
- Anna Webber, flute & saxophone
- Erik Hove, flute & saxophone
- John Hollenbeck, drums & percussion
Brice Gatinet & Benjamin Lavastre : Instrumental Interaction III
Instrumental Interaction III for Karlax and classical guitar is a profoundly mixed piece in which each instrument explores the territory of the other. Sources of inspiration include the guitar's microtonal harmonic universe, as well as the gestural and choreographic expression of the Karlax digital musical instrument. A variety of writing styles are superimposed, more or less electronic, spatialized, synchronized or active like very slow pulsations, with Time as the main witness.
Performers:
Bio
James Annett
James Annett is a multi-instrumentalist and composer currently based in Montreal. His music explores the intersections between diverse styles of music including jazz, new classical and experimental rock music. His artistic practice is based in improvisation and also incorporates movement and interactivity. He has performed alongside Roscoe Mitchell, Malcolm Goldstein, as a member of the Ratchet Orchestra and in his trio Say Spirit with Colin Fisher and Josh Cole. He performs regularly at events and festivals in Canada including FIMAV, Suoni Per Il Popolo and the Off Jazz Festival.
Brice Gatinet
Brice Gatinet is a French composer currently living in Montreal. His musical interests are numerous. He has studied jazz, improvisation, death metal and Chopin. He has had the good fortune to cross paths with such great musicians as Kurt Rosenwinkel, Francesco Filidei, Joelle Léandre, Bojan Zulfikarpacik, Stephano di Battista, Ana Sokolović, Jean Andreo and Michel Portal. He also took part in an artistic residency at IRCAM, focusing on the creative partnership between Man and AI in the context of machine learning. His works exhibit energetic disparities and demonstrate a marked interest in extremes, two elements at the heart of his writing and musical thinking. His work bears the hallmark of this approach, where technicality, poetry and structure are intimately linked to create a personal dynamic, close to explosion, the foundation of a sound universe freed from constraints. Brice Gatinet holds a master's degree from the Université de Montréal under the direction of Ana Sokolovic, and a doctorate from McGill University under the supervision of Philippe Leroux.
Benjamin Lavastre
Benjamin Lavastre trained at the Haute Ecole de Musique de Genève with Michaell Jarrell, Luis Naón, Eric Daubresse and Pascal Dusapin, and at the Hochschule Weimar with Michael Obst. He is currently pursuing a PhD at McGill University in Montreal with Philippe Leroux. His research focuses on interactions between digital instruments (notably the Karlax) and acoustic instruments. His works have been performed by such prestigious ensembles and conductors as the MDR Symphony Orchestra, the TANA Quartet, the Contemporary Music Ensemble, Lorraine Vaillancourt, Guillaume Bourgogne, Kanako Abe, Ullrich Kern and at the Archipel Festival in Geneva, the ZKM and Impuls, among others. He has also been selected for the ARCO Academy in 2019. He won the Prix du conseil de Genève in 2018 and the Prix Paléo Festival de Nyon in 2020. Also a guitarist, he plays a varied repertoire ranging from contemporary music to jazz. He is a qualified guitar teacher in France. His works are published by Babelscores.
Anna Webber
Anna Webber is a flutist, saxophonist, and composer whose interests and work live in the aesthetic overlap between avant-garde jazz and new classical music. Her music has been called "visionary and captivating," (Wall Street Journal), and “heady music [that] appeals to the rest of the body” (NPR). Her album Clockwise was voted #6 Best Album of 2019 in the NPR Jazz Critics Poll, and her 2020 release, Both Are True (Greenleaf Music), co-led with saxophonist/composer Angela Morris, was named a top ten best release of 2020 by The New York Times. She was recently named a 2021 Berlin Prize Fellow and was voted the top “Rising Star” flutist in the 2020 Downbeat Critic’s Poll.
Erik Hove
Erik Hove is an alto saxophonist who plays a wide variety of jazz, improvised, and contemporary music. Born in Vancouver, he has lived in Montreal and New York, attending McGill University as well as studying with alto master Greg Osby. While in New York, he formed the turntable-jazz group Soundclash, which won the Montreal OFF festival's Francois Marcaurelle prize and released a disc with Effendi records. He also heads various trios and quartets. He recently returned to McGill to study composition, and while there formed his latest project, the Erik Hove Chamber Ensemble. He plays with many local and international artists, including the Juno-winning Christine Jensen Jazz Orchestra and Anna Webber's Montreal People.
John Hollenbeck
Genre-crossing composer/percussionist John Hollenbeck, renowned in both the jazz and new-music worlds, has gained widespread recognition as the driving force behind the unclassifiable Claudia Quintet and the ambitious John Hollenbeck Large Ensemble, groups with roots in jazz, world music, and contemporary composition. He has earned six GRAMMY nominations and has worked with many of the world's leading musicians in jazz including Bob Brookmeyer, Fred Hersch, Tony Malaby, and is well known in new-music circles for his long-time collaboration with Meredith Monk.