Bergen Centre for Electronic Arts

After I had been studying with him for two years, Schoenberg said, “In order to write music, you must have a feeling for harmony.” I explained to him that I had no feeling for harmony. He then said that I would always encounter an obstacle, that it would be as though I came to a wall through which I could not pass. I said, “In that case I will devote my life to beating my head against that wall.”

“Listening to Donald Judd” is a collaboration between BEK and KHIB.

Gisle Martens Meyer is a norwegian musician and composer, born in 1975, and living in Bergen. Gisle had a commercial breakthrough with the electronica project UGRESS in the early 2000s. The use of cinematic elements both in music and on stage made Ugress very popular. His musical career developed into several different projects, and Gisle is a frequently used composer in films, TV, theatre, computer games and art.

In 1948, Pierre Schaeffer broadcast over French radio a “Concert of Noises”, a set of pieces composed entirely from recordings of train whistles, spinning tops, pots and pans, canal boats, percussive instruments and the occasional piano.

This week we read a text by Schaeffer on Acousmatics and listen to excerpts from works by Pierre Schaeffer, Pierre Henry and others. “Listening to Donald Judd” is a collaboration between BEK and The Bergen National Academy of the Arts.

This session will be divided into two parts. First we will listen to some examples of early electronic and experimental sound and music, and next we will look into the World Soundscape Project, initiated by R. Murray Schafer in Vancouver in the early 70s, providing a critical documentation and examination of the urban and rural soundscapes surrounding us.

“Listening to Donald Judd” is a collaboration between BEK and The Bergen National Academy of the Arts.

POW Ensemble played the Borealisfestival 2009 with electronic tap dancing. Now they are back in Bergen, this time with an electronic dissection of the guitar. In addition to the Landmark concert on Sunday, they will present their work and techniques at BEK on Monday 26. October

Michelle Teran (Canada), nominated for a “Transmediale 2010 Award”, will do a selfpresentation at HKS, as part of BEKs ongoing presentation series.

BEK introduce a new regular activity labeled Listening to Donald Judd… in collaboration with Bergen National Academy of the Arts. At regular intervals we will meet to listen to and discuss selected works of contemporary music and sound art, accompanied by relevant literature.

The first session will be focusing on futurism, and in particular the manifesto The Art of Noise, written by Luigo Russolo in 1913.

Peter Sinclair is an English sound artist living in Marseille, France. At Kunstakademiet, Bergen, he will talk about his own artistic works, the sound lab Locus Sonus, and give a short introduction to the PhD-program where he participates.

The artistic work of Bjørnar Habbestad tends to cross the borders between music interpretation and improvisation, conceptual sound art and development of music technology. Drawing on concrete sound experiences from a number of traditions and perspectives he aims at investigating tangential points between acoustic performance practise and digital processing.

Trond Lossius gives an introduction to electronic music for students of contemporary music at The Grieg Academy. The lecture will provide an overview of the history of electronic music, important composers, works, schools and artistic practices.