Two Rooms for Listening #3: Maria W Horn + Mats Erlandsson + Amina Hocine

Friday 25 November 2022 • 6.30pm

Concert Series with performances at Lyssningsrum and an adjascent space, in this case MDT's studio 1.

Series made possible with so-called Krisstöd from Kulturrådet, The Swedish Arts Council — and devised and delivered in collaboration with Daniel M Karlsson and the Royal College of Art.

Amina Hocine presents the public debut of her Fog Horn organ. Maria W Horn and Mats Erlandsson present HIMLAGLÖD (commissioned by INA GRM) and other works.

HIMLAGLÖD

In October 2019 Maria W Horn and Mats Erlandsson traveled to Vardö¸, a municipality in Finnmark county in the northeastern part of Norway, close to the Russian border. They used field recording as a way of processing their sliver of time in the area as it unfolded to them. A hailstorm heard through the window of an emptied bowling hall, the sound of walking through pieces of shattered rock inside an abandoned bunker, the ever-burning gas-lit fire of a memorial monument commemorating the victims of witchcraft trials in 1621. All the recordings show recurring interference patterns in the recordings themselves likely caused by the presence of the radar station present on the island.

The processed field recordings form a synthetic ever-changing room that still remains the same. These sonic imprints with all of their particular characteristics, heard through the ears of two transient visitors, served as an aural setting in which the synthesized parts of the piece could manifest as the pair immersed themselves in modular synthesizers at the GRM in August 2021. The work done at the GRM focused on developing a shared tonal language based on near-stable harmonic timbres drawn up by a combination of the analog instruments at the studio and digital algorithmic techniques for sound generation.

Maria W Horn

Maria W Horn (1989) is a composer whose work explores the inherent spectral properties of sound. Her compositions employ a varied instrumentation ranging from analog synthesizers to choir, string instruments, pipe organ and various chamber music formats. Synthetic sound is often paired with acoustic instruments in order to extend the instruments timbral capacities with precise control of timbre, tuning and texture.

Maria combines spectralist techniques and site specific source material in order to explore the inherent memories of a building, object or geographical area. In her recent compositions she uses acoustic artifacts from physical spaces to create musical frameworks for her compositions. Using these acoustic imprints as a starting point Maria weaves intricate harmonic patterns that slowly transform from intimate fragility to searing high-density aural monoliths.

Her debut album Kontrapoetik (2018) is a historical investigation, and a kind of counter-exorcism tackling the deceivingly serene, yet turmoiled past of her home region Ångermanland in the North of Sweden. Dies Irae (2021) derives from the resonant frequencies of an empty machine hall from the mining region of Bergslagen and Vita Duvans Lament (2020) is a sonic excavation of what used to be the only panoptic cell prison built in Sweden.

In addition to her artistic practice she is also the co-founder of Swedish record label XKatedral.

Mats Erlandsson

As a composer, musician and sound artist, Mats Erlandsson is part of the vibrantly reemerging field of drone music in Stockholm, Sweden, and is associated with practices characterized by the extensive use of sustained sound.

Erlandsson has undergone studies in composition in Stockholm, where he received a Master’s degree in Composition of Electronic Music. In addition to his own artistic practice, Erlandsson holds a position as studio assistant at the world-renowned Elektronmusikstudion (EMS) in Stockholm.

Erlandsson presents his work both as a solo artist and in collaborations, most notably together with Yair Elazar Glotman. In 2018 the artist and choreographer Erik Berg commissioned Erlandsson to score his most recent work, Unfortunate Desires, which premiered in the spring of 2019.

Recent releases include Minnesmärke on Hallow Ground (2020), the collaboration Emmanate made with Yair Elazar Glotman on 130701 (2020), Hypodermic Letters on Portals Editions (2018), 4-track guitar music on XKatedral (2018), Selective Miracles and Valentina Tereshkova on Posh Isolation (2016), and again together with Glotman, Negative Chambers on Miasmah (2017). Erlandsson has performed his work extensively, most recently at Présences Électronique hosted by the GRM in Paris, CTM 2019 and The Long Now in Berlin, Norbergfestival in Norberg, Sonica Festival in Ljubljana and in various music and arts venues around the world.

matserlandsson.com

Amina Hocine is a composer, sound artist and instrument creator from Sweden currently pursuing her masters in electro acoustic composition at the Royal College of Music in Stockholm. Her current work is centered around an instrument she has created, called The foghorn organ or The instrument. It’s a compressed air driven organ, built by PVC pipes and various HVAC bits, inspired by the sound of foghorns. Her compositions revolve around timbre, deep listening and narrative, and she draws inspiration from the spiritual sciences.

aminahocine.com