The exploratory, collectivist ethos of the U.K. live-coding scene laid the groundwork for Xylem Records, an experimental electronic music netlabel founded by composer and computer scientist Dr. Norah Lorway. Originally from Vancouver, B.C., Lorway moved to the U.K. in 2010 to pursue a Ph.D. at the University of Birmingham, where she researched electroacoustic composition andContinue reading “Xylem Records: Building Community for Live Coding”
Genre Archives
Intersystems. #IV.
On Ghost—the first track on the new recording by the late ’60s Toronto exploratory psychedelic group Intersystems—a fragmented series of vignettes concresces over the irregular pulse of an analog synth patch. The lyrics, like the music they share space with, are unsettling: children play in tattered clothing; a crow is silent, “all tired out fromContinue reading “Intersystems. #IV.”
What’s Inside Musicworks 140?
The Fall 2021 issue connects you to music artists of distinctive styles and from distant places with expertly crafted words and carefully chosen images. It is accompanied by a CD of deeply felt, hand-blown music, enhanced with chiselled edges and unusual colours. IF YOU ARE A PRINT ENTHUSIAST, YOU’LL WANT TO SNAG A SINGLE COPYContinue reading “What’s Inside Musicworks 140?”
Fall 2021
Shifting the Narrative
The time for postponing discussions of environmental issues is over. This is the main thrust of two music-and-sound-powered documentary projects, both of which aim to encourage honest conversations about climate change and to explore the many ways our lives intertwine with—and impact— the fate of the natural world. In her documentary theatre work Tar SandsContinue reading “Shifting the Narrative”
James Goddard Makes Brave New Spaces
“Recorded music these days is like an inversion of the old-time medicine show—you know, those people who would go from town to town and put on this big carnival performance to sell their medicine. Now that ticket sales have become the main income generator for musicians, recorded music is just an advertisement for the show.”Continue reading “James Goddard Makes Brave New Spaces”
Cold Wave
A sad-looking polar bear drifts on a shrinking ice sheet in a vast, deep-blue sea under a bright, blue sky. Scenes like this have long been used to illustrate climate change, and they are more than symbolic. Polar regions are warming at more than twice the rate of the rest of the world. The meltingContinue reading “Cold Wave”
Scrap Arts Music: Dr. Seuss meets steampunk
Scrap Arts Music is a joyous collision of creativity, experimental sound, and energetic movement, with percussion pieces performed on reborn hunks of junk. It’s challenging to describe and impossible to ignore. Since 1998, when he founded Scrap Arts Music in Vancouver with his wife Justine Murdy, composer and performer Gregory Kozak has built more thanContinue reading “Scrap Arts Music: Dr. Seuss meets steampunk”
Walter Smetak. Smetak & Interregno.
The first comprehensive biographical article on Walter Smetak in English was published in Musicworks 121 (2015). Since then, interest has been growing: in 2017 the BBC Radio show Hear and Now dedicated an episode to his work; Smetak was the only artist to receive a full chapter in Sound Art: Sound as a Medium ofContinue reading “Walter Smetak. Smetak & Interregno.”
Dániel Péter Biró. Mishpatim (Laws).
“You must not carry false rumours.” These words from the Book of Exodus are the first to be heard in Dániel Péter Biró’s large-scale cycle of works, Mishpatim (Laws), composed between 2003 and 2016 and released on two CDs on the German new-music label NEOS. Of course, rumours means noise and might thereby be understoodContinue reading “Dániel Péter Biró. Mishpatim (Laws).”