Det Norske Blåseensemble performs my Attitude from 2004.
Conductor: Christian Eggen
Obo: Boris Fatulaev, Clarinet: Eirik Jordal, Saxophone: Camilla Bjørndahl Sørensen, Trumpet: Stian Aareskjold, Percussion: André Fjørtoft, Guitar: Thomas Kjekstad, Piano: Trond Schau
Interview with André Fjørtoft (in Norwegian)
Green House Sessions is a concert series by and with composer and cellist Lene Grenager.
The concerts are recorded in a green house in Oslo, early in the morning, once a month from april to september. The concerts will be released on this page the 20th of every following month. The green house will develop with the season and because of this the scenography for each concert will be altered from concert to concert. By recording early in the morning birds and other sounds from nature will be present but also sounds from traffic and other human activities.
The compositions are created for this series so each concert is a first performance of a new part of the work.
In this book I have written about my work as a composer and I have had 8 other contributors writing text on different aspects of my practice. The topics ranges from notation, inspiration and cooperation with performers to in depth explorations of single works. In Norwegian only.
SKIN (2019) - for embroidered scores, video and two percussion players
We live in a documentation culture where everything is accessible and can be distributed and multiplied. I wanted to create the score as a unique object that cannot easily be copied and investigate the implications of this choise. At the same time, I wanted to look at industrial and work history through feminist glasses. I have embroidered the score on large pieces of clothing. It was exciting for me to create a clear and unambiguous score in such a strange form. At the same time, embroidery provides opportunities rarely used in traditional scores. For example, I work with color codes to show dynamics. A score in textile material presents the musician with practical challenges as to how the sheet material can be used in a performance situation.
A background idea for using textiles for my part is how textile techniques have been one of the few possible forms of expression available to women from different classes and parts of the world throughout history. These are forms of expression that are not only exploited industrially, but also inextricably linked to the home.
Wood and Metal is a commission from Ultima Festival 2018 for SISU percussion ensemble. The work was first performed 20th September 2018 at Sentralen in Oslo where I also was awarded the Arne Nordheim Composers prize 2018.
For this work I have collaborated closely with SISU for the set up of instruments and we have designe a few new ones with bamboo, oak, pine, metal sheets and metal tubes. The score also contains processed sound samples of some of the instruments.
Wood and Metal is inspired by the old greek creation myth and particularly by the tale of the Titans: the giant sons of the earth and the heaven. As in many greek mythological stories this one is also full of violence, intrigues and in this case also incest, but the result of Kronos the Titan`s castration of his father Uranos (the heaven) is the creation of Afrodite, the goddess of love, so something good enters the world.
Photo: Signe Fuglesteg Luksengard
Photo: Signe Fuglesteg Luksengard
Østfolds tapte lydbilder is an installation focusing on lost industry in Østfold.
I have recorded old industrial machines from different museums and chosen different sounds. Then I have gone to empty industrial locations in Halden, Sarpsborg, Fredrikstad, Moss and Askim where I have recorded and filmed the sounds played on a cello. This is the basis for a video. The installation also comprises 5 scores, one for each town. The installation is up in Moss by-og industrimuseum from Nov 3rd 2017 to Jan 29th 2018.
Shadows of ideas is a piece written for the three ensembles Parcour (SE), Krock (SE) and Rank (FI). The ensembles work with notated music, open form scores and improvised music. My challenge was to write a joint piece for the three ensembles. They had not played together before just worked on a joint concert event. My solution was a graphic score distributed in time including dynamics and specifications on the instrumentation (solo, duo, trio, quartett, tutti etc).
The project got funding from Nordisk Kulturfond.
Excerpts from the first performance in Gerlesborg 16.9.2017
Together with dancer Torunn Robstad I did an interpretation of Janne Camilla Lyster´s score Studie i grått.
Performance space: Oslo Kunsthall
All pictures: Harald Fetveit
Hva ser jeg når jeg kommer til et sted? Hva hører jeg? Hvordan opplever jeg byen, landskapet, naturen, det menneskeskapte? Ser jeg den vakre kysten? Ser jeg slitet på de gamle fiskebrukene og i stenbruddene? Støyen og støvet i tekstilfabrikken? Ser og hører jeg tranedansen? Ser jeg skjønnheten i forfallet eller forhåpningene i det nye? Ser jeg historien? Hører jeg kjøpesenteret?
Hvilket portrett kan jeg som komponist lage av det jeg ser og hører og hvordan kan jeg få fire tilsynelatende adskilte steder til å henge sammen? Berøre hverandre. Uttrykke noe sammen.
«Fyra platser i Väst-Sverige» er en konsertinstallasjon bestående av portretter av fire ulike lokasjoner: Borås, Fengersfors, Gerlesborg og Skövde.
work for Ensemble Zwischentöne, sampler and an orchestra of sewing machines for the exhibition of works by Leonard Rickhard at Henie-Onstad Art Centre 2015.
Leonard Rickhards work consists mainly of dense birch forests, building sites and vast arrays of machinery combined with detailed renderings of machine parts and model fragments, all in a carefully calculated mathematical perspective. His paintings are quiet and motionless. Time has come to a halt and there are seldom human figures interacting. The machines and the surrounding nature are sort of measuring each other in a silent stand still before or after an industrial take over.
My work for Zwischentöne deals with a scenario true for many small industries and towns in Norway. The stand still of machines has left small towns and communities quiet and robbed of their former identities as producers of shoes, cloth and paper. The reason for this is always money. New machines and good working conditions create products that have a high quality but are to expensive in a global market.
My work comprises sounds from the textile industry: both an imagined soundscape of a factory environment, real samples of industrial sounds and live sound from an orchestra of sewing machines.
Khipukamayuq is a cello concerto for solo cello and sinfonietta. The title refers to the Inca kingdom of Peru in the 15th and 16th century. In order to maintain the cohesion of their vast society and control taxes and happenings, the Incas needed a simple yet detailed communication system that could be transported from village to village. Due to the severe terrain and climate, the system had to be compact enough to be carried by one person, for it was difficult to rely on wagons or animals for help. The Incas therefore invented a system of knots, the Khipu, which involved groupings of threads, some of them coloured, which created meaning based on colour combinatons and knot posi ons, making it possible to record both numbers and text. But the system was not for everyone to learn. It was specially the work of the Khipukamayuk to learn how to tie knots and read this language. As a composer I find I do the same; I tie the knots and the musician interprets my language.
The work was written in close collaboration with Marianne B. Lie
Marianne B. Lie cello with Trondheim Sinfonietta and conductor Torodd Wigum
with Michael F. Duch
Together with the writer Hild Borchgrevink I have worked on an operaproject based on the novel Pinocchiopapirene by Tor Aage Bringsværd. In June 2014 we got the oportunity to try out some scenes with scenography by Christina Lindgren
Music: Lene Grenager
Libretto: Hild Borchgrevink
Scenography: Christina Lindgren
Soloists: Frank Havrøy and Ebba Rydh
Musicians: Bjørnar Habbestad, Morten Barrikmo, Hanne Rekdal, Hild Sofie Tafjord, Tomas Nilsson
Choir from Det Norske Solistkor: Ingeborg Dalheim, Ingrid Stige, Jeanette Ekornåsvåg Goldstein, Marit Sehl, Eva Landro, Øystein Stensheim, Robert Lind, Peder Arnt Kløvrud, Olle Holmgren
Together with Maja S. K. Ratkje voice/electronics, Hild Sofie Tafjord french horn/electronics and Kristin Andersen trumpet/recorders I have the quartet SPUNK. SPUNK was founded in 1995 and is my mothership.
From the artist page at runegrammofon:
"Last time I heard SPUNK was phenomenal! They are among the most exciting improvising groups in the world right now". Fred Frith
Formed in 1995, SPUNK comprises four of Norway’s most innovative musicians: Maja S. K. Ratkje, Hild Sofie Tafjord, Lene Grenager and Kristin Andersen. The quartet combine talents that range from vocal experiments, instrumental virtuosity, impulsive improvisation and a witty sense of play. All four work in the indefinable area between modern composition, free jazz and total improv. Free collective improvising is one of the most demanding ways of making music: the pitfalls are many - self-absorption, incoherence, certain standardized "gestures" of free jazz, lack of dynamics, humourlessness - but SPUNK are alert to the dangers. Bold, sometimes witty, always alert, they make engaging music, and keep the sound of surprise alive.
All albums:
Together with Bjørnar Habbestad flutes, Hild Sofie Tafjord french horn and Michael Francis Duch bass I have the quartet Lemur. Lemur was founded in 2006 and does improvised music and collaborative compositions.
Lemur performs, creates and curates contemporary music in improvised, composed, mediated and conceptual formats. The group works as four-headed organism of strong-minded individuals geared on creative group processes.
Since forming in 2006 Lemur has performed in Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Iceland, Germany, Belgium, Holland, France, Italy, Latvia, Taiwan, Macau, China, England and Scotland. Their albums on +3db records have been met with much critical acclaim, as is the case with their collaborations with Stian Westerhus, Paul Lytton, Julia Eckhardt, Mats Gustafsson, Ilan Volkov, Lotte Anker, Amit Sen, Robin Hayward, John Hegre, Caput Ensemble, Glasgow Improvisors Orchestra, Dickson Dee, Trondheim Sinfonietta, N Ensemble and Tom Løberg amongst others.
From 2011 to 2018 the group curated the concert series PB.1898 at Bomuldsfabriken Kunsthall in Arendal. In 2018, Lemur is Ensemble-in-Residence at the National Museum of Art, Architecture and Design.
