Konus Quartett & Tomas Korber
presented by crow with no mouth
Oct. 28, 2015
Studio Z: 275 East Fourth Street, Suite 200, St. Paul 8 p.m. $12 door admission |
crow with no mouth promotions presents the all-saxophone chamber music ensemble Konus Quartet and Swiss-Spanish composer/improviser Tomas Korber. crow with no mouth promotions brings vital, seldom-heard music, electro-acoustic composition, and improvisation to Twin Cities audiences.
Visit bodhidog.wordpress.com for more information. The Konus Quartett are a chamber music ensemble dedicated to contemporary composition, as well as works of past centuries. The quartet has established itself as a major voice for new contemporary and experimental music for over ten years.
The quartet has received commissions from Barry Guy, Urs Peter Schneider, Tomas Korber, Phill Niblock, and composers associated with the Wandelweiser collective, including Makiko Nishikaze and Jürg Frey I became aware of the Konus Quartett in 2014 with the release of two radically disparate works – Jürg Frey’s Komponisten-Protrait, and Tomas Korber’s Musik für ein Feld. The Frey release includes the quartet’s realization of his exquisite Mémoire, horizon (2013/14). Frey was my house-guest for a week during the crow / Wandelweiser festival in the Fall of 2014, and gave me a preview of Mémoire, horizon just prior to its release. I was, and continue to be with each listen to this piece, deeply moved by the Konus Quartett’s stunning embodiment of the composer’s spirit and intentions. Here is an excerpt from my review of the Korber/Konus collaborative composition, Musik für ein Feld: “Musik für ein Feld is a long-form piece, a field of considerable expanse, teeming both with life and with powerfully felt silences; the field takes shape in the fantastic synergy between the Konus saxophone quartet and Korber’s electronics. This is a suite with wildly variegated parts – sections in which the quartet’s reed tones are splayed, granulated and refitted beyond recognition by Korber; sections of gorgeously sustained, clustered timbres reminiscent of Radigue; a lovely episode of rising and falling sine-like tones referencing, at least covertly, Lucier; stretches of the sort of mulched audio that pelts and stings like an ice-storm, the needle-y noise that is a leitmotif heard across many Korber releases; and, heard in their masterfully placed positions in the field, those silences.” I am pleased to have the opportunity to present an evening with both the Konus Quartett and composer Tomas Korber in performance; the program will be Komponisten-Portrait and Musik für ein Feld. This will be the Minnesota debut of both the quartet and Tomas Korber. Konus Quartett: Stefan Rolli / Christian Kobi / Fabio Oehrli / Jonas Tschanz Born in 1979 in Zurich, Swiss-Spanish composer/improviser Tomas Korber has written numerous compositions and played improvised music since the early 90’s. He has worked solo as well as collaborating with, among others, Günter Müller, Norbert Möslang, Otomo Yoshihide, Lê Quan Ninh, Toshimaru Nakamura, Stephan Wittwer, Jason Kahn, Thomas Ankersmit, Sachiko M, Christian Weber, Keith Rowe, Christian Wolfarth, Kazuya Ishigami, Keith Fullerton Whitmann (aka Hrvatski), Lionel Marchetti, Charlotte Hug, Adam Sonderberg, Mattin, Taku Unami and many others.
He also composes music for theater- and film-productions (i.e. under the direction of Franz Dängeli, Kaspar Kasics, Fredi Murer, Stefan Haupt, Fanny Bräuning, Christine Hürzeler, Martin Moll etc … In 2009 he was awarded a biannual artist residency in New York City by the Department of Cultural Affairs of the City of Zurich. Korber has studied psychology and computer science at the University of Zurich and holds a Master of Science degree. I first wrote about Korber when I interviewed him (as well as reviewing several of his releases) for Paris Transatlantic in 2005. His 2014 release, Musik Für Ein Feld (cf. Konus Quartett bio above) is among my favorites of the past several years, and I am excited, after a decade of collecting everything he has released, to finally present Korber’s work to a Twin Cities audience. |