Tuesday 16 July 2013

thoughts on the go-Kiriakos Spirou Day 2

Strikes strike.  Everyone a bit late as new routes to the studio need to be found.  The city centre is closed.  Still, we are almost all here...We re-engage with scores, looking deeper into the options available when address a score.  We focus on the graphic score, discuss possible definitions to the graphic symbols  in order to create the rule that will lead to making the score work. What parameters are imposed upon the score to make it a springboard to an event?


Food for thought: from http://radicalart.info/anything/OpenForm/Music.html

- Graphic scores whose interpretation is partially or completely unspecified. The most radical proponent of this genre is Anastesis Logothetis. The anthology Notations, edited by John Cage, provides examples from many composers.
  •   - "Meta-scores" with an infinite variety of structurally different realisations, from which the performer may choose at his own discretion. A very complex example is Plus-Minus by Karlheinz Stockhausen.
  •   -  "Word pieces": generic verbal descriptions of musical events. This genre was practiced by George Brecht, La Monte Young, Henry Flynt, Dick Higgins, George Maciunas, and other composers associated with the International Fluxus Movement.  Some of these pieces do not specify any constraints. And some are impossible to perform; that is when music becomes concept art.
  • Sometimes, the transfer of the composer's authority to the performer's autonomy symbolizes a political stance. John Cage, one of the most enthusiastic advocates of indeterminacy, was a card-carrying anarchist.


  •  
    Feedback from the floor:
     
    Unique in the act of open 'reading', disappearance of the composer, if you use  pre-existing element 
    for your score, is the original author of the element also part of the composition?  Transitions are a challenge, hard to think of overall rhythm if you are instantly composing?  What if every single element was the same but in different circumstances, as  a performer, interpret this as a rigid form of guidelines as a performer, we would need the choreographer to translate it?  (hummm),  as a dancer I prefer the visual image of the score, as a choreographer I can see how a score gives you a basis to start from, space seems obvious, time and duration harder.  As a choreographer I would ideally have a composer to create the score.... an original score.  Difficulty.  It seems we cant escape knowing something  before we try to address the score... stepping stones needed.... Funny they seem to want less freedom.... ? For me it is more clear now how we use it how we make it... it is really important now for me what a score is, how it can help interdisciplinary practice... Choreographer/dancer case is perhaps more specific...how to leave it open so that there are still open spaces in the performance... new decisions available... thinking afterwards, as performer, depends on the nature of the scores. As a choreographer, as a score, not a notation, interesting for me, it organised my wishes, my intention,  organise the material...  how to use to create, perhaps not so, I normally have material, start with the body and the score comes in as a second stage... useful as a strategy...interesting strategy for dialogue with dancers, not just as improvisation...   the score as a mediator, not a generator

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    More on Choreographers and scores:

    Jonatahn Burrows Stop Quartet
    Thomas Lehmen Schreibstueck (see the score html)
    Forsythe, Eco, Davies, Mc Gregor as part of the Beyond Text Project UK
    Deborah Hay as part of Motion Bank