Stockhausen off the wall

After John Cage in Bruges Stockhausen has been happening in London. Take a leading rock music venue with no seats and a bar across the back wall, pack in three hundred experimental music fans, add contemporary music specialists Daan Vandewalle (piano - making his UK debut) and Chris Cutler (percussion) and a dodgy piano, and you have last week's Stockhausen tribute.

The first half of the SPNM promoted evening at the Luminaire deep in darkest Kilburn was devoted to emerging British experimental artists and in a neat move the audience was given a free CD recording of the set at the end of the evening. In the second half Stockhausen's Klavierstucke I-IV and the improvised version of Kontakte were coupled with two tributes in which Robin Rimbaud (electronics) joined Daan and Chris.

First came a solo from Robin, Retuning Stockhausen, which used samples of the composers music. A very off the wall evening ended with Opus 2128 based on Stockhausen's curiously suppressed Opus 1970 which was composed to mark the 200th anniversary of Beethoven's birth. In the original the performers listened on headphones to extracts of Beethoven's work and accompanied them in designated ways with the option of making them audible.

In Opus 2128 (the number presumably being the year of Stockhausen's centenary) the Beethoven extracts were replaced, with one exception, with samples from Stockhausen's output. This improvised premiere brought the tribute evening to a suitably experimental end. Daan Vandewalle and Chris Cutler were also the driving forces in the Bruge John Cage Happening, and these tireless musicians are making a habit of showing that off the wall is still a good place for contemporary music music to be.

You can have too many low-light photos of gigs. So, as we were off to the Marcel Duchamp Tate exhibition the next day, my header photo was taken at the Stockhausen gig but shows the grafitti in the mens' toilets (rest rooms in Sequenza21 land). Much more interesting than the Glyndebourne equivalents, and like the Bruge photo I'm in their somewhere. More off the wall pictures here.
Header photo (c) On An Overgrown Path 2008. Report broken links, missing images and errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk

John Cage was really happening in Bruges

happening - a gathering of people at which something happens. A party or function where people indulge in activities contrary to the social norm.
~ from John Basset McCleary's Hippie Dictionary.


If something is boring after two minutes, try it for four. If still boring, then eight. Then sixteen. Then thirty-two. Eventually one discovers that it is not boring at all ~ John Cage


The first question I ask myself when something doesn't seem to be beautiful is why do I think it's not beautiful. And very shortly you discover that there is no reason ~ John Cage.


Which is more musical: a truck passing by a factory or a truck passing by a music school?
~ John Cage


As far as consistency of thought goes, I prefer inconsistency ~ John Cage


There is no such thing as an empty space or an empty time. There is always something to see, something to hear ~ John Cage


John Cage was really happening in Bruges, Belgium on February 17, 2008 as my photos show. The one above was taken on the margins of available light in the Concertgebouw's main hall during the performance of Cage's 4' 33" and yes, my digital camera was in 'silent' mode. The amplified cactus, which provided a suitably mystical conclusion to the happening, can just be seen to the left front of the musicians. The Concertgebouw was built for the Bruges' tenure as European City of Culture in 2002. The main hall is acoustically adjustable to suit opera or symphonic/choral music and was also used for a performance of Morton Feldman's Rothko Chapel.


My photo above shows the stunning lantaantoren (‘lantern tower’) which is used for chamber music and amplified events. The new Concertgebouw provides a wonderful choice of flexible performing spaces. But, despite the claims of the project consultants Arup Acoustics, the isolation from external noise in the chamber music venue leaves a lot to be desired. But I'm sure John Cage would have approved of the traffic noise in his Hymns and Variations and the marching band in Sonatas and Interludes.


The Cage happening also included music by Earle Brown. Seen in my photos are the musicians who made it happen, Daan Vandewalle piano, Arne Deforce cello, Jean-Marc Montera electric guitar, Chris Cutler percussion, Aimé Lombaert carillon; Cage's Radio Music (photo 2) was performed by students from the Conservatories of Ghent and Bruge. Lunch (photo 5) was 'indeterminacy cooking' with individual menus decided by a random number generation programme. This was a true happening - a gathering at which something happened contrary to the social norm. Other concert planners, broadcasters and record companies please take note.


'I have nothing to say
and I am saying it
and that is poetry
as I needed it'
~ John Cage

All photos (c) On An Overgrown Path 2008. Report broken links, missing images and errors to - overgrownpath at tmail dot co dot uk

New music is Europe's hot ticket

The all day John Cage Happening in Bruge, Belgium this Sunday (Feb 17) is a complete sell-out. On An Overgrown Path will be there and also at Morton Feldman's Rothko Chapel two days before. Adventurous programming and new music is certainly pulling in the European audiences, and the next hot ticket looks to be the happening previewed below, and we will be there as well:

spnm’s experimental music night The Sound Source returns to Kilburn’s Luminaire (see footer photo) on 12 March with an unusual and creative response to the work of Karlheinz Stockhausen. Headlining the event are Belgian pianist Daan Vandewalle, who will perform Klavierstücke I-IV, and drummer and percussionist Chris Cutler, who will join him for a version of Kontakte. Electronic artist Scanner completes the line-up with some Stockhausen-inspired works. Rounding off the evening, the three will team up to perform a newly commissioned tribute to one of Stockhausen’s hidden gems, Stockhoven/Beethausen.

The event begins with an Open Source slot, in association with Music Orbit, offering emerging British artists the chance to showcase their work. A CD of the results will be given to audience members at the end of the night.

Chris Cutler is an English percussionist, composer, lyricist and music theorist. After working in the ‘70s with English avant-garde rock group Henry Cow, he founded Art Bears, News from Babel and Cassiber, and joined the American band Pere Ubu. In addition to special projects for stage, theatre, film and radio he still works consistently with Fred Frith, Zeena Parkins, Jon Rose, Tim Hodgkinson, David Thomas, Peter Blegvad, Daevid Allen, Hugh Hopper, Daan Vandewalle and Stevan Tickmayer and has toured the world as a soloist with his extended electrified kit. Other recent projects include Out of the Blue Radio - a daily year-long soundscape project for Resonance FM and p53 for Orchestra.

Belgian pianist Daan Vandewalle enjoys an international reputation as a new music specialist, with a strong focus on 20th century American piano music. He studied at the Conservatory of Ghent, Belgium with Claude Coppens and at Mills College, California with Alvin Curran. His recitals and projects have become increasingly more diverse and challenging, and his programmes are often highly unusual, both on a technical and intellectual level, often combining the classical repertoire with premieres of new works written especially for him e.g. Frith, Newman, Curran, Rzewski. As an improviser he has collaborated widely with David Moss, Fred Frith, Han Bennink, Chris Cutler and Tom Cora amongst others.

British artist Robin Rimbaud, aka Scanner (see header photo), traverses the experimental terrain between sound, space, image and form, creating absorbing, multi-layered sound pieces that twist technology in unconventional ways. From his early controversial work using found mobile phone conversations, through to his focus on trawling the hidden noise of the modern metropolis as the symbol of the place where hidden meanings and missed contacts emerge, his restless explorations of the experimental terrain have won him international admiration from amongst others, Bjork, Aphex Twin and Stockhausen. Scanner has collaborated with artists from every imaginable genre, including Bryan Ferry, Radiohead, The Royal Ballet, Merce Cunningham, Michael Nyman and Luc Ferrari.


Read about other 'hot ticket' new music festivals here and here.
Any copyrighted material on these pages is included as "fair use", for the purpose of study, review or critical analysis only, and will be removed at the request of copyright owner(s). Report broken links, missing images and errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk

Inner Cities just got longer

'A painting is never finished - it simply stops in interesting places' said the Scottish artist Paul Gardner, and it is the same with contemporary music. Back in November I thought I was broadcasting Alvin Curran's Inner Cities complete, but I was wrong. The epic 4 hour 24 minute cycle for solo piano had just stopped at an interesting place called Inner Cities 11.

Pianist Daan Vandewalle tells me that two new Inner Cities have been added to the cycle, and another is in the pipeline. This week he recorded IC12 in Paris, he has performed IC13 in Italy, and is finalising a commission for Alvin Curran for IC14. I wonder what would have happened if Daan had been around when Wagner was composing the Ring?

My next project is a marathon broadcast of Kaikhosru Sorabji’s Opus Clavicembalisticum for solo piano which also lasts for hour hours. Read about it here.
Any copyrighted material on these pages is included as "fair use", for the purpose of study, review or critical analysis only, and will be removed at the request of copyright owner(s). Report broken links, missing images and errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk

4.5 hours of new music - it was incredible

When did a listener last describe a piece of new music to you as incredible? I've been filing away responses to my overnight broadcast on Future Radio of Alvin Curran's Inner Cities and thought this typical message was worth posting. Shows that there is an audience for contemporary music - if you can reach it.

Hi, I was listening to the show last night (around 12-1am maybe) and I heard a piece of music which lasted 4.5 hours long, preceded by an on-air phone call with the pianist from Belgium I believe. Could you please give me more information about this piece of music? I thought it was incredible.
Many thanks, TL

Proof that the music hasn't died on every radio station.
The score in my photo of the Future Radio studio isn't by Alvin Curran. But it is by another contemporary composer. Can any reader with supernatural powers tell me who the composer is? Photo (c) On An Overgrown Path 2008. Report broken links, missing images and errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk

Inner Cities completed

Rod has left a new comment on your post "Surgeon General's Warning: Inner Cities":

... just tuned in and wonderful - thanx for the link!

Posted by Rod... to On An Overgrown Path at 1:39 AM

This comment was typical of many received here and at Future Radio - that's me in the studio above. Many thanks to the station for making the webcast possible and to Dan Nyman in particular for setting up the technical side of the all-night vigil. Also to Daan Vandewalle for his contribution, and to the many readers who listened via the internet.

Report broken links, missing images and errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk

New music premiere for internet radio

Inner Cities are where you go to get debriefed, to watch Trisha Brown levitate on Bach in San Francisco; to help Cage squeeze lemons into his fresh taboule on 18th Street and watch David Tudor mix chili peppers and lasers at the Grand Hotel des Palmes; to play the Sydney Harbour like a bandoneon; to teach advanced-orchestration in the Greek Theater at Mills College with Pauline Oliveros and the ghost of Harry Partch; to shake Stravinsky's hand in the American Sector-Berlin and Varese’s in New Haven; to watch Kosugi dance his electric violin around Marcus Aurelius; to get thrown off stage in London as a warmup act for the Pink Floyd; to meet Stockhausen at a strobe-light show in Düsseldorf; to open windows on Cage’s cue for adding real cold air to his Winter Music; to camp out with Teitelbaum and Rzewski for Antonioni’s Zabriskie Point; to hear Terry and LaMonte’s landmark concerts at the Attico in Rome ...

Inner Cities is a twelve part cycle for solo piano that lasts for four hours twenty-four minutes and twenty-two seconds. Its composer Alvin Curran studied with Elliott Carter, and founded Musica Elettronica Viva with Frederic Rzewski and Richard Teitelbaum. The notes above and below are by Alvin Curran.

Inner Cities 10 is dedicated to the Belgian pianist Daan Vandewalle. His repertoire includes Ives, Ligeti, Lutoslawski, Cage and Clarence Barlow, and he has had works written for him by Fred Frith, Chris Newman, and Frederic Rzewski as well as Alvin Curran. Daan has played Inner Cities complete in concert, and has recorded it on the Long Distance label.

Inner Cities has never been broadcast complete to our knowledge. But on December 5th Future Radio is letting me go where others fear to tread. The four and a half hour cycle will be broadcast complete on that day without any announcements or advertisements, and Daan Vanderwalle will be introducing the performance with me. The programme starts at 12.01am on Wednesday December 5th, which is afternoon or evening the previous day in North and South America. Convert to your local time zone here.

Inner Cities described by Daan Vandewalle can be heard as a podcast from iTunes. If you do not have iTunes installed click here to download it. With iTunes you can subscribe to future On An Overgrown Path podcasts.

Inner Cities photographs are by me, and show the Cité du Livre and the Pavillon Noir in the Avenue Mozart in that most musical of cities, Aix en Provence. Alvin Curran has the last words ...

Inner Cities contain no "drive-by" anything; there’s merely back alleys, empty lots full of stubborn weeds and clear sky, trails of memory which may or may not lead anywhere or even have relevance to the music at hand. The bottom line: these pieces are a set of contradictory etudes - studies in liberation and attachment, cryptic itineraries to the old fountain on the town square whence flows all artistic divination and groping for meaning in the dark.

Inner Cities complete continues the proud tradition established by WHRB's classical music 0rgies. Yet more confirmation of the importance of the long tail of radio
Photos (c) On An Overgrown Path 2007. Listen by launching the Radeo internet player from the right side-bar, or via the audio stream, on Wednesday December 5 at 12.01am UK time. Convert time to your local time zone using this link. Windows Media Player doesn't like the audio stream very much and takes ages to buffer. WinAmp or iTunes handle it best. Unfortunately the royalty license doesn't permit on-demand replay, so you have to listen in real time. If you are in the Norwich, UK area tune to 96.9FM. Report broken links, missing images and errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk