CoLab - Xenakis - Thursday, Friday and the concert

So, wow, just got back in from the concert, wow, right, start at the beginning. So, yesterday, despite being a very busy day, has gone blurry in my mind. The day was a whirlwind of rehearsals, both Xenakis and satellite projects, and was the most tiring day of the ENTIRE project. From what I can remember everyone was working at full pelt and everything started falling into place. We ended the day by running the entire show and it went really well.
Today, everybody was at their battle stations. After viewing the other satellite projects we completely ran the entire show. It was, erm, tiring, but everything went well and their was lots of excitement for the concert. As 7:30 approached the atmosphere got a tad more nervous but, once the audience were all in, which took a while as they were all a little reluctant to sit amongst the orchestra, we began. The Xenakis went off without a hitch. Everyone played brilliantly and most of the percussion sections were even in time. Then, we rushed off to perform the satellite projects which we did 3 times as the groups moved between projects. Here is a a picture of the start of ours.

Then, we all ran back down to play a percussion piece that Nic directed and made up on the spot. It was a brilliant first half to the concert and the atmosphere was electric.

The entire project has been really enjoyable and I know some people didn't like it but hey, the music world is a diverse one, you have to do things you don't like so pipe down, in my most humble opinion. The only thing I would say to improve the project is to use a smaller group for the audio visual project so it can be a little more hands on and "collaborative" but otherwise, I thoroughly enjoyed the project and it has been a new and exciting experience. Peace out :)

CoLab - Xenakis - Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday

Hi there peeps, random readers and the unlucky individual who is examining this. The world of CoLab continues to involve, enthral and slightly scare the trinity students taking part. Bright and early, ok, I know it was 10am but I had to walk for an hour to get there, we assembled at Blackheath to begin the satellite projects. There are three satellite projects: movement, tunnel of sound and an audio visual project. My group, audio visual, started by introducing ourselves and then proceeded to discuss and outline what we were basically going to do with out project. After getting to know the basics we then recorded interviews with each member of the group to be edited together, we're not sure how but they will be, to create the focus of the project. As well as recording video a separate audio recording was made to also be used in the project.
On Monday afternoon we continued working on the Xenakis. We continued to improve and perfect the piece although there was still much to do. Section cohesion was becoming less of a problem as people settled into their roles in the orchestra and the two of us that were playing the "beasty" (technical term, honest) woodwind instruments began to fear the phrase "let's have the contras from..." We were finding it quite difficult to work together while at opposite sides of the room but we began to get better at it as the rehearsal wore on.

Tuesday, again we started the day with the satellite projects, we started putting ideas together such as starting with all the audio playing at the same time or pointing at someone and turning someone else's voice on, it was quite interesting but we were beginning to see a flaw in the project. Although everyone had good ideas there were really too many people to allow everyone a say. The project was very much reliant on the person programming it and it was difficult sometimes to get points across. Despite this we did get quite a bit done before another afternoon of rehearsing. The fine details of the Xenakis were starting to be added but we were still spending quite a bit of time on percussion bits, it's disconcerting how many musicians have no sense of rhythm as soon as they pick up a different, and far easier I might add, instrument. By the end of rehearsal we had progressed enough that it was declared by Lord Nic that the following day shalt be a national day of holiday from the Xenakis. As such, the satellite projects would be receiving full attention.

And finally, we get to today, the national day of satellite projects. Today was a bit stop and start as we perfected and altered the project, there also had to be large breaks as Dominic programmed all the performance so it worked seamlessly. The project is really starting to come together and the group are becoming more comfortable with working with each other which is making the work progress a lot more smoothly. Altogether it was a bit of a dull day but work got done which is the important thing.

CoLab - Xenakis - Thursday and Friday

So, first things first, this my first EVER blog post, exciting much? and the sceptics say CoLab doesn't have it's uses haha. Right, well, I've just got back from the second day of rehearsal for the Xenakis project. Over the last day and a half we have been rehearsing Iannis Xenakis absolutely crazy composition Terretektorh. The piece is composed for 88 musicians and everyone has their own individual part and a collection of percussion instruments (yeah, we didn't act like small children when we saw the percussion, no no, that would be silly...). Also, we are sat in a circle around the conductor, cos that's not weird, which is, erm, an interesting experience. It was quite disconcerting at first tbh and so, to make me feel better, I decided to see if their was a pattern to the circle, yes I am that cool. Everybody is arranged pretty much opposite their matching instrument, eg the trombones are opposite each other, and, where the instruments don't have an match, opposite their corresponding "partner in crime", eg because I was playing Contra bassoon I was sat opposite the Contrabass clarinet. The circle is split into 8 sections and each section contains a double bass, and a various assortment of other instruments.
The piece it self is an experiment with textures and rhythms are passed throughout the orchestra, around the sections. The piece doesn't even change off one note for the first 100 or so bars. The two "solo" instruments, much to my horror I might add, are the contra bassoon and the contrabass clarinet as they have the heaviest going and most interesting parts. In addition to playing their instruments everyone has, as I mentioned earlier, percussion instruments. These are a wood block, maracas, whip and siren whistle. The first thing we did when we started was learn how to play the siren whistle as it is more complicated than one would think.
Despite the fact that if I had been listening to the piece I would have hated it, I've really enjoyed rehearsing it. The way the sounds pass around the orchestra is really interesting. It was also different working with the other instrumentalist around me rather than mainly just working with the bassoon section, it took a while to get used to but we worked together really well.
It took the entirety of yesterday to sight read the piece just because it's so complicated and we did go back and rehearse bits. The bits most people found most difficult though wasn't playing the music, it was playing the percussion. It's amazing how people pick up a percussion instrument and loose all sense of rhythm. Thankfully I didn't have this problem but it was quite amusing to watch the others haha.
So far I'm really enjoying the project and on Monday we start the satellite projects, I'm doing an audio visual one, which I believe is going to be the more "collaborative" part of the project. I'll probably update again on Wednesday but until then, Deanna out.