With the first day of Rewire 2019 in our rear view, we’re looking forward to an action-packed Day Two. Here’s an overview of our daytime programme.
Staging Sound is the first of our two thematic programmes at Rewire 2019. It observes the performative nature of music – the experience, ritual, and show – and takes an in-depth look into the ways in which artists are choosing to express, present and perform their music. The programme opens with a panel discussion featuring pioneering British electronic musician Mark Fell, Friday night performer Sega Bodega and movement artist Elaine Mitchener, before moving on to conversation with Berlin-based DJ and producer turned vocalist and performer Lotic and his live collaborator Emmanuel Biard.
The Saturday discourse programme also features a series of artist talks. In the first, Chilean producer and composer Nicolás Jaar reflects on his musical journey and the diversity of his artistic practice, while American trio Low chart a course from ‘slowcore’ to snarling static and shattering electronic beats with The Wire. The final artist talks sees Darren Cunningham stretch through his releases as Actress and Angel Bat Dawid reveal that which has inspired and influenced her path of music and spirituality.
Stretching from noon until 5pm are a pair of workshops that take the creation of music into two divergent directions. Setting up shop in Koorenhuis, The Hague-based collective Crab Music invite you to the Creative Sound Lab, a buzzing all-ages sound laboratory where you can build and try your hand at a variety of customised electronic instruments. On the other end of the spectrum is Music Hackspace’s Machine Learning For Artists Workshop, in which Goldsmiths’ computing expert Dr. Rebecca Fiebrink gives you an introduction to user-friendly machine learning tools for creating new music and art.
The Saturday also sees us team up with fellow The Hague festival Dag in de Branding for an adventurous route that showcases the latest developments in classical and improvised music. Co-curated with Dutch pianist Saskia Lankhoorn, the Rewire x Dag in de Branding route crisscrosses festival locations and stars five unique live performances, starting at Korzo with Diamanda Dramm, Henry Vega & Jan Willem Troost as Nine Volt, a movement opera by Elaine Mitchener, and American percussion virtuoso Eli Keszler, before moving to Lutherse Kerk for a commissioned work by Kit Downes & Ensemble Klang for the church’s organ.
As the Dag in de Branding programme moves to Lutherse Kerk, Korzo hosts a trio of Dutch premieres. Dutch-Israeli composer Anat Spiegel presents ‘Temporary Palaces’, a new music, experimental opera and song based on the iconic textual artworks of Robert Montgomery, Zeno van den Broek unveils his new audiovisual work ‘Breach’, and Danish cellist, singer and composer CTM performs her soulful electroacoustic pop.
From CTM, we shift gears to celebrated Montreal-based saxophonist and experimental composer Jason Sharp. Setting up shop at the Grey Space, Sharp combines his saxophones with customised electronics that translate his heartbeat and breathing into an array of analogue drums, sine waves, feedback and synthesizers in real time. And with that, we move on to the rest of the night’s performances at Paard, Koorenhuis, and Lutherse Kerk.