STREFA 522 – concert
Composition Faculty and Studio of Electroacoustic Music – SME, Polish Society of Electroacoustic Music – PSeME and International Confederation of Electroacoustic Music – CIME/ICEM invite to the concert STREFA 522.
13 May 2022, 19:00
CSW Solvay
ul. Zakopiańska 62, Kraków
Włodzimierz Kotoński Mikrostruktury (1961) for tape SEPR
Michael Selvaggi Fetid Echoes, Rebirth (2022) for bass clarinet, accordion, piano and electronics *
Jeremy Wexler Meeting halfway (2022) * fixed media
Ostap Manulyak Transgression (2021) for flute and electronics
GrupLab Plejrek 324
Marek Chołoniewski, Dominika Czachor, Leszek Hefi Wiśniowski, Jan Kucharski, Piotr Madej, Wojciech Skowronek, Anton Stuk and others
Dominika Czachor bass clarinet
Jan Kucharski accordion
Dominika Peszko piano
Michael Selvaggi electronics
GrupLab
*World Premiere
Michael Selvaggi – winner of Residence Prix CIME 2021 – AMKP
www.sme.amuz.krakow.pl
Michael Selvaggi is a Toronto-based composer of experimental and electroacoustic music, soon to complete his Bachelor’s in Music Composition at the University of Toronto’s Faculty of Music. He has been a participant of various programs, some of which are: the Precept.Concept.Percept masterclasses, the ACTIVATE Reading Sessions hosted by the Canadian Music Centre, the EMERGE Workshops and Concert hosted by the Julius Quartet, the 2021 Arraymusic Young Composer’s Workshop, the Du Vert a L’infini Call for Collaborative Projects, and the ConneXions Mentorship Program hosted through the Canadian New Music Network.
He has been the recipient of multiple awards and commissions, some including: Honourable Mention in the Louise MacPherson Memorial Award, selection as Eastman School of Music’s 2020 OSSIA International Call for Scores Winner, a commission for the Kamratōn Ensemble as part of the 2021 Society of Composers, Inc. National Conference, two separate interactive multimedia installation and spatialized percussion ensemble commissions from Redshift Music, selection as the winner of two separate SOCAN Foundation Young Composer Awards in both the Chamber Music category and the Electroacoustic category, and most notably has recently been selected for an artistic residency in May at the SME AMKP Studio for Electroacoustic Music at the Academy of Music in Krakow, Poland through the Residency Prix CIME 2021 (ICEM).
Michael has collaborated with multiple organizations, including: Redshift Music, Women on the Verge, the Julius Quartet, the Kamratōn Ensemble, the Canadian Music Centre, the Canadian New Music Network, Du Vert a L’infini, and is a current Lead Composer for Green Room Sound Collective’s newest spectral-multimedia installation, “The Gallery”. His interest in exploratory music manifests through combining the familiar with the unfamiliar, specializing in the unknown and often pleasantly discomforting realm of noise. Having previously worked under the instruction of mentors such as Norbert Palej, Jacob Adler, James Rolfe, and Raven Chacon, he is now studying under the mentorship of two notable electroacoustic composers, Bekah Simms and Darren Copeland. In his research, Michael is exploring the limits of spectral composition, experimental sound art, microtonality, and soundscape, with a musical output that lies within a wide variety of genres, often incorporating various forms of complex multi-media—and anything between.
Fetid Echoes, Rebirth was written for the Krzysztof Penderecki Academy of Music in Krakow, as part of my artistic residency at the Electroacoustic Music Studio, which I had graciously been granted through the support of the International Confederation of Electroacoustic Music. The idea for this work emerged in May of 2021, as I was reflecting on a previous body of music I had composed. This set of three pieces dealt with the gradual progression of seasonal decay—a movement from liveliness to stagnancy that occurs between the months of August to January— and sought to make musical all of the grotesque sounds that emerged from this disintegration of organic matter. Within this reflection, “Midwinter Fractures” sparked the most inspiration, as its material—derived from spectral analysis of winter-based sounds—explored a sort of encapsulation of the material that preceded it, a process of “freezing-over” the remnants of Autumnal decay.
“Fetid Echoes, Rebirth” explores the subsequent vernal thawing of this environment—both as a literal ecosystem and as a figurative collection of aesthetic matter—and sources sonic material from personal field recordings of this seasonal rebirth, processed material from a previous recording of “Midwinter Fractures” by the Julius Quartet, as well as excerpts from the electronics of the previously mentioned pieces. Spectral structures from these earlier works are retuned in just-intonation, preserving their aforementioned grotesque character, while altering their relationship to the surrounding material; in this way, almost all structures can exist on one plane. Spectral shapes and structural form in the instrumental and electronic sound worlds are derived from analysis of the new and existing material. “Echoes” of former sonic matter are scattered throughout the newly introduced soundscape in the electronics, tainting the beautiful rebirth with fetid remnants of past decay. As the seasons turn and as the ice begins to melt on the forest floor, earlier putrefaction is uncovered and given space to emerge, warranting all sorts of new phenomena.
Amplification permits highly unstable techniques and nuances in instrumental preparation to be brought to the foreground, allowing such to work in tandem with electronics to craft an environment indicative of renewal, while fostering a newfound artificiality not present in the preceding body of work.