Touch Newsletter #286
Welcome to the Touch Newsletter #286. This newsletter covers a lively period coming, with the issue of Fennesz’s second album for Touch “Black Sea” on vinyl, two live Touch.40 events in Brussels and London, and Organ Reframed featuring Chris Watson and Claire M Singer, who collaborate for the first time.
Fennesz
“Black Sea”
TO:76V
2x10” vinyl. Buy “Black Sea” on Bandcamp. Mastered by Denis Blackham. Cut by Jason @ Transition. Artwork and photography by Jon Wozencroft.
A1: Black Sea
A2: The Colour Of Three
B1: Perfume For Winter
B2: Grey Scale
C1: Glide
C2: Vacuum
D1: Glass Ceiling
D2: Saffron Revolution
“Black Sea” was the follow-up album to “Venice” (Touch, 2004), and was originally released in 2008; Stylus Magazine's Nick Southall wrote: “Fennesz does with sound what Stan Brakhage did with film, altering its very fabric and texture, employing disorder and error as forms of communication and expression. He forces you to learn a different method of perception and interpretation, to look beneath the chaos that seems to govern the movements of life and find the patterns beneath.” Fennesz’s career has come a long way since “Instrument”, his debut for Mego in 1995, and his first solo album “Hotel Paral.lel” which followed in 1998. “Endless Summer” (Mego, 2001) brought him to a much wider audience and Venice underlined his mastery of melody and dissonance. His songs usually embody the skillful application and manipulation of dense sonic textures with a genuine feel for the live, and real-time. “Black Sea” features guitars that rarely sound like guitars; the instrument is transformed into an orchestra. Fennesz lists the elements used to make the compositions: “Acoustic and electric guitars, synthesizers, electronics, computers and live-improvising software lloopp.” On “Glide,” Fennesz duets with New Zealand's Rosy Parlane, whose work is also released on Touch. Fennesz also teams up with eMego artist Anthony Pateras whose prepared piano features on “The Colour of Three.” Fennesz pushes his work into a more classical domain, preferring the slow reveal to “Venice”’s and “Endless Summer”’s more song- based structures. Jon Wozencroft's artwork makes visible this carefully hidden world resting beneath the surface of “the first impression.” A series of shots, taken in quick succession as the tide recedes, reveals a world of specific activity only visible at a particular time and place, histories appearing and disappearing.
Buy “Black Sea” 2x10” vinyl on Bandcamp
Organ Reframed
Union Chapel, London
16-18 September 2022
Artists: Anna von Hausswolff, Abul Mogard, Ipek Gorgun, Claire M Singer and Chris Watson. Further info and tickets: unionchapel.org.uk
A festival pushing the boundaries of new music and cross-collaboration for organ. On the 16th September 2022 (rescheduled from September 2021) the fourth annual Organ Reframed returns to Union Chapel with a programme packed full of cutting edge new works from artists at the forefront of experimental music. Alongside headline performances, the two-day international festival will also feature talks, masterclasses, an interactive soundscape and family-friendly workshops.
Organ Reframed launches with three new works composed and performed by artists known for redefining their fields: Anna von Hausswolff renowned for her gothic organ creations “Anna von Hausswolff is reinventing rock ’n roll, producing work that is radical yet familiar and shimmering with invention.” - The Observer, enigma Abul Mogard a synth visionary "the music cuts through all the grime of a developed perception and leaves its essence in pure form.” - Headphone Commute and Ipek Gorgun a composer of energetic, textural masterpieces “patiently stitching together a whole sonic universes” - Pitchfork. All three works for organ, electronics and the London Contemporary Orchestra will push Union Chapel’s sonic possibilities to the extreme.
On Saturday evening join us for the world premiere of Voci del Vento by Chris Watson and Claire M Singer. A new multichannel diffusion work for field recordings, organ, the London Contemporary Orchestra and Choir.
The work will incorporate the soundscapes of habitats northwards from Antarctica to the Arctic captured by Watson processed and diffused live over a multi channel set up brought in specially for the event. These field recordings will be combined with organ, brass, strings, voice and electronics located around the chapel echoing a musical response from Singer to the sound and spirit of each location. Together the music and field recordings interweave taking the listener on an immersive aural journey from Pole to Pole.
Chris Watson, is a founding member of the influential experimental music group Cabaret Voltaire. He is famously known for his recording of wildlife sound for David Attenborough’s documentaries and his ground-breaking work on Grammy nominated “Chernobyl”. His 2003 release Weather Report was voted as one of the 100 best albums to hear before you die by The Guardian.
Further info and tickets: unionchapel.org.uk
Touch.40
Ancienne Belgique, Brussels
24 September 2022
Artists: Fennesz, Simon Scott, Valery Vermeulen and special guests Razen (and an interview with Mike Harding by Katrien Schuermans). Further info and tickets: abconcerts.be
"Touch and AB have already had a long love affair, one perpetuated in recent years with a number of superb events around this fantastic label: there was the expo with the artwork of co-founder Jon Wozencroft, we celebrated their 30 year existence at the Feeërieën, there were several label nights in the AB Salon, we organised together with Touch the Jóhann Jóhannsson tribute in 2018 involving the second live performance ever of “Virðulegu Forsetar”, there was the legendary evening with Mika Vainio, Thomas Ankersmit and Hildur Gudnadóttir at Domino ‘11, Chris Watson performed his “El Tren Fantasma” live in Train World, Bana Haffar recorded her debut album in AB…
And of course there were Fennesz, BJ Nilsen, Philip Jeck, Biosphere, Jana Winderen, Zachary Paul, Ipek Gorgun, Yann Novak, Simon Scott,… all unique artists that the label has given opportunities early in their careers, have established long-lasting relationships with, and who we have been able to present in AB at just the right moments in time.”
Further info and tickets: abconcerts.be
Touch.40
Café Oto, London
1 October 2022
Artists: Jana Winderen, Simon Scott, Claire M Singer, Howlround, Budhaditya Chattopadhyay and a short film by People Like Us. Further info and tickets: cafeoto.co.uk
Touch also has a long-standing relationship with Café Oto, of course, with many events there over the years at this classic venue.
Further info and tickets: cafeoto.co.uk
Guerrilla Audio
Guerrilla Audio is a series of audio raids by Simon Fisher Turner.
guer·ril·la
ɡəˈrilə/
noun
noun: guerilla
a member of a small independent group taking part in irregular fighting, typically against larger regular forces.
Each audio edit will be posted for 14 days and then removed from the site, although the information about each guerrilla activity will be archived, but without the audio. There will be two postings per month with the first (also featuring Klara Lewis & Rainier Lericolais) on 1st August 2015, so please check in regularly to listen to the latest offering. We are well into the fifth year and have just posted episode 171…
Guerrilla Audio
Long Wave
“Suspending time and immersing the listener in a widescreen of sound.”
Each month on the second Friday, Mike Harding and Bana Haffar present two hours of audio for dublab, Los Angeles.
You can catch up with the dublab archive on dublab.com, and for the entire Long Wave history (12 series so far for dublab and resonancefm) visit mscharding.net
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