Performed at Rational Rec (London)
LP#6 (Five Monuments Of Our Time)
Ricciotti Ensemble
Conductor: Gijs Kramers
Carmal College, Emmen, The Netherlands
Conductor: Gijs Kramers
Carmal College, Emmen, The Netherlands
LP#3 ("Australia") -- Sasha Milavic Davies & Lucy Railton
Performed at the Old Queen's Head Pub, London (Broken Toy Records Event)
LP#1 (Arsenal) -- performed by Shila Anaraki & Tomma Wessel
Performed at Festival Made, part of the Flandres Festival (Gent)
LP#4 (Adams) -- Peter Willcock & Vicky Wright
Performed at the National Portrait Gallery, London (16 May 2008)
What are Letter Pieces?
Letter Pieces is an ongoing series of short performance pieces that I began composing in 2007. To date there are eight Letter Pieces, seven of which are duos. Each Letter Piece has a score, positioning a small number of physical actions and sound objects - which the players invent - in a fixed order. I have called them Letter Pieces because the scores use letters to represent these sounds and actions. To put it simply, I’ve created the structure and the players create the content; two enactments of the same piece may look and sound entirely different.
Each of the first four Letter Pieces is for a visual performer and a musician. The performer part may be enacted using any visual language, and by someone from any background: dance, puppetry, mime, etc. Musicians have also enacted the visual part, sometimes using physical-actions associated with playing their instruments. The only factor essential to the performer part is that its focussed on the visual medium, as exploring audio-visual relationships is key. The music part is equally open, and any instrumentalist may perform it using conventional or non-conventional instrument(s).
In these pieces each player creates a set of five events: the performer creates five physical-actions and the musician creates five sound-objects. Each event is always one beat long; as each piece has a different tempo a beat may range from half a second to two seconds in length. The five respective events are labelled A, B, C, D & E in the score. For both players an event may be a single visual action/sound, or a complex of actions/sounds that form a gestalt. For instance, a sound-object could be a single note or it could be a gesture that is made up of a bunch of notes perceived as a single event. Each event should be distinct, discrete and performed exactly the same way each time without variation (unless instructed otherwise). The symbol “+” denotes a one beat rest, indicating to the performer to hold still in a neutral position or to the musician to be silent.
A passage of score looks like this:
PERFORMER --- A + B + + A + B C
MUSICIAN ------ A + B + A + B + C
PERFORMER --- A B + B A + A B C
MUSICIAN ------ A B + A B + B A C
Players may think about the relationship between the visual and sonic dimensions in different ways. The five sound events could be unrelated to one another (other than “sounding good” together), and not obviously relate to the physical-actions. But the sound events could also be conceived mimetically. For instance, the visual action of knocking on a door matched with a knocking sound, or a raising-of-eyebrows matched with an ascending musical figure. From my perspective both approaches are valid. One of the interesting things is that when an action and a sound are performed together, we perceptually couple them even if they share no material relationship. A central idea of all the pieces is shifting these relationships.
Although all of the Letter Pieces share similar ideas, each piece also has a specific concept.
In Letter Piece 1 the visual performer is asked to construct a narrative sequence in five actions; A, B C, D and E. Here are two possible narratives:
A Getting on a bicycle
B Riding along
C Looking terrified
D Evading something
E Falling off
A Walking
B Ducking
C Looking Above
D Aggressive gesture
E Running away
In Letter Piece 2 there is an additional symbol in the score that indicates micro-variation. That is, the performers are instructed to modify aspects of a given event in such a way that the identity of the original event remains recognisable. Throughout the piece there are sections that focus on this feature by presenting a series of variations on a single event.
Letter Pieces 5: Northern Cities
In Letter Piece 5 both players produce actions, sounds and speak words. For the first half of the piece the two players each create a set of three related actions and a set of three related sound-objects that are not related to the other performer’s sets. For instance:
Actions
PLAYER 1: Sign for "wind" / Sign for "rain" / Sign for "sun
PLAYER 2: Smile / Yawn / Wink
Sounds
PLAYER 1: Strike box / Strike tin / Strike pot
PLAYER 2: Shake coins / Shake sand / Shake water
For the second half the players create new sets of actions and sounds where the relationships are between players:
Actions
PLAYER 1: Yelling motion / Punch / Reading
PLAYER 2: Covering ears / Being hit / Turning page
Sounds
PLAYER 1: Tear paper / Sing “do” / Single clap
PLAYER 2: Scrunch paper / Sing “re” / Double clap
Letter Pieces 6: Five Monuments For Our Time
Letter Piece 6 is for conductor and orchestra. The music is fully notated and fixed. The conductor chooses 5 actions: A, B, C should be conventional conducting gestures of their choice, D is to bow, and E is an action external to the conducting visual language.
Letter Piece 7: British Sign Language
All actions in this piece are based on sign language and are fixed.
Letter Piece 8: Wrong Song
This piece is specifically for a singer and a pianist. The singer is asked to create five actions relating to Lieder.
Each of the first four Letter Pieces is for a visual performer and a musician. The performer part may be enacted using any visual language, and by someone from any background: dance, puppetry, mime, etc. Musicians have also enacted the visual part, sometimes using physical-actions associated with playing their instruments. The only factor essential to the performer part is that its focussed on the visual medium, as exploring audio-visual relationships is key. The music part is equally open, and any instrumentalist may perform it using conventional or non-conventional instrument(s).
In these pieces each player creates a set of five events: the performer creates five physical-actions and the musician creates five sound-objects. Each event is always one beat long; as each piece has a different tempo a beat may range from half a second to two seconds in length. The five respective events are labelled A, B, C, D & E in the score. For both players an event may be a single visual action/sound, or a complex of actions/sounds that form a gestalt. For instance, a sound-object could be a single note or it could be a gesture that is made up of a bunch of notes perceived as a single event. Each event should be distinct, discrete and performed exactly the same way each time without variation (unless instructed otherwise). The symbol “+” denotes a one beat rest, indicating to the performer to hold still in a neutral position or to the musician to be silent.
A passage of score looks like this:
PERFORMER --- A + B + + A + B C
MUSICIAN ------ A + B + A + B + C
PERFORMER --- A B + B A + A B C
MUSICIAN ------ A B + A B + B A C
Players may think about the relationship between the visual and sonic dimensions in different ways. The five sound events could be unrelated to one another (other than “sounding good” together), and not obviously relate to the physical-actions. But the sound events could also be conceived mimetically. For instance, the visual action of knocking on a door matched with a knocking sound, or a raising-of-eyebrows matched with an ascending musical figure. From my perspective both approaches are valid. One of the interesting things is that when an action and a sound are performed together, we perceptually couple them even if they share no material relationship. A central idea of all the pieces is shifting these relationships.
Although all of the Letter Pieces share similar ideas, each piece also has a specific concept.
In Letter Piece 1 the visual performer is asked to construct a narrative sequence in five actions; A, B C, D and E. Here are two possible narratives:
A Getting on a bicycle
B Riding along
C Looking terrified
D Evading something
E Falling off
A Walking
B Ducking
C Looking Above
D Aggressive gesture
E Running away
In Letter Piece 2 there is an additional symbol in the score that indicates micro-variation. That is, the performers are instructed to modify aspects of a given event in such a way that the identity of the original event remains recognisable. Throughout the piece there are sections that focus on this feature by presenting a series of variations on a single event.
Letter Pieces 5: Northern Cities
In Letter Piece 5 both players produce actions, sounds and speak words. For the first half of the piece the two players each create a set of three related actions and a set of three related sound-objects that are not related to the other performer’s sets. For instance:
Actions
PLAYER 1: Sign for "wind" / Sign for "rain" / Sign for "sun
PLAYER 2: Smile / Yawn / Wink
Sounds
PLAYER 1: Strike box / Strike tin / Strike pot
PLAYER 2: Shake coins / Shake sand / Shake water
For the second half the players create new sets of actions and sounds where the relationships are between players:
Actions
PLAYER 1: Yelling motion / Punch / Reading
PLAYER 2: Covering ears / Being hit / Turning page
Sounds
PLAYER 1: Tear paper / Sing “do” / Single clap
PLAYER 2: Scrunch paper / Sing “re” / Double clap
Letter Pieces 6: Five Monuments For Our Time
Letter Piece 6 is for conductor and orchestra. The music is fully notated and fixed. The conductor chooses 5 actions: A, B, C should be conventional conducting gestures of their choice, D is to bow, and E is an action external to the conducting visual language.
Letter Piece 7: British Sign Language
All actions in this piece are based on sign language and are fixed.
Letter Piece 8: Wrong Song
This piece is specifically for a singer and a pianist. The singer is asked to create five actions relating to Lieder.
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