The McGill Association of Student Composers (MASC) is pleased to present, in partnership with the Ensemble Contemporain de Montréal (ECM+), a talk by composers Symon Henry and Adam Scime this Friday from 5-7pm in room A-510. Symon and Adam are currently on a cross-Canada tour with the ensemble as part of the 2016 Génération Project.
Symon Henry
drawing the intimate, subverting the ego: poetics and ambiguities of a graphical process of sound (trans. Maxime Fillion)
During this conference, Symon Henry will present the road that led him from the intricate transcription of motives from the paintings of Swiss painter Paul Klee, to the large graphical performative scores painted directly in abandoned buildings in Finland, to two major creations in the Fall of 2016. Voir dans le vent qui hurle les étoiles rire, et rire, for marimba and orchestra, will open the Lassonde Pavillion of the Museum of fine-arts of Québec, and debout, un respir grand comme, will be performed on nine occasions - from Victoria to Québec - by the Ensemble Contemporain of Montreal in the context of its tour: Génération2016. At the turn of 2010, Symon started seeking new sound objects: melodic contours, musical gestures, even total forms, by means of a more and more precise pictural and sonic language. His process took a decisive turn during the elaboration of his series "Intranquillités," which consists of five pieces as of today, and seeks a new mode of graphical notation of timbre that compromises both precision and openness. These scores require a closely collaborative work with the performers - it is a work that completely blurs notions of composition/improvisation, and, first and foremost, it is a work that aims to get rid of the egos of composers and performers behind poetic universes that must be invented in collaboration.
Adam Scime
Liminal Pathways – Program Note
The essence of music is motion. Our imagination has the potential to augment the values of reality depending on how motion is perceived. In my music, I have become increasingly interested with how the motion and thrust of musical gestures can create vivid imagined spaces in the minds of the listener. The impact of the musical gesture and how it can imply a certain form of energy and drama emanating from a collection of sounds is of paramount concern in my piece Liminal Pathways. Throughout the piece I applied my gestural palette combined with a novel approach to instrumental articulation in order to broaden the listeners’ perception of the sounds they are hearing. In my music it is always a goal to find a unique brand of virtuosity resulting in a compelling display of instrumental dramaturgy and precise articulation - as opposed to virtuosity in the traditional sense – while maintaining a capacity for expression. My hope is to send the listener on an adventure of observing not only what happens in the music, but also what happens within themselves as the music unfolds.
