Windschatten - live recording of the premiere

Here comes the live-recording of my composition Windschatten:

Live recording of the premiere of my composition Windschatten for solo flugelhorn, symphony orchestra and live-electronics. Recorded at the St. Nikolai church on May 19 - 2013 (Pentecost). The recording was done with two mics which were located near to the mixing desk at the left side of the church, so of course this recording can't reflect the spatial aspects of this composition.


Performers:
solo flugelhorn: Markus Stockhausen
Hamburger Symphoniker orchestra
conductor: David Porcelijn
live electronics, sound direction: Simon Stockhausen

The performers change their position during the piece. In section A the soloist is located on stage in the altar area of the church together with a drummer (vibraphone, gongs and other instruments). The conductor, a brass section with 10 players and a drummer (timpanies/woodblocks) are located on the gallery, strings and woodwinds are playing at the back of the church.

At the beginning of section B the soloist moves to the gallery, all brass players walk to the stage and the conductor joins the strings and woodwinds.

During a procession before section C the conductor (occasionally ringing a handbell) and all string and woodwind players move from the back of the church to the stage, some musicians play while walking (2 solo violins, 3 flutes, oboe, english horn and 6 violas), the soloist walks from the gallery to the stage (sometimes ringing a hand bell) where everybody then joins to perform the final section C of the piece. At the end the soloist leaves the church while playing, the last motif is played from outside - the entrance area of the church.

Two shotgun mics are positioned outside the church in a park and at certain spots in the score I bring in the signal. Four speakers are positioned around the public to project the live-electronics, derived from the signal of the live instruments and pre-pepared samples.

During sections A+B a video camera films the conductor and transmits the signal to various monitors in the church to provide accurate synchronization of the musicians.

This was the 5th and last premiere during my artist in residence-season with the Hamburger Symphoniker orchestra in 2012/2013.

The day after...

On Sunday May 19 the Hamburger Symphoniker orchestra conducted by David Porcelijn, my brother Markus on flugelhorn and myself performed my composition Windschatten in the St. Nikolai church in Hamburg. I was delighted with the result and the applause at the end of the concert was overwhelming. I made a live-recording which I have to edit and mix first before releasing it on various platforms and sending links around to friends and affiliates.

The artist in residence with this orchestra was a fantastic experience, my first 2 works for symphony orchestra were born in this time period and I am determined to find other opportunities to write for orchestra in the future. Thank you Hamburg and a big embrace to all the people who helped me with the various projects and performances.

Upcoming premiere Windschatten

Here is a quick and dirty bounce of the 3rd part of my upcoming orchestral premiere "Windschatten" - a concerto for Flugelhorn (played by my brother Markus), symphony orchestra (Hamburger Symphoniker) and some live-electronics (myself) which will be performed in a church in Hamburg on May 19.

In the first and second part the orchestral groups and the the soloist are distributed over different locations in the church, then in the 3rd part they finally come together  in the altar area.

Produced entirely with samples/virtual instruments, not mixed, just one Reverb on everything (VRoom) to simulate the acoustics in the church.

Sounddesign endavours

For the last weeks I've been working full time on a soundset for the Alchemy Synthesizer/Sampler only using samples I made from a Framedrum which I got some weeks ago. I'm totally amazed about the huge variety of sounds I got out of this drum, I thought I knew it all but with each project I seem to fall deeper into this wonderland of sounds...

All sounds you can hear in the demos below were made entirely from original Framedrum samples, nothing else - 100% Alchemy:

Doktrin der Ruhe - orchestral work - live recording of the premiere

Here is the live recording of my orchestral work "Doktrin der Ruhe" for symphony orchestra, sampler and live-electronics which was performed on Octobre 27 - 2012 by the Hamburger Symphoniker orchestra in the big hall of the Laeiszhalle in Hamburg/Germany.

I only used 2 mics for the recording, did my best to pimp up the sound quality but it still sounds a bit far away, anyway the music is audible:

Aftermath

Here is a Halloween inspired Soundscape for you:

Back home...

The concert last Saturday was a great success. The premiere of my piece Doktrin der Ruhe was performed really well by the orchestra, they played it expressivley and full of dedication, some of the more difficult parts were a bit off, but I can live with that.

In the last part of the concert named "Felder" (fields) my brother Markus and I experimented with improvising together with the orchestra, we had written out 4 smaller composed "Felder" and in between my brother conducted the impro using dedicated hand signs for various textural things. I processed the orchestral sounds with various Plug-Ins and the electronic sounds were flying through the  hall adding a surreal element to all of this.

Then in the end my brother and I took over the impro and improvised together (me sitting at the mixing desk in the hall with my keyboards) which we hadn't done for almost 10 years, and at some points he brought the orchestra back into the impro.

The audience was amazed by all of this and the final applause was enthusiastic, warm and quite long.

Final applause...

some rehearsal pics

This is a waggon full of technical equipment we need for the quadrophonic amplification of the live-electronics, which process the sounds of the orchestra. They just roll it into the hall, connect the cables, setup the Mixer, install the speakers and we're ready to go - the only solution if you don't have the time to setup things in a normal manner due to the overbooking of the only concert hall in Hamburg:

71 musicians and a conductor (Jules Buckley) on one stage during the first rehearsal of my orchestral piece Doktrin der Ruhe (Doctrine of Calmness):

Concert in Hamburg

The rehearsals for the big concert next Saturday in Hamburg with the Hamburger Symphoniker orchestra have started, this afternoon we will rehearse my orchestral piece Doktrin der Ruhe for the first time and I'm pretty excited about that. I will try to take some photos during the afternoon and post them here.

Audio Teaser for my orchestral piece "Doktrin der Ruhe" (Doctrine of Calmness) produced entirely with virtual instruments which is premiered in on the 27th of Octobre 2012 with the Hamburger Symphoniker orchestra.
It's a 40-minute long composition for symphony orchestra, sampler and live electronics.

It'll be fun, I'm almost finished with writing out all the parts, an insane amount of work...