Touch Radio 49 | Chris Watson
08.02.10 - A Journey South – 50:21 - 192 kbps
Chris Watson journeys to the South Pole for the forthcoming David Attenborough series “The Frozen Planet” (BBC, 2011). Here he reports back with his experiences…
Photos by Chris Watson & Jason Roberts.
Subscribe to the TouchPod podcast of TouchRadio via the iTunes Music Store
Play "A Journey South"
www.chriswatson.net
T-Phone 1 - Biosphere "Outside By The Fjord"
1 track .m4v video, digital download for iPod/iPhone
Track listing:
1: Outside By The Fjord - 25:09
From a field recording trip in Sørfjorden, near Tromsø, Norway.
Commissioned by Fondazione Musica per Roma, 2008.
Buy Outside By The Fjord in the TouchShop
www.biosphere.no
Touch Radio 48 | Biosphere
28.01.10 - Live in Den Haag – 37:05 - 192 kbps
Born in Tromso (Norway), Geir Jenssen is better known as Biosphere, a key figure in contemporary Norwegian music. In 1992, Jenssen shot to fame with his Biosphere-debut album "Microgravity", becoming one of the pioneering ambient artists from the 90's. He was one of the first to come up with the mix of soundscapes, voice samples and atmospheric noise with trancey melodies and solid beats.
Touch Live on September 26th 2009 at Todaysart 09, Den Haag featured Biosphere, Philip Jeck, Hildur Gudnadottir, Jana Winderen & The Eternal Chord. Biosphere gave an intimate performance in the Lutherse Kerk, a very small church.
Recorded straight from the mixing desk to an Ares Pll Nagra digital recorder.
Subscribe to the TouchPod podcast of TouchRadio via the iTunes Music Store
Play “Live in Den Haag”
www.biosphere.no
Biosphere film soundtrack @ Berlin Film Festival | February 2010
Im Schatten (In the Shadows) by Thomas Arslan, Germany (WP) appears as part of A world in pieces: the films of the 40th Berlinale Forum, with music by Geir Jenssen (published by Touch Music).
www.arsenal-berlin.de
www.biosphere.no
Philip Jeck & Hildur Gudnadottir live in London | February 2010
Arctic Circle - The Resonance of Music with Water
Kings Place, 80 York Way, London NW1
Wednesday 24th February 2010
Philip Jeck
Time: 20:00
Venue: Hall One
An Ark for the Listener, a new work inspired by Gerard Manley Hopkins’ poem The Wreck Of The Deutschland.
"An aspiration in answer to an inspiration,
out of music shaped by all the sea has claimed,
as is the inevitable shipwreck of our existence.
Salvaged out of vinyl, by way of ear, hand and electricity."
"And I have asked to be... out of the swing of the sea." (G M Hopkins)
Thursday 25 February
Time: 20:00
Venue: Hall One
Hauschka with Hildur Guðnadóttir
Haushka is the alias of Dusseldorf keyboardist Volker Bertelman. His critically-acclaimed albums on the 130701 imprint evince a playfully accessible approach to the often austere realm of the prepared piano. Haushka is joined tonight by gifted Icelandic cellist Hildur Guðnadóttir for a major new, aquatically-themed commission.
Saturday 27 February
Hildur Guðnadóttir
Time: 19:00
Venue: Hall One
Icelandic cellist Hildur Guðnadóttir has collaborated with the likes of Throbbing Gristle, Múm and Haushka. She released her debut solo album in 2007. An electronic-tinged follow-up, Without Sinking, appeared in 2009 on the Touch label.
More info and tickets at www.kingsplace.co.uk
www.jointhecircle.net
www.philipjeck.com
www.hildurness.com
TO:77 - BJNilsen "The Invisible City"
CD - 8 tracks - 1:04:57
Jewel case with concertina insert
Artwork & Photography by Jon Wozencroft
Plus bonus 320kbps .mp3 download - 1 track - 33:44
TO:77DL - BJNilsen "Live at Café Oto", Atmospheres 3, 7.xii.09
Available only when purchasing "The Invisible City" via the TouchShop.
Track listing:
1. Gravity Station
2. Phase and Amplitude
3. Scientia
4. Virtual Resistance
5. Meter Reading
6. Into Its Coloured Rays
7. Gradient
8. The Invisible City
About this release:
Recorded and Mixed during 2008-2009 in Berlin.
All tracks composed by BJNilsen using Tape Recorders, Computer, Organ, Acoustic Guitar, Electronics, Viola, Subharchord. Field recordings from; Sweden, Iceland, Norway, UK, Japan, Portugal and Germany. The Subharchord was recorded in the EAM Studio @ Adk, Berlin. Viola played by Hildur I. Gudnadottir.
Mastered by Denis Blackham at Skye
Published by Touch Music [MCPS]
You can download a MP3 of Meter Reading by clicking here.
Buy The Invisible City plus bonus live MP3 download in the TouchShop
www.bjnilsen.com
Ash 8.5 | Paul Williams - Pillars of Wisdom
1 track .m4v video, digital download for iPod/iPhone
Track listing:
1: Pillars of Wisdom - 5m27s
Filmed and edited by Paul Williams on location in Abu Dhabi.
Soundtrack: Gel by Philip Marshall, published by Touch Music [MCPS].
Paul Williams writes: "Arriving in Abu Dhabi my initial reaction, standing on the balcony of my hotel room on the 20th floor, was disorientation and near-vertigo. Laid out before me was a building site on a scale I had never seen before; a small island was under construction.
This was “a room with a view” of a very different kind. Not some picturesque vista illustrating historical achievement but a vast, stark scene of becoming; a display of the knowledge, effort and will required to alter the landscape and create a new world. The skyscrapers I was watching turn from plans into reality suggested the phrase “Pillars of Wisdom”, adapted from the title of T.E. Lawrence’s account of his life in Arabia.
As the days went by the view became a site of contemplation. There was always something going on, some detail that warranted attention: the endless comings and goings of the work-crews, the slow gestures of the cranes, the shifting patterns of aircraft warning lights.
I wanted to capture something of what I was witnessing so, as you survey these monuments rising from the white sand, look closely and you will see tiny events occurring: the slow trajectory of a car's headlights, the flare of a welder's torch at night, even a bird flying across the face of the sun…
As I have come to know this landscape I am continually reminded that even though we live beneath the gaze of giants, made with our own minds and hands, it is our simple joys that continue to define us as human."
Buy Pillars of Wisdom in the TouchShop
www.ashinternational.com
Touch Radio 47 | Pascal Wyse and Tom Haines
01.01.10 - A Rock and a Hard Place – 11:45 - 201 kbps [VBR]
Eighty miles off the coast of mainland Scotland, the archipelago of St Kilda is host to almost a million seabirds each summer. Beginning underwater, this journey takes in the remote island group – with its gurgling seawash, gannets and storm petrel – before sailing east to the Shiants, home to puffins, guillemots, fulmars and razorbills. Finally, a mix of the exotic and commonplace – Carrion crow, wren, herring gulls. heron, ringed plover, cuckoo, oystercatcher, song thrush, common sandpiper – heard at dawn on the island of Rhona.
Sound and photography: Pascal Wyse and Tom Haines. Recorded in June 2009 with Dolphin Ear hydrophones, Sennheiser and DPA microphones and Sound Devices recorders.
Subscribe to the TouchPod podcast of TouchRadio via the iTunes Music Store
Play “A Rock and a Hard Place”
www.bergerandwyse.com
www.brainsandhunch.com
www.myspace.com/thelondonsnorkellingteam
Ash 8.6 | Stephan Mathieu - 10 Minutes
9x .m4v videos, digital download for iPod/iPhone
Track listing:
I. Crepuscule
light, curtain, wind
audio: Amelita Galli-Curci sings Massenet
78rpm from 1921
II. Screen
16mm projector, b/w flicker, projection
audio: Stephan Mathieu
III. Eye
light, reflection
audio: Stephan Mathieu plays Sylvain Chauveau (excerpt)
IV. Sonnenschatten
light, mobile, shade
audio: Heinrich Isaac
78rpm from von 1928
V. Licht
kitchen cabinet, sunlight reflection
audio: (silent)
VI. Hoch
garden, picnic gramophone, 78rpm record with bird song
audio: unknown throssle
captured on 78rpm shellac in 1932
VII. Sonne
light, mobile
audio: Stephan Mathieu, text by Yoko Ono
VIII. Two Dots
empty turntable
audio: François Couperin, "Le Carillion de Chitere" 78rpm from 1934
IX. Code
16mm projector, b/w flicker, puzzled webcam
audio: Stephan Mathieu (from “Process”)
“Nine webcam movies for handheld devices shot with my laptop's camera between September and October 2009. The soundtrack is basically what was playing then. 10 Minutes is dedicated to Anna Carolina Mikalef.”
Buy 10 Minutes in the TouchShop
www.bitsteam.de
www.ashinternational.com
LCO perform Biosphere | Roundhouse, London, 23rd January 2010
On 23rd January 2010, the London Contemporary Orchestra, one of the UK’s youngest and most adventurous ensembles, make their Roundhouse debut. “Shhoctavoski” is the first piece for orchestra that Biosphere, aka Geir Jenssen has composed and is given here its UK premiere with the Roundhouse Experimental Choir.
The same evening sees London Contemporary Orchestra also perform the world premiere of Shiva Feshareki’s “TTKonzert” (a concerto for turntables and orchestra), alongside performances of Steve Reich's “Different Trains” and the UK premiere of John Cage's “Seventy-Four”.
These performances are part of the Roundhouse's Reverb series, which “explores the many sides of music at the Roundhouse through world and UK premieres, genre-defying performances, fresh collaborations and a new approach to classical music.”
More info and tickets at www.roundhouse.org.uk
www.lcorchestra.co.uk
www.biosphere.no
