INTROVERTS’ COLLECTIVE (conceptual pack of four participatory compositions, monographic concert)
FULBRIGHT AWARD final (CNMAT Berkeley, CCRMA Stanford)
17.11.2021 #score #
Czy muzyka może być dotkliwa? Czy można słuchać nie oceniając albo czy można oceniać nie słuchając? Czy podczas koncertu jesteśmy częścią współodczuwającej wspólnoty, czy elementem zbioru jednostek tym bardziej od siebie odległych, im bardziej pogrążamy się w indywidualnym przeżywaniu? Czy nie jest to i tak próżny trud przynoszący poczucie daremności? Czy na te wszystkie wątpliwości poradzi coś medytacja pod cyfrowym przewodnictwem?
Na te i inne pytania nie odpowiada forma otwarta Introverts’ Collective, która jest między innymi monograficznym koncertem kompozycji Rafała Zapały w wykonaniu Hashtag Ensemble. Jest też nowatorską próbą odejścia od linearności przebiegu muzycznego, wyzyskania możliwości wszechobecnej technologii do wyjścia poza stereotypową interakcję i wejścia w sytuację prawdziwie partnerskiego dialogu, horyzontalności komunikacji i otwarcia na nieprzewidywalne. Kolektywnego odkrywania i kształtowania czegoś faktycznie nieznanego.
Jeśli chodzi o konkrety, to Introverts’ Collective jest efektem stypendium im. Fulbrighta (Fulbright Senior Award 2021), a program wieczoru stanowią cztery utwory z lat 2018-2021: Futility, Judge Me Again, Scrolling to Zero i stworzona specjalnie z myślą o tym projekcie kompozycja, od której całość wzięła tytuł: Introverts’ Collective.
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Can music be touching? Is it possible to listen without judging or to judge without listening? Are we a part of a sympathizing community during a concert or an element of a set of entities – the more distant from each other the more we sink into individual sensations. Isn’t it vain toil which brings a feeling of futility? Could digitally-guided meditation be of any help for all those doubts?
Those and other questions are not answered by an open form Introverts’ Collective, which is, among others, a monographic concert of works by the polish composer Rafał Zapała performed by the Hashtag Ensemble. At the same time it is a novel way to deviate from linearity of music narrative, to take advantage of ubiquitous technology as a step further away from stereotypical interaction and a step closer to a truly partner dialogue, horizontality of communication and openness towards the unpredictable. Collective discovery and shaping of something actually yet-unknown.
As for practicalities: Introverts’ Collective is an outcome of Zapała’s Fulbright Senior Award (2021) and it consists of four works from 2018-2021: Futility, Judge Me Again, Scrolling to Zero and a piece conceived with this project in mind which gave it its name: Introverts’ Collective.
- JUDGE ME AGAIN FOR SOLO FLUTE AND LIVE ELECTRONICS
Briefly it’s a short story of GETTING OUT OF THE ROLE OF A VICTIM.
Interaction here is very simple and very symbolic – it’s just touching the performer / treating her as a live trigger for the next part of the piece.
This gesture is overcoming the physical barrier of privacy, but it also symbolizes a judgment, a judgmental opinion, which is always severe, always „touching”.
- FUTILITY FOR ENSEMBLE, ELECTRONICS, MOBILE CONTROLLERS
First please open a console on your phones: futility.herokuapp.com
The composition has two layers: electronic one from speakers, and acoustic one played by musicians. And they are both competing, fighting.
The electronics symbolizes something unpredictable and dark that is about to come.
And we can try to stop it.
When the console starts blinking we can repeat turning left the volume knob to try to volume down the „danger sound” and help musicians.
All texts and philosophical background of the piece is based on writings of NY based philosopher Eugene Thacker. Thank you Eugene for your thoughts!
- INTROVERTS’ COLLECTIVE FOR ENSEMBLE, ELECTRONICS, MOBILE CONTROLLERS
First please open a console on your phones: introverts-collective.herokuapp.com
When we meet to listen to music we are simultaneously together and alone in our inner perceptual apparatus. So we become here a local & temporal „community of listeners” – an “Introverts’ Collective”.
You can be engaged in this by answering the questions on the console.
It’s the first performance of this composition so everything can happen …:)
- SCROLLING TO ZERO FOR KEYBOARDS AND ELECTRONICS
It’s not a musical piece sensu stricto, it’s rather a transhuman sound meditation.
Digital leader on the screen will ask us to create together a communal sound, by chanting together one word – similar to buddhist Ohm practice.
“It’s the end. Just sit still, relax and breathe… “