BEK Studio Sessions #1: toktek and Eva Pfitzenmaier
Published
Do you remember the last time you heard a new musical genre for the first time, a totally new sound universe, or a surprising combination of sounds that you thought would never work together? We want to cultivate that moment with BEK Studio Sessions.
Studio Sessions #1 – Toktek and Eva Pfitzenmaier from BEK.no on Vimeo.
For the first Studio Session, we have invited two artists that both have a knack for electronic experiments and loop- and sample based music: Tom Verbruggen, aka toktek, and Eva Pfitzenmaier will spend 10 days in BEK’s sound studio to develop something new together.
toktek (NL)
Tom Verbruggen, aka toktek, is a Dutch artist who designs, constructs and deconstructs his own electronic instruments, which contain a unique performative character and allow him to create improvised music live on stage. toktek’s instruments, often described as illogical hardware bending, play with unusual outcome as a performative quality. In recent years he has released various works such as the Crackle-canvas – a painting that produces sound, he plays in the drum/electronica duo FELL with Simon Berz, and has been engaged in a slew of expositions and performances worldwide.
Eva Pfitzenmaier (DE/NO)
Eva Pfitzenmaier was born in the south of Germany, studied singing at the conservatory of Amsterdam and is now based in Bergen, Norway. She works as a musician, performer, composer and writer in different projects: the art rock band Krachmacher, the theatre ensemble Lang Sang Produksjoner and her solo project By the Waterhole. On her latest By the Waterhole release two she elaborates her unique take on loop-based music, blending improvisation, squeaky jazzpop and old-fashioned blues.
Read more about Eva Pfitzenmaier here.
About BEK Studio Sessions
BEK Studio Sessions is a new series of artist residencies, initiated and organised by Bergen Centre for Electronic Art. During 2018, in three 10 day sessions, BEK’s sound studio will be occupied by one local and one international musician. Together, they will develop and perform either a sound art piece, or experimental music. Two musicians/composers from differing genres will be invited to BEK so that they can collaborate and create a new composition, informed by their diverging musical backgrounds. The artists that we have chosen to invite will not have collaborated before, but they will have an interest in one another’s music. Their task is to develop a new, unique and experimental composition, which will be created and performed using various forms of both classical and modern technology.
With this new model for collaboration and production, BEK intends to give musicians the possibility to expand and create a new piece of music, with the help of experimental means. BEK Studio Sessions is a call to encourage the use of experimental methods of composing and/or instruments. It creates room for experimentation within both classic and newly established genres.
In the autumn of 2017, we produced a test version of this format, called BEK Sound Lab. This was extremely successful, and ended with a groundbreaking and hard hitting concert for Prøverommet at Landmark: Carsten Aniksdal and James Welburn performed a new piece, developed and prepared at BEK’s sound studio over the course of 8 days. See documentation of the results here.
Studio Sessions are part of the program developed for Future DiverCities. Where we invite artists to develop new expressions and projects together. In FDC we work to create opportunities for artistic exploration and networking. Future DiverCities is supported by Creative Europe.