2004 Songs of(f) Stage (SoundArt Project)

“Songs of(f) Stage – SoundArt Project” continues the SoundArt and performance-based research project from 1998 “Songs of(f) Stage – Dedicated to Mauricio Kagel” at the Mozarteum University Salzburg (1998) in a newly contextualized audio format.

• About the SoundArt Project
• Structure and Sound Content
• The Instrument Set and Sound Material
• CD Cover Graphics
• Further New Contextualisations of the ‘Songs’
• Project Page (May 1998) and Trailer: “Songs of(f) Stage” with Lauren Newton, VoiceArt
• Seminar Page: “Concepts and Designs for ‘Space-Sound-Body’ in the 20th Century”
• Gallery

About the SoundArt Project

Based on the sound recordings of the experimental space-sound-body-theatre “Songs of(f) Stage” 1998, the “Songs of(f) Stage” were created as a SoundArt Project, decomposed and recomposed, newly arranged and designed in 2004. This aesthetic research project is the result of a collaboration between Helmi Vent (idea, concept, composition), Isabeella Beumer (voice art) and Michele Gaggia (sound recording, 1998; editing, mastering, 2004). The arrangement and sound design of the project emerged from the experimental working process with Michele Gaggia (DNS Studios) and Helmi Vent.

Structure and Sound Content

The first part comprises nine ‘Songs’. The sound material is primarily based on stationary and mobile components, as well as stage equipment of the main stage and off-stages areas (lower stage, upper stage, main stage, gallery) of the “Großes Studio” of the Mozarteum University Salzburg. All audio events were brought to life through the body movements and body senses of the “Songs of(f) Stage” performers. The new sound-artistic composition of the ‘Songs’ 2004 is – like the performative-scenic stage composition from 1998 – largely dialogic: The stage sounds, the performativity, the physicality of the sound generators, the digital processing of the sounds and their ‘Lieder’ – Everything comes together in dialogue with space and spatiality, spatial sound and sound space.

The second part of the project focuses on “Songs of(f) Stage with Voice”. ‘Songs’ 1–9 from the first part are repeated to create an audio platform for new compositional dialogues in nine additional ‘Songs’, this time between the soundscapes of the main and off-stage areas and an experimentally soloing human voice.

The Instrument Set and Sound Material

The sound material originates from the following moved to sound inventory components of the “Großes Studio” of the Mozarteum (as of 1998) and the stage equipment (supervised by a stage technician):

Under stage: toothed rails of the lifting platform mechanics, motor-driven lifting platform hydraulics, emergency damping of the lifting platform, protective grille of the under stage cross-aisle

Upper stage: metal stairs to the mobile maintenance bridge, maintenance bridge safety trolley, metal stair handrail, installation sockets and boxes, hard plastic cable lugs, profiled steel floor plates, protective grille of the upper stage railing

Gallery: safety chains, motor-driven light bridge

Main stage: counter wheel for hand cable hoists, metal brush, machine screws, aluminium ladders, motor-driven lifting platforms.

CD Cover Graphics

Further New Contextualisations of the ‘Songs’

In the course of the development history of SpaceSoundBodyTheatre, a distinct genre and aesthetic profile of the “Lab Inter Arts – LIA” (formerly TanzMusikTheaterWerkstatt) at the Mozarteum University, some of the ‘Songs’ of the SoundArt Project have sought further dialogical opportunities to initiate new work, encounter and discussion processes. The latter include video-documented Lab Inter Arts performances from the following years 2009, 2012, 2011, 2015, presented, reviewed and discussed by Helmi Vent at the “Symposium of the Gesellschaft für Tanzforschung / gft 2016, Sound – Traces – Moves: Klangspuren in Bewegung” (Sound tracks in motion), 18–20 November 2016, Salzburg.

Here the recontextualised video examples in detail:

Film Source – Symposium Presentation “Songs of(f) Stage” Salzburg (2016) (under construction)

• Flagstone Grove (excerpt), with Liesa Baumgartner, Lina Höhne, Christoph Kendlbacher, Katrin Pernull. Timecode 13:20 (2009)
• Allegro ma (excerpt), with Christiane Amereller. Timecode 14:20 (2012)
• Kraut Cuts (excerpt), with Barbara Keller. Timecode 16:28 (2011)
• Hätte Hätte Fahrradkette (excerpt), with Marena Weller. Timecode 18:10 (2015)