Sunday 20 and 27 December 2009, 2 pm - 9 pm:
Two works by Hiromi Ishii:
Summer Grasses (2004) - acousmatic (German Premiere)
Ryum (2008) - Video
Hiromi Ishii on "Summer Grasses":
"Summer Grasses" was composed to create an acoustic coexistence of the nature and culture. The material sounds are insects’ sounds and metal noises. The latter has been produced by rubbing and beating knives, and by jingling a metal spiral. The spectral data of the insect sounds have been used for formant filters in order to transform metal sounds. In this music moments of silence called ma - „moments of emptiness”, but high-tensioned silence - of traditional Japanese music, are another important 'acoustic factor' to structure the piece. Hiroshige Ando's print, A Picture of Listening to the Insects, a short haiku by Basho Matsuo (translation below), and an appreciation of Japanese swords produced as art crafts, inspired me to create a fantasy of insects and the metal.
Summer Grasses...
traces of dreams
of ancient warriors
Hiromi Ishii
studied general composition in Tokyo, electroacoustic music at the Aufbaustudium (graduate course) of Musikhochschule Dresden under Wilfried Jentzsch, and later at City University London with Simon Emmerson and Denis Smalley where she was conferred her PhD degree. Her research, ‘composing electroacoustic music relating to Japanese traditional music’, was supported by an ORS Award Scheme scholarship of the UK. Her pieces have been invited and presented at music festivals such as CYNETart Festival Dresden, the International symposium at Folkwang Hochschule Essen, the Electroacoutic Music Festival Florida (granted by Japan Foundation), EXPO 966 by Sonic Arts Network UK, and broadcast by the WDR, MDR, Radio Berlin and Antwerp Radio. In 2006 she was invited as a guest composer by ZKM Karlsruhe. Currently, she is working as a curator of visual music. As a lecturer she taught at Shobi University and Institute of Sound Technique in Japan, and is currently giving workshops and lectures world wide in Japanese, English and German.
Hiromi Ishii