{"id":10787,"date":"2017-10-06T15:11:34","date_gmt":"2017-10-06T13:11:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/archive.camerimage.pl\/?p=10787"},"modified":"2017-11-10T20:29:36","modified_gmt":"2017-11-10T19:29:36","slug":"hauschka-what-if-koncert-na-camerimage","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.camerimage.pl\/en\/hauschka-what-if-koncert-na-camerimage\/","title":{"rendered":"HAUSCHKA “WHAT IF” CONCERT AT CAMERIMAGE"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

\n
We would like to invite you to Dw\u00f3r Artura (The Artus Court)\u00a0 in Toru\u0144 for a musical event of this year’s edition of Camerimage<\/strong> – the concert\u00a0Hauschka What If<\/em><\/span><\/strong> which will take place on November 17th<\/sup><\/strong>\u00a0at 8 pm.<\/div>\n
\u00a0
\nYou can buy tickets here:\u00a0http:\/\/www.kupbilecik.com\/impreza-21317-hauschka.torun.html#<\/a><\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/div>\n
\"\"<\/a><\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
HAUSCHKA<\/strong><\/div>\n
WHAT IF<\/strong><\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/div>\n
Since the release of his debut album, Substantial<\/em><\/span>, in 2004, Volker Bertelmann<\/strong> \u2013 aka Hauschka<\/strong> \u2013 has, slowly but surely, earned a remarkable reputation as a purveyor of imaginative, distinctive, prepared piano music. This isn\u2019t, to be fair, a heavily populated field, but it\u2019s one he\u2019s made his own, and while some might have dismissed his work early on as a novelty, Bertelmann<\/strong> has proven himself to be uncommonly inventive, coaxing ever more unprecedented, euphonic sounds and rhythms out of his instrument. Even so, on What If<\/em><\/span> \u2013 which finds him adding player pianos (also known as pianolas) to his armoury \u2013 Bertelmann<\/strong> expands his range even further, defying expectations and delivering what is without doubt his most ingenious album yet.<\/div>\n
It\u2019s somewhat astonishing, given his recent schedule, that Bertelmann<\/strong> has found time to record this eighth solo studio album at all. Since 2014\u2019s Abandoned City<\/em><\/span>, the D\u00fcsseldorf pianist and former hip hop artist \u2013 he was a member of major label duo God\u2019s Favorite Dog in the early 90s \u2013 has released a collection of remixes and outtakes from Abandoned City<\/em> <\/span>(A NDO C Y<\/em><\/span>) as well as a live album (2.11.14<\/em><\/span>). He\u2019s also toured the world, contributed to dance performances \u2013 Swan of Tuonela<\/em><\/span> found him reinterpreting Jean Sibelius\u2019 tone poem alongside Samuli Kosminen and Markus Hohti for a ballet choreographed by Finnish circus performer Ville Walo \u2013 and worked with a variety of musicians and ensembles. His collaboration with Amsterdam\u2019s Alma Quartet was performed as part of The New Romantics<\/em>, a concert series he curated at 2016\u2019s Schumannfest<\/em> in D\u00fcsseldorf, while Lost, a piece written for acclaimed cellist Nicolas Altstaedt, receives its UK premiere at London\u2019s Kings Place in the spring.<\/div>\n
Furthermore, Bertelmann<\/strong> has found increasing amounts of work as a soundtrack composer, working on scores for a number of documentaries and feature films, not least James Franco\u2019s adaptation of John Steinbeck\u2019s In Dubious Battle<\/em><\/span> and, alongside Dustin O\u2019Halloran<\/strong>, Lion<\/em><\/span>, for which they\u2019ve both been nominated for a Golden Globe. Nonetheless, despite this rush of activity \u2013 or perhaps even inspired by it \u2013 What If<\/em><\/span> reveals itself as the work of a man hungry to explore new sounds, eager to experiment with new approaches, and undeniably revelling in this irrepressible outpouring of creativity.<\/div>\n
For Bertlemann<\/strong>, the opportunity to record another album of his own was a welcome one. \u201cMy solo work<\/em>,\u201d he explains, \u201cis autonomous, and I can choose every step from the beginning without any outside influence. I definitely decided with What If <\/span>to make a record that might be my most radical. The lyrical piano has disappeared, and the sounds I\u2019m fascinated by \u2013 like noise and electronic elements \u2013 have taken over<\/em>.\u201d In practise, this means that this time Bertelmann<\/strong> used an old Roland Jupiter 4 synthesiser and an Eventide H3000 Harmonizer, as well as engaging with his trademark technique of utilising unusual objects \u2013 art erasers, for instance \u2013 to treat (or \u2018prepare\u2019) the piano. More importantly, however \u2013 and in a break from his traditional methodology \u2013 he programmed parts for player pianos, exploiting the speed at which they could play, manipulating the resulting sounds, and building layers to emphasise a composition\u2019s metre.<\/div>\n
Not for the first time, Bertelmann<\/strong> decided to construct his new record around a conceptual framework. But while, for example, 2011\u2019s Salon Des Amateurs<\/em> <\/span>employed the prepared piano\u2019s percussive qualities to explore his love of house and techno music, What If<\/em><\/span> aims to provoke reflection beyond the musical sphere with the titles of the both the album and its individual tracks. \u201cI had the idea of doing an album that is, in a way, a statement about the world in which we\u2019re living and in which I see my kids growing up<\/em>,\u201d Bertelmann<\/strong> elaborates. \u201cWhat If<\/em><\/span> deals with utopian concepts, and speculates about the world in thirty years\u2019 time. The more I feel questions being raised, the more I try to understand how activity is needed to make the drastic changes required, and there are still people out there who deny that global warming or other similar circumstances exist. Even scientists can\u2019t convince them anymore, so I wanted to dedicate this to such thoughts. The record is there to create awareness for certain topics, but I didn\u2019t want to make it too heavy. It\u2019s more like a very playful way of dealing with our perspectives<\/em>.\u201d<\/div>\n
Notably, What If<\/em> <\/span>represents the first time that Bertelmann<\/strong> has worked with anyone else on one of his solo albums. \u201cHalf of the record was recorded with Francesco Donadello<\/strong><\/em>\u201d \u2013 who also mixed the entire album \u2013 \u201cat his Vox-Ton Studio in Berlin<\/em>,\u201d Bertelmann<\/strong> says, \u201cwhere our basis was first-take recordings of my improvisations, before I then did overdubs. The second half was recorded in my studio with a Yamaha Disklavier<\/em> [a contemporary player piano that can record performances to a MIDI file], where I captured layers of programmed pianos and worked with my hands like a filter for the sound<\/em>.\u201d<\/div>\n
Overflowing with haunting melodies (I Can\u2019t Express My Love<\/em><\/span>, Familiar Things Disappear<\/em><\/span>), mysterious sounds (I Can\u2019t Find Water<\/em><\/span>, My Kids Live On Mars<\/em><\/span>), complex patterns (Constant Growth Fails<\/em><\/span>, Nature Fights Back<\/em><\/span>) and a rare dexterity that\u2019s hopefully matched by the intellectual response to the challenging scenarios its titles envisage, What If<\/em><\/span> crowns an extraordinary couple of years for Bertelmann<\/strong>. Arguably, in fact, it represents the culmination of everything he\u2019s worked towards these past dozen or so years. \u201cI was always attracted by hip hop, deep rhythms and weird sci-fi electronica<\/em>,\u201d he concludes. \u201cWhat If<\/span> is a result out of both that and the hundreds and hundreds of concerts I\u2019ve played, where I developed a way of mixing all these elements together<\/em>.\u201d<\/div>\n
Likely to prove one of 2017\u2019s most original albums, while at the same time inspiring questions about the very nature of the world we inhabit, What If<\/em><\/span> redefines the very notion of piano music in a dramatic and exceptional fashion. It stands as a rebuttal to those who lazily seek to shoehorn Hauschka\u2019s<\/strong> work into the so-called, uncomfortably broad \u2018new classical\u2019 category, and instead underlines his status as a unique and invaluable artist. What If<\/em>, indeed\u2026
\n <\/strong><\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/div>\n

<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We would like to invite you to Dw\u00f3r Artura (The Artus Court)\u00a0 in Toru\u0144 for a musical event of this…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":10790,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[141],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10787","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-wiadomosci"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.camerimage.pl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10787"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.camerimage.pl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.camerimage.pl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.camerimage.pl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.camerimage.pl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10787"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/archive.camerimage.pl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10787\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14300,"href":"https:\/\/archive.camerimage.pl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10787\/revisions\/14300"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.camerimage.pl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10790"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.camerimage.pl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10787"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.camerimage.pl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10787"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.camerimage.pl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10787"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}