Hidden City (live) in november

Okay, so if you only come to one live show that i am playing at this year, this would be the one to come to.

November 5, @ Coma @ The Wheatsheaf Hotel in Thebarton

Hidden City
Electro Acoustic Free Improvisation

This group consists of:
Luke Harrald: laptop / AI handler
Derek Pascoe: saxophone
Lauren Sutter: electronic hardware devices
Sebastian Tomczak: electronic hardware devices
Stephen Whittington: keyboards

Combining live circuit bending, artificial intelligence, and free
improvisation, “Hidden City” brings together the lo-fi experimental
electronica of Hidden Villiage (Lauren Sutter and Sebastian Tomczak),
the game theory experiments of Luke Harrald, and the instrumental
virtuosity of Derek Pascoe and Stephen Whittington for one night only!
With no one at the helm, except maybe a couple of virtual software
entities, who knows where this musical ride may lead or end. Certainly
we don’t!


(blurb by Luke Harrald)

Luke Altmann Interviews Hidden Village

Luke Altmann is an Adelaide-based new music composer, curator and gallery director, and runs the de la Catessen Gallery on Anster Street in the CBD.

In the chiptune community Lauren Tomczak and Sebastian Tomczak, as Hidden Village, are internationally recognized. They draw upon an eclectic collection of retro game consoles, such as the Atari 2600, Vectrex, the Sega Master System and Mega Drive, utilising recently developed sound software to create a performance duo. They endeavour to explore the use of relatively unconventional hardware and software in music making, such as the use of mobile phones as homebrew portable instruments and the construction of self-designed digital sequencing devices from scratch as performance.

Additionally, they have designed and implemented a number of physical interfaces for use in musical performance involving light and water as well as an interface for the Vectrex videogame console. They have performed at the Australian Computer Music Conference (2006), the Tyndall Assembly Concert Series (2007), and expanded to perform as Hidden City for the opening of the 2008 Adelaide Festival of Arts, alongside Stephen Whittington, Luke Harrald, Derek Pascoe and the Zephyr Quartet. The closing concert of AFUM 09 is one of Hidden Village’s major performances for 2009, and will feature a keyboard-controlled walkman-mellotron, singing bowls, and live VGA hacking.


Obviously, I had some questions to ask them ahead of this, beginning with a request for their definition of the under-represented art of Chiptune:

HV: Chiptune or chipmusic is the use of obsolete video game consoles and computers in music composition, production, and performance. The movement revolves around the use of sound chips. However, the meaning of the word has changed over time; originally, the term chiptune was used to describe a certain kind of Amiga music in the very late eighties and early nineties, so it was a very narrow use of the word.

Since then, the word has become broader in its application, and today includes music that was made using emulation, music that has its roots in inspiration (music that uses sounds that imitate sound chips rather than emulate), and music that uses traditional instrumentation to complement (or to be complemented by) chipmusic instrumentation. Currently, popular consoles and computers within the chipmusic scene include the Nintendo Game Boy, the NES, the Commodore 64, and the Amiga. However, a wide variety of consoles are in use today.


LA: Most activities of the growing international chiptune community are conducted online. Why are live performances so rare?

HV: Are live performances so rare? They are in Adelaide, but even in Melbourne and Sydney the numbers of concerts and shows featuring Game Boys and Nintendos are increasing. In the US, the UK and Europe, and parts of South-East Asia, live chipmusic performance is more common than here in Australia.


LA: Chiptune music, pervading areas of private entertainment otherwise closed to art music - namely computer and video games - has undeniable connotations of introverted escape. How do people respond to hearing this music in the context of a public concert in room full of strangers?

HV: The responses of people will undoubtedly change depending on the material that is presented as well as their own connection (if any) to these types of electronic sounds. For Hidden Village, chipmusic at its core represents an exploration of decontextualisation and an exploration of constraints - both technical and, as a result, timbral. So in this sense, it is hoped that people do no necessarily connect any feelings of nostalgia directly with our music but, rather, hear these sounds in a new light, in a new context.


LA: Do you perform as though playing a game, thus building a piece out of personal responses to unforeseeable dilemmas hidden from the audience, or do you largely compose pieces in advance with a focus on musical development in the more or less traditional sense?

HV: Our performances are a mix of through-composed music and improvisation in the sense that the structure and form of a work is not set but certain phrases and instrumentation are set beforehand. In our performance for the AFUM, we are combining aspects of chipmusic, live sampling, improvisation, and field recordings, with a healthy dose of humour and reflexivity, as well as some more serious minimalism.


LA: The late Tristram Cary was a pioneer of finding new musical uses for old electrical equipment - starting with discarded WWII navy surplus components - and also played a central role in the institutionalisation of electronic music in Australia. We now see Hidden Village taking a similar do-it-yourself approach as graduates of the Adelaide University's state-of-the-art Electronic Music Unit to which Cary contributed so much. Is this a consciously ironic reaction to the standards of academia or a warm acknowledgement and deep bow to your musical roots? Or both?

HV: I would have to say it's more of a deep bow to our musical roots. The use of DIY aesthetics and ideologies have been a part of electronic music for as long as music has been electronic - this sense still runs strongly through modern music technology academia. However, the use of hacked, modified or subverted obsolete technology - especially hardware-oriented applications - is something that is not so popular today in academic circles… we are all very good at looking forwards and never looking back. So perhaps in a sense there is a little sense of irony, or at least a sense of going against the grain.


LA: It's important to point out that your prominent use of otherwise obsolete and culturally era-specific thus nostalgic equipment does not represent a rejection of current audio technology, which in fact you constantly utilise and explore alongside the vintage models of - for example - Atari and Vectrex. Is this co-existence of old and new employed simply through a need to make various old interfaces compatible with contemporary technology while using their limitations as a structure for performance, or a need or desire to expand the language of musical expression through which you communicate to the public?

HV: We would have to say that the use of obsolete technology in our music and performances represents a need to use a different language of musical expression than what might be otherwise available, especially in the areas of timbre and texture. Technology from different eras has different characteristics and as a result different positive attributes. We don't see a need to exclude certain technologies based on their age or function but rather try to find a use for a range of different technologies in music performance.

Hidden City Audio Repository

I have uploaded all of the recorded Hidden City audio material that I have in my possession (about three and a half hours at this point in time). This material can be accessed here:

http://hiddencity.milkcrate.com.au/

More material will be added as it becomes available.

Hidden City playing Elder Hall at the Festival

Hidden City will be performing at Elder Hall, Adelaide University under the title of "The Imaginary Menagerie" on the Ignition! night of the 2008 Adelaide Festival (29 February).

The lineup will include Stephen Whittington, Derek Pascoe, Luke Harrald, Lauren Sutter and myself as well as members of the Zephyr Quartet.

This should prove to be an interesting evening. I believe we are playing from 8pm onwards.

Hidden City 5 Nov 2007 Recording

The recording from the last Hidden City show (5.11.2007) can now be downloaded. The set has been split up into five files. The lineup was: Stephen Whittington, Derek Pascoe, Luke Harrald, Lauren Sutter and myself.

The recording was engineered by Martin Jones.

Get it here: http://www.milkcrate.com.au/_other/downloads/hc20071105/

Programme Announced for AFUM09

Adelaide Festival of Unpopular Music - AFUM 2009

April marks the end of the fourth year of musical activity at de la Catessen. To celebrate, a selection of musicians with a special emphasis on those working in Adelaide’s underground, experimental, and academic fields will present a series of concerts from April 12-23. The programme is as follows:



Sunday, April 12th, 3:30pm
Monday, April 13th, 6:30pm
$20/$15
ALEKSANDR TSIBOULSKI & JACOB CORDOVER
Classical Guitars

Five years after their intensive collaboration at the Banff Centre in Canada, two of Australia’s most gifted young guitarists come together for a one-off reunion tour across Australia. The versatile programme will feature solo sets, and duos, including the rarely heard contemporary virtuosic masterwork “Clocks” by American composer Joan Tower, Antonio Jose’s “Sonata”, and “Three Duets” by Australia’s own guru, Phillip Houghton.

Jacob Cordover resides in Barcelona, and this will be his first concert performance in Adelaide.



Monday, April 13th, 3pm $10/$8
DAVID KOTLOWY: prepared guitar, ruined piano, shakuhachi
ADE SUHARTO: dance
STEVEN KOTLOWY: bowed metallophones

Leading Adelaide composer David Kotlowy gives his final performance here before embarking for an extended stay in Japan as the 2008 recipient of the Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi Japan Travel Fund.



Tuesday, April 14th, 10pm $5
DEREK PASCOE
saxophone

Derek Pascoe is among the leading free improvisers in Adelaide, whose rigorous approach to musical self-discipline gives a profound assurance to his rare extended solo public performances.


Wednesday, April 15th, 8pm $5
JASON SWEENEY with Tristan Louth-Robins:
Panoptique Electrical

Panoptique Electrical is both an experimental studio project by Jason Sweeney and occasional collaborations with Zoë Barry, Jed Palmer, Tristan Louth-Robins (live performers) and Steve Phillips (Sensory Projects record label). Sweeney has been composing sound and music scores for live theatre, dance, film/video and installation projects since 1998. The first album Let The Darkness At You was released in 2008. The new album Yes to Fear, Yes to Desire will be released in July 2009 on Sensory Projects/Inertia Music.



Thursday, April 16th, 8pm FREE
CHRISTIAN HAINES

This performance by Christian Haines will an eclectic exploration of the mobile phone, Ligeti, failure aesthetics and the highly relevant amplification of the sound of ice melting.



Sunday, April 19th, 8pm $5
TRISTAN LOUTH-ROBINS

Using a combination of laptop, turntable and iPod, Tristan Louth-Robins (red_robin) creates live electro-acoustic improvisations of rich sonic textures interspersed with restrained melodic gestures and deviations.



Monday, April 20th, 8pm $5
MINIMAX
featuring
LUKE HARRALD - computers
DEREK PASCOE - saxophone
CHRIS MARTIN - piano

As a collaborative project between electronic music teacher Luke Harrald and the gestalt of the accomplished free-impro duo of Martin and Pascoe, MiniMax offers a complex live audio-visual performance.



Tuesday, April 21st, 8pm
BITCHES OF ZEUS
solo sets and trio by
DANIEL VARRICCHIO
PATRICK SARACINO
MOURGOS GRUND

Post-rock-logged sponges of musical performance practice: intuitive, unpredictable, uninhibited, confronting, self-taught, and psychedelic, Bitches of Zeus members Varricchio, Saracino, and Mourgos Grund offer sibylline commentary on unpop-culture.



Wednesday, April 22nd, 9pm
ADAM PAGE SOLO

Adam Page Solo is at the forefront of a new and unique style of performing, recording live instruments into loop pedals and spontaneously composing intricate grooves in many different styles. Primarily a Saxophone player, the instruments Page loops are as diverse as Bass, Keys, Percussion, Vocals, Tuvan Throat Singing, Beat Boxing, Guitar, Flute, Clarinet, Mbira (African Thumb Piano), Didgeridoo and Nose Flute in styles ranging from Funk, Tango and Punjabi to Classical, Jazz and Metal. He has even dabbled in playing drilled out vegetables.



Thursday, April 23rd, 7:30pm
HIDDEN VILLAGE

As Hidden Village, Lauren Tomczak and Sebastian Tomczak are internationally recognised musicians of the online chiptune community. They draw upon an eclectic collection of retro game consoles, such as the Atari 2600, Commodore 64, Vectrex and original Gameboy, utilising recently developed sound software to create a performance duo. They endeavour to explore the use of relatively unconventional hardware and software in music making, such as the use of mobile phones as homebrew portable instruments and the construction of self-designed digital sequencing devices from scratch as performance.

Additionally, they have designed and implemented a number of physical interfaces for use in musical performance involving light and water as well as an interface for the Vectrex videogame console. They have performed at the Australian Computer Music Conference (2006), the Tyndall Assembly Concert Series (2007), and expanded to perform as Hidden City for the opening of the 2008 Adelaide Festival of Arts, alongside Stephen Whittington, Luke Harrald, Derek Pascoe and the Zephyr Quartet.

The closing concert of AFUM is one of Hidden Village’s major performances for 2009, and will feature a keyboard controlled walkman-mellotron, singing bowls, and live VGA hacking.

Hidden City has been practicing for Friday

We have been getting ready for playing in Elder Hall for the opening of the Adelaide Festival. It will be a great mix of AI sample bank selection via game theory, gameboy, ableton live, commodore 64, two violins and cello, saxophone, piano and some other musical instruments such as an ektara.

We start playing this Friday at 7pm with additional sets at 7.40 and 8.20.

Hidden City Live on Thursday