Becoming

Suitable for all who enjoy spending an evening sitting, observing, listening, and celebrating.

A recording of the concert will be broadcast on Radio SRF2 Kultur on Wednesday, January 10, 2024 at 9pm. Tune in here.

Accessibility: Wheelchair accessible, induction loop for the hearing impaired

Ensemble Contrechamps
Nilufar Habibian – Qanun

Kimia Koochakzadeh-Yazdi: «Unstuck in Time» (2023) for ensemble, and electronics
Nilufar Habibian: «Becoming» (2023) for qanun, bass clarinet, and electric guitar
Zeynep Toraman: «Castle Terraces in Barry Lyndon» (2023) for ensemble and electronics – World premiere

Sharif Sehnaoui – Guitar
Mazen Kerbaj – Live visuals

«Wormholes»

Shiva Feshareki – Ambisonic turntable live manipulations

Every year SONIC MATTER opens with a raucous celebration featuring voices from the contemporary music scene that take the audience on explorations of ever new sonic territories. This year the opening line-up also serves as a preview of what’s to come in the festival: the Ensemble Contrechamps, one of the most renowned entities in contemporary music that continuously re-invents itself; Sharif Sehnaoui and Mazen Kerbaj, the founders of our guest festival Irtijal in Beirut, who perform as the duo «Wormholes» and spontaneously create stories without words; qanun musician Nilufar Habibian, who develops her own musical language using an instrument from classical Iranian music; and lastly the turntablist Shiva Feshareki, whose virtuoso and energetic sets continually spiral off into musical surprises.

Cooperation: Schauspielhaus Zürich

LINER NOTES

Kimia Koochakzadeh-Yazdi: «Unstuck in Time» (2023) for ensemble and electronics

«Unstuck in Time» is inspired by Kurt Vonnegut’s concept of being unstuck in time. The piece aims to creates soundscapes that are constantly shifting and evolving, mirroring the fluid nature of time itself. Timelessness is embraced and the sounds move between the thresholds of definition and non-definition. «Unstuck in Time» was initially written for Distractfold and can be played in fourteen different congurations. As the videos are made from purely the performer’s faces, for each revision, the videos need to be remade.

Nilufar Habibian: «Becoming» (2023) for qanun, bass clarinet, and electric guitar

«Becoming» is a sonic journey through the intricate process of change, with the aim of preserving the essence that defines the core identity. The composition serves as a metaphor for transformation. The piece explores the possibilities of creating a new sonic realm by employing unconventional instrumentation and various instrumental techniques.
This composition navigates through moments of both stability and chaos, capturing the continuous nature of change. It maintains a sense of continuity, a thread that persists even in the face of experimental deviations. Sections of the piece build upon one another, crafting a narrative of growth and evolution. The intentional interplay between instruments generates a soundscape that is both challenging and rewarding.
«Becoming» explores the essence of continual change and transformation. At the same time it encourages reflection on the beauty found in evolution and underscores the importance of embracing transformation while safeguarding the essence that defines our existence.

«Wormholes» – Mazen Kerbaj & Sharif Sehnaoui

Wormholes is an ongoing audiovisual project by Mazen Kerbaj and
Sharif Sehnaoui, two artists from the free improvisation scene in
Lebanon who have been collaborating since the late 1990s. In 2008,
Kerbaj devised a set-up in which he draws live on stage, projecting his
painting process onto a screen. He draws on a prepared, illuminated
glass panel using a wide array of inks, water, solvents, brushes,
sponges, window wipers, and various unidentified objects. His movements
turn into textures and figures that are constantly modifying, painted
over, reappearing and disappearing, exactly like the sounds emitted by
Sehnaoui’s guitar. Nothing is permanent or even fixed; both sound and
visual elements are created in real time and are gone forever with the
end of the performance.

Shiva Feshareki: «Live Turntable Manipulations» – new version of ongoing composition in flux for Live Ambisonic Turntables and Immersive Electronics

I will present a 360 degree sound world: a live ambisonic turntable composition that I create in the moment in direct response to the energies in the room and the acoustic space. I will manipulate and warp records, time and space through the boundless possibility of my turntables, contorting samples of my own compositions along with peculiarities from my LP collection. I will employ an array of technology from vintage analogue tape echo, vinyl turntables, CDJs, to state-of-the-art ambisonic technology to create experiences that reveal the fluid and infinite interplay between sound and the physics of space.