Sounding Here: Ensemble Echolab, Esther Mugambi + Marc Alberto, Charles Antoni
SOUNDING HERE is a stage for fresh collaborations, premieres, and trying out new things as an artist at any stage of their career. Opening up the idea of what experimental can mean, Christine invites artists which keep sound at the core, but the series often presents “more than musical” ideas. SOUNDING HERE celebrates art that lives, grows, and breathes throughout a festival-in-an-evening atmosphere.
Ensemble Echolab
“a stammering woman came to me in dream: her eyes askew, and crooked on her feet, her hands were crippled, her complexion sallow.” (Dante Alighieri, Purgatorio XIX)
The Dream of the Siren is a 25-minute concert program for three acapella voices by Ensemble Echolab, exploring the creativity of the future through the archetype of the siren and pulled together from existing contemporary music written on the sirens of antiquity, and brings newly commissioned works written with AI-assistance to expose the underbelly of our desires. From the power of looking, her shape warps from misshapen limbs into a smooth mirror of our desires. For Dante, the siren became a beautiful woman. For us, our siren song is Artificial Intelligence, singing of a frictionless utopia, promising that mass surveillance, data collection and scraping Buzzfeed articles can completely replace any need for human beings, and also solve climate change. The Dream of the Siren is inspired by the siren’s uncanny parodying of Dante’s desire. The concert experiments with AI hallucinations and stutters to discover a path for creative agency with machine learning programs.
“Swatya bnebyam panm s s r s r a s s s s s s s There are many ways to get a job
The eyes are wise and the feet are speaking.
Illustration
so far
so far.” [Text experiment with Microsoft’s AI-powered translation]
Program:
Kristia Michael, Love Song to A. (2023)
Kate Soper, O Sailor (2014)
Livia Malossi, new commission (2024)
Niko Schroeder, new commission (2024)
Ensemble Echolab is a new vocal ensemble based in the Hague. Led by Vanessa Guinadi, the ensemble seeks to experiment with vocal work that is fiercely modern, theatrical and collaborative. The ensemble currently comprises of singers Vanessa Guinadi, Kristia Michael and Jasperina Verheij.
Esther Mugambi + Marc Alberto
How to travel light.
This showing marks the first phase of a new collaboration between Marc Alberto and Esther Mugambi; an exchange of words, sounds and objects. A dialogue across time and space, they ask what is an object and what does it carry? What do you take when you travel? Poetry to fit your pocket.
Marc Alberto
Euro-Caribbean word and sound-artist Marc Alberto tours internationally as a saxophonist, multi-instrumentalist and spoken-word artist. Their work and activism dismantle colonial structures, by any means necessary, but often from knowledge, craftsmanship and radical vulnerability. Marc (they/them) is also active as a composer of film, theatre and chamber music, as well as working as a musical dramaturg, poet and artistic researcher.
Esther Mugambi
Esther Mugambi (Kenya/Australia) is a performance artist based in Amsterdam. Her work concerns community making and crafting real connections in a world in which technological means have complicated direct communication. In audio series ‘Podcast for Introverts’ (2022-23) she creates a soundscape that charms on a subliminal level. Mugambi has collaborated with Sarah van Lamsweerde ‘Sore Spot Singing’ (Nieuw Dakota, Amsterdam 2019, Q02 Brussels, 2020)an outdoor garden project which facilitates sound healing in a natural setting, connecting stories and songs of pain with medicinal plants, and on the collective research project Tracer, that takes a critical look at 1956 spectacle, ‘Changwe Yetu’ commissioned by former Belgian mining company Union Minière. (Wetsi Gallery, Brussels 2023). Her research at BAU focused on the experience of mind and body duality(2023)
Charles Antoni
Employing the body as both the primary instrument and vessel of expression, Charles delves into character development and storytelling through embodied rhythmic patterns. He navigates the body’s constraints, utilizing its percussion and voice to weave narratives rich in depth and emotion. Playfulness emerges amidst the struggle and conflict, intertwining with the unfolding story to reveal themes of perseverance and courage.
Charles Antoni graduated from Codarts Rotterdam with a Bachelor of Dance (BA) in 2020. He has danced with ICK Dans Amsterdam, Tanz Theater Pforzheim and DAGADA dance company. Since March 2024, he has been a member of Opera Ballet Vlaanderen. Additionally, Charles choreographs; his duet “Nowhere but blue” was selected for the semi-finals of RIDCC in June 2022, and he recently performed his solo-creation « The weight we carry » at Stuttgart Solo Choreo.
in a world in which technological means have complicated direct communication. In audio series ‘Podcast for Introverts’ (2022-23)she creates a soundscape that charms on a subliminal level. Mugambi has collaborated with Sarah van Lamsweerde ‘Sore Spot Singing’ (Nieuw Dakota, Amsterdam 2019, Q02 Brussels, 2020)an outdoor garden project which facilitates sound healing in a natural setting, connecting stories and songs of pain with medicinal plants, and on the collective research project Tracer, that takes a critical look at 1956 spectacle, ‘Changwe Yetu’ commissioned by former Belgian mining company Union Minière. (Wetsi Gallery, Brussels 2023). Her research at BAU focused on the experience of mind and body duality(2023)
Employing the body as both the primary instrument and vessel of expression, Charles delves into character development and storytelling through embodied rhythmic patterns. He navigates the body’s constraints, utilizing its percussion and voice to weave narratives rich in depth and emotion. Playfulness emerges amidst the struggle and conflict, intertwining with the unfolding story to reveal themes of perseverance and courage.