Minimalist Monday
29 May 2006
ULTRA
Extreme Economy in Electronic Music and Visualization
Robert Henke aka Monolake; alva noto [Carsten Nicolai]; Ryoji Ikeda
Programme Notes | Ryoji Ikeda | alva noto interview | Robert Henke audio
Atlantic Waves IV by Robert Henke aka Monolake
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| Atlantic Waves IV mp3 download (mp3, 26.6 Mb) | |
Listen to the track in the player or download the entire 30-minute improvisation between Robert Henke and Torsten Prôfrock right click (PC) or control click (Mac) on the text link above and save target as.
Robert Henke, Atlantic Waves IV © Tate 2006
An improvised, musical concert by Robert Henke, using the Altantic Waves audio-visual, network performance instrument; connecting two computers across the internet enabling musicians to work live on the same musical score from any location on the planet. Acting as both a bridge and a distributed instrument, the interface is displayed to the audience, making the process of sound creation transparent and allowing for an anticipation of musical developments. For communication between the remote and local performer, the interface includes a simple chat function, which similarly is part of the display. The remote player is Torsten Pröfrock, who was be contributing from the Monolake studio in Berlin.
Creative Commons (Atlantic Waves IV, by Robert Henke)
The performance recording of Atlantic Waves IV by Robert Henke is licensed under an Attribution-Non-Commercial Share-Alike 1.0 (UK) Creative Commons Licence. Terms of the Licence: You are free to copy and distribute the work in conjunction with this licence. You must give the original author credit. You may not use this work for commercial purposes. If you alter, transform, or build upon this work, you may distribute the resulting work only under a license identical to this one. See here for further information on Creative Commons.
Starting with an empty score, the composition is developed and constructed by populating the interface with events. These build up a musical state, which in the course of the performance is modified, altered and finally destroyed. The score itself is represented as a matrix of 16 by 32 grey fields, ready to be filled with coloured squares of different sizes. These squares represent midi triggers for pre-prepared sounds. Red dots scan through the matrix, triggering sound each time they pass through a coloured square. The dots’ movement and direction is controlled by the performers. The result is a highly rhythmical, repeating and permutating series of percussive events.
Whilst Atlantic Waves provides the score, the instrumentation depends on other sound-generating applications. Sounds have been created specifically for this event according to a limited set of criteria: duration, spectral distribution, tonality and sonic evolution. The result is a discrete set of musical relationships and building blocks, used by both the local and the remote performers. The two performers may also alter the graphical interface, dramatically changing the visual display, to become more and more abstract.
The Atlantic Waves project started in 2002, for a performance between Robert Henke and Scott Monteith ('Deadbeat') and has seen many evolutions since that time. The current version has been re-designed especially for tonight’s concert. Henke is best known for the subtle, cinematic music he has recorded under the name Monolake, an extensive catalogue of textural ambient techno and stark minimal house. Henke founded the label, Imbalance Computer Music and long-term collaborator Gerhard Behles founded the software company, Abelton.
The Atlantic Waves software will be placed into the pubic domain, allowing other artists to use it as a platform for their own creations. This will be available for download along with documentation and the original sound samples used in this performance.
- For further screen shots, project history and information on the Atlantic Waves Software used in performance see the Monolake website
