CONDUCTORS
Cordula Bürgi
Lars Mlekusch

PHACE
Doris Nicoletti, flute
Walter Seebacher, clarinet
Reinhold Brunner, clarinet
Michael Krenn, saxophone
Mathilde Hoursiangou, piano
Ivana Pristasova Zaugg, violin
Petra Ackermann, viola
Roland Schueler, cello
Maximilian Ölz, double bass
Alexandra Dienz, double bass
and many more …

SOUND DESIGN
Alfred Reiter

Dates in this Series

MO 25.11.2024 PHACE | ACCESSING PLEASURE
DI 11.2.2025 PHACE | IRRÉALITÉS / UNREALITIES
DI 11.3.2025 PHACE | LIGHTNESS
SO 4.5.2025 PHACE | AKUSMATA

Details on our concerts can be found on the respective pages.

Peyee Chen, voice

PHACE
Doris Nicoletti, flute
Walter Seebacher, clarinet
Reinhold Brunner, clarinet
Michael Krenn, saxophone
Mathilde Hoursiangou, piano
Ivana Pristasova Zaugg, violin
Petra Ackermann, viola
Roland Schueler, cello
Maximilian Ölz, double bass
and many more …

SOUND DESIGN
Alfred Reiter

Confrontations between the real and the imaginary have been a part of human coexistence for thousands of years. Societies created mythologies, stories, fairy tales and communal dreams, stimulating the imagination and producing a distinct “cultural body” in an effort to explore the real and transform it through the imagination. Based on the concept of morphism and dysmorphism, IRRÉALITÉS / UNREALITIES by Januibe Tejera examines how music can connect the diversity of this cultural body, not based on cultural similarities, but organized by an acoustic reality. Tejera, whose work lies somewhere on the borders between various musical styles and scenic arts, transfers the mechanisms of communal imagination into a musical reality. Using autogenerative sound models, the work is imagined in real time for voice, ensemble and electronics, creating a new vocabulary of unrealities and unreal sound models. With a distinctive sound identity for each musician and electronic improvisation, the project creates a sonic reality in which the boundaries of voice, instruments and electronics are no longer perceptible, but are mixed into a large and limitless, unreal and dysmorphic sound space.

PHACE
Doris Nicoletti, flute
Walter Seebacher, clarinet
Reinhold Brunner, clarinet
Michael Krenn, saxophone
Mathilde Hoursiangou, piano
Ivana Pristasova Zaugg, violin
Petra Ackermann, viola
Roland Schueler, cello
Maximilian Ölz, double bass
and many more …

SOUND DESIGN
Alfred Reiter

Fzsch… A flicker illuminates faces and hands, only briefly, the light goes out immediately. The afterimage on the retina, the mental echo of the crackling has no time to solidify, it is carried along by the rhythm of the movements, is bathed in a new light by the next match. Juliana Hodkinson’s Lightness is theater for the ears and eyes, a quiet kind of fireworks music and a deeply hypnotic and archaic experience.
Superimpose I + II by Alexander Schubert, on the other hand, is not inclined to create such trance states. The two pieces quickly and hyperactively zap through styles and stereotypes, a reflection of an accelerated society and its media. It is a juxtaposition and superposition of acoustic instruments and artificial, synthetic replicas of the same. Copy and paste jazz between improvised and notated music.
Sonic leak by Huihui Cheng puts a damper on the enthusiastic events. Developing tones, phrases and rhythms are muted, held back, veiled, and often have to fall silent abruptly. The playing technique of dampening is the central driving force and brake of the composition. The disrupted processes create an exciting dynamic and drama of their own.
The transformation of some verses from Ovid’s Metamorphoses (the iron age) into structural micro-events serves as the starting point for Oliver Weber’s Inscription II. The molecular sound structures come together to form aggregates, break apart again and constantly change their state. They form an independent sound body that penetrates all levels and is inscribed in the bowels of the piece.
We met as Sparks by Franck Bedrossian closes the fiery circle and thrives on an unequal balance of power and the juxtaposition of strong contrasts. The constant exchange between the bass and treble registers creates unexpected tensions and divergences, echoes that shoot through the darkness like glittering sparks.

Lars Mlekusch
Alexandra Dienz, double bass
Maria Chlebus, percussion

PHACE
Doris Nicoletti, flute
Walter Seebacher, clarinet
Reinhold Brunner, clarinet
Michael Krenn, saxophone
Mathilde Hoursiangou, piano
Ivana Pristasova Zaugg, violin
Petra Ackermann, viola
Roland Schueler, cello
Maximilian Ölz, double bass
and many more …

SOUND DESIGN
Alfred Reiter

Sounds jump into consciousness in a short, fragmented and concise way. It is an irregular dance of sonic particles that becomes music in Scrap by Annesley Black. The smallest possible fragments compete for dominance over hearing and memory, each in an effort to replace the previous one. However, they cannot help but communicate with each other and transform each other in constant interaction.
This kind of spectral-temporal economy is probably absent in Bernhard Gander’s new work. With his pieces, the sounds often come into close contact without great distance and join together to form dense, physically perceptible structures.
In Alessandro Baticci’s Luminal Mirage natural and virtual sounds merge. The instruments imitate the sound of electronics, doubling rhythm and timbre up to the point, where in the hyper-fast, mechanical atmosphere, in which endlessly ascending and descending lines flow like through a stairwell by M.C. Escher winds, it is no longer possible to distinguish between what is played and what is generated.
With I wonder if I should start accessing pleasure a whole lot, Giorgia Koumará asks the question of identity and belonging in the distorting mirror of social norms and values. The areal, smoldering electronics, repeatedly interrupted by wild rhythmic excesses and incisive sound events, serve as an amplifying basis for a series of alienated text passages by Audrey Lorde, Gillian Flynn and others that address the role models of women in society.

Cordula Bürgi, conductor
Cantando Admont

PHACE
Doris Nicoletti, flute
Walter Seebacher, clarinet
Reinhold Brunner, clarinet
Michael Krenn, saxophone
Mathilde Hoursiangou, piano
Ivana Pristasova Zaugg, violin
Petra Ackermann, viola
Roland Schueler, cello
Maximilian Ölz, double bass
and many more …

SOUND DESIGN
Alfred Reiter

Beat Furrer’s Akusmata is inspired by those enigmatic sayings and wisdoms that are attributed to Pythagoras and appear like an inhomogeneous set of rules of a fantastic society: some are clearly understandable, others are reminiscent of riddles by da Vinci and some have a strangely grotesque quality to them. With a newly expanded part of the series, Furrer connects with Pythagorean mysticism and not only symbolically deconstructs the relationships, but also breaks down the harmonic spectrum. The density of voices and instruments together with the constant transformation and mutability of the vocal sound create a new reality, a new space in which music can resonate and exist on its own. A mysterious world that only exists in the ear.
Widely protruding, finely branched sound structures, studded with countless signs, metaphors, phrases, symbols and influences from every conceivable direction and music can be found in the works of Sarah Nemtsov and yet the deep roots in the European musical tradition cannot be overheard. Her new work WAVES is as enigmatic as Furrer’s Akusmata and delves into the flowing alternating currents between individual and collective consciousness in Virginia Woolf’s novel “The Waves” from 1931. Six voices, with each other, next to each other and against each other. Moving in space – sometimes individually, sometimes as a group – embedded in an expanded instrumental-electronic sound space, searching for the way in which multiple selves and multiple perspectives can weave together a pluralistic truth.

ensemble

PHACE | NOUVELLES AVENTURES

29.May.2023 // 19:30
Wiener Konzerthaus, Mozart-Saal

PHACE Series 22/23 – N°4

ARTISTS
Lars Mlekusch, conductor

Neue Vocalsolisten Stuttgart
Johanna Vargas, soprano
Truike van der Poel, mezzo-soprano
Guillermo Anzorena, bariton

PHACE
Doris Nicoletti, flute
Reinhard Zmölnig, horn
Reinhold Brunner, clarinet
Berndt Thurner, percussion
Sonja Leipold, cembalo
Mathilde Hoursiangou, piano
Jacobo Hernández Enríquez, violin
Victor Lowrie Tafoya, viola
Roland Schueler, cello
Alexandra Dienz, double bass

PROGRAM

Andreas Trobollowitsch
hybrid #1 – ⥀18 for mechanical turntables, rotating recorders, balloons and performers, 2023 (UA)
Commissioned by PHACE

Hristina Šušak
ANIMA II for soprano, mezzo, recorder, calrinet, drumset, piano, violin and viola, 2022/23 (wp)
Commissioned by PHACE, with support by Wiener Konzerthaus & SKE-Fonds

Pierluigi Billone
Δίκη Wall for percussion solo and 6 instruments (2012)

P A U S E

György Ligeti
Aventures (1962) and Nouvelles Aventures (1962-65) for 3 voices and 7 Instruments

In honor of the old master and yet with new adventures – György Ligeti’s Aventures and Nouvelles Aventures have opened up new spaces for vocal music, emphasizing articulatory expression and showing singing as an independent musical art even without linguistic meaning. On the occasion of the composer’s 100th birthday, we would like to honor this turning point in the history of new music not only with a performance, but also with two commissioned works. The young composer Hristina Šušak is writing a new piece for the same cast, equally as a contrast across time and age, and Andreas Trobollowitsch is creating a performative music installation as an homage to the influential composer. With Pierluigi Billone’s Δίκη Wall, a very exciting work by a well-established contemporary artist is also on the program.

Prior to each concert, at 18:45, Juri Giannini will discuss the music with the composers within the setting of “Salon PHACE”.

ensemble & installation

PHACE | BLUR

28.Mrz.2023 // 19:30
Wiener Konzerthaus, Berio-Saal

PHACE Series 22/23 – N°3

ARTISTS

Yalda Zamani, conductor

PHACE
Doris Nicoletti,  flute
Iva Kovac, flute
Walter Seebacher, clarinet
Michael Krenn, saxophone
Stefan Obmann, trombone
Berndt Thurner, percussion
Mathilde Hoursiangou, piano
Ivana Pristasova Zaugg, violin
Leo Morello, cello
Roland Schueler, cello
Alexandra Dienz, double bass
Samuel Toro Perez, electric guitar
Alfred Reiter, sound design

PROGRAM

Hristina Šušak
ANIMA for trombone, cello, piano, e-guitar and percussion (2018/19) (Austrian premiere)

Katharina Rosenberger
blur for flute, clarinet, percussion, piano, violin and cello (2019)

Reinhold Schinwald
campi deserti for ensemble, 2022 (wp)
Commissioned by  PHACE, with support by the  SKE-Fonds and Kulturabteilung der Stadt Wien MA7

Maurizio Azzan
Wasteland_not yet, for nine spatialized and amplified  musicians, 2022/23 (wp)
Commissioned by PHACE with support by Wiener Konzerthaus

In Katharina Rosenberger’s piece, blurred contours emerge from the noise, like a late-night taxi ride in the unsteady light of neon signs and traffic lights. blur smudges the edges and contours but still remains in a defined form. ANIMA by Hristina Šušak finds similarities in the very opposite emotions of laughter and crying. The piece shows the sonic differences and similarities as the boundaries blur and raises questions about the dualistic view of emotions. They are joined by Reinhold Schinwald and Maurizio Azzan with exciting new works commissioned by PHACE.

Prior to each concert, at 18:45, Juri Giannini will discuss the music with the composers within the setting of “Salon PHACE”.

chamber ensemble & installation

PHACE | CHROMA

31.Jan.2023 // 19:30
Wiener Konzerthaus, Berio-Saal

PHACE Series 22/23 – N°2

ARTISTS

PHACE

Concert-installation with works by Maurizio Azzan, Clara Iannotta, Peter Jakober, Sarah Nemtsov and performative sound-sculptures by Andreas Trobollowitsch.

PROGRAM

Maurizio Azzan
Monochrome for string trio (2018) (Austrian premiere)

Stefan Prins
Mirror Box (Flesh+Prosthesis #3) for saxophone, piano, percussion and electronics (2014)

Andreas Trobollowitsch
sägezahm (panorama version 7)
performative sound installation for 7 mechanical turntables, saw blades and acoustic guitars (2022-23)

Peter Jakober
Vom Kreis brechen for bass clarinet and string trio (2011)

Clara Iannotta
Limun for violin, viola and 2 page-turners (2011)

Sarah Nemtsov
Seven Colours for cello, e-bass, prepared piano with keyboard, drum set and electronics (2018) (Austrian premiere)

Sound and noise viewed from all sides and in all facets – Maurizio Azzan‘s monochrome, closely linked to the private dimensions of music, grown out of the restrained feeling of playing just for oneself and discovering sounds, meets Stefan Prins‘ mirror box, in which musical extensions of the body trace the phantoms of electronic sounds. Both Peter Jakober and Clara Iannotta step into sonic spaces that are characterized by a self-contained, inwards turning logic. While the viola and violin circle each other in Limun with a lot of friction, the instruments in Jakober’s piece rock each other up until the fracture, already announced in the title. In Seven Colours, Sarah Nemtsov dedicates herself to the artistic work of her mother and her memories in a wide range of sound worlds and seven earth-colored shades.

Prior to each concert, at 18:45, Juri Giannini will discuss the music with the composers within the setting of “Salon PHACE”.

ensemble, video & voices

PHACE | PASOLINI

23.Nov.2022 // 19:30
Wien Modern, Wiener Konzerthaus, Mozart-Saal
PHACE Series 22/23 – N°1

17.Nov.2022 // 20:30
Pordenone, Teatro Verdi

19.Nov.2022 // 20:30
Festival Aperto, Reggio di Emilia, Teatro Cavallerizza

A coproduction by PHACE, Wien Modern, Fondazione I Teatri Reggio Emilia, Teatro Verdi Pordenone & Wiener Konzerthaus (Zyklus PHACE) with support by

ARTISTS
Stefano Gervasoni, composition
Paolo Pachini, video
Nacho de Paz, conductor

PHACE
Company of Music

commissioned by PHACE & Wien Modern, in cooperation with Fondazione I Teatri Reggio Emilia and Teatro Verdi Pordenone

In Nomine PPP – Cantata per Pier Paolo Pasolini für 8 voices, 16 instruments and video (2022) (Austrian premiere)
Text by Laurent Feneyrou on Pier Paolo Pasolini‘s writings selected by Roberto Calabretto, with a poem by Biagio Marin.

The Cantata per Pier Paolo Pasolini, composed on the occasion of his 100th birthday, pays homage to the work and life of the great Italian artist and intellectual and his political and cultural role in Italian and European society of the 1960s and 1970s. Stefano Gervasoni sets Pasolini’s poetry and writings to music in a large cantata, which also incorporates melancholic interludes by Josquin Desprez, all about lamentation, grief and loss, and grows into a broader musical connective tissue (so to speak: déploration pour la mort de Pier Paolo Pasolini). Following Pasolini’s anthropological vision, the eye of the camera in Paolo Pachini’s video explores poetic images of man and nature, countered by contemporary media streams. The closely interwoven interactions between music and images create a unique atmosphere in which perception is completely immersed.The hybridization of languages gives rise to a torn, but sometimes also forgiving expression, a homage to Pasolini’s harsh gaze, whose maieutic power lays bare things and – especially today in a globalized world – shows those intertweavings of modernity and tradition for which the poet was a prophet.

Prior to each concert, at 18:45, Juri Giannini will discuss the music with the composers within the setting of “Salon PHACE”.

ensemble – electronics

PHACE | KXE!

our series at
Wiener Konzerthaus
2022/23

CONDUCTORS
Nacho de Paz
Lars Mlekusch

PHACE
Doris Nicoletti, flute
Walter Seebacher, clarinet
Reinhold Brunner, clarinet
Michael Krenn, saxophone
Mathilde Hoursiangou, piano
Berndt Thurner, percussion
Ivana Pristasova, violin
Petra Ackermann, viola
Roland Schueler, cello
Maximilian Ölz, double bass
Alexandra Dienz, double bass
and many more …

On the centenary of Pier Paolo PASOLINI’s birth, Stefano Gervasoni and Paolo Pachini are searching in images and voices for the junction point between barbarism and civilization, for human authenticity, the heart of Pasolini’s vision. With this homage we start into new vocal-instrumental spheres, which span the arc from traces of Franco-Flemish vocal polyphony by Josquin Desprez to the voice-acrobatic miniature dramas Aventures and Nouvelles Aventures by György Ligeti – the second centenerian. With this pioneer of modern music, we continue the discourse on vocal-instrumental expression opened with Pasolini – the voice wanders with precision away from the level of meaning towards a labyrinthine amalgamation of imaginary actions and exaggerated emotions. New spaces open up between these program points: contours melt, sounds rub and grind, pulsate, flicker, melt away, are torn apart. An interplay of near and far: the view from a distance into the microscopic world of sound, into its granularity and brittleness and ultimately into silence.

Prior to each concert, at 18:45,  Juri Giannini will discuss the pieces with the composers of the evening.

Dates in this series:

WED 23.11.2022 KH series 1 – PHACE | PASOLINI
TUE 31.01.2023 KH series 2 – PHACE | CHROMA
TUE 28.03.2023 KH series 3 – PHACE | BLUR
TUE 29.05.2023 KH series 4 – PHACE | NOUVELLES AVENTURES