Program

I.

Handbells

Celestial Mechanics (2011) World premiere     Douglas Repetto

 

II.

Carillon and Electronics

Berlin Bahn Bells (2011) World premiere     Hans W. Koch

Hans W. Koch was born in 1962 in Heidenheim/Brenz, studied music, history and physics at the Pädagogischen Hochschule Weingarten from 1984 til 1988 and composition at the Hochschule für Musik in Cologne with Johannes Fritsch from 1988 to 1995. In 1998 he was awarded the Bernd Alois Zimmermann-Förderprize of the city of Cologne. In 2002 he had a stipendium from the Villa Aurora in Los Angeles and in 2007 he was visiting professor at the California Institute of the Arts. In 2008 he received the award of distinction for “the benchmark consort” at the Ars Electronica Festival, in 2009 he was visiting artist at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and at the Institute for Multimedia of the Academy for Performing Arts in Prague. In 2011 hew lectured and conducted workshops at various universities in Taipei, and since 2012 he has taught hybrid sound computing and extended systems at the Institute for Music and Media in Düsseldorf.






Microphones at the carillon tower

Andreas Pysiewicz, Christian Dietz, Hans W. Koch and Andre Bartetzki at the computer

The audience
 
For Berlin Bahn Bells the composer set up microphones in the nearby train station, piped the sounds live to loudspeakers set up at the carillon tower and used a specially developed software to convert them into notes which appeared on a computer screen mounted on the carillon console. The computer program started by writing individual notes with the same pitches and used the sounds from the train station to develop ever more complicated and more extensive textures that later gradually became progressively simpler towards the end of the piece until it finishes on a single note. The carillonneur sightread the spontaneously produced notes as soon as they appeared on the screen. The piece was performed in its entirety and lasted 45 minutes. The carillonneur converted the noises of the train station heard live at the tower into bell sounds which he played as a musical accompaniement and commentary.