BiLE will now be performing in the 7:30pm concert on Friday, 27 January in the Network Music Festival at The Edge 79-81 Cheapside, Deritend, Birmngham, B12 0QH. We will be playing XYZ and the premiere of Act 2 of the Laptopera, The Death of Stockhausen.
The Network Music Festival is the first ever festival dedicated to music made involving computer networking and is three days of concerts, workshops, talks and installations. It’s well-worth a look (and is put together by several BiLE members!).
BiLE is set to perform in the 7:30pm concert on Friday, 27 January in the Network Music Festival at The Edge 79-81 Cheapside, Deritend, Birmngham, B12 0QH. We will be playing XYZ and the premiere of Act 2 of the Laptopera, The Death of Stockhausen.
The Network Music Festival is the first ever festival dedicated to music made involving computer networking and is three days of concerts, workshops, talks and installations. It’s well-worth a look (and is put together by several BiLE members!).
The Financial Times article, Ctrl-Alt-Concerto, about the growing interest in Laptop Bands and Orchestras mentions BiLE and uses one of our press photos. Check it out!
BiLE will be performing at the Ort grand opening on November 11th
We had so much fun playing at BMAG and what a fantastic audience! Thank you Artsfest.
Here is a video by Antonio Roberts of the gig:
BiLE has been selected to play at famous Birmingham festival Artsfest.
We will be playing at the Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery in the Round Room Gallery Saturday the 10th of September at 15.30. BiLE will be performing Julien Guillamat‘s Back to Front an electroacoustic cello sonata and Stucknote by Scot Gresham-Lancaster of our favourite laptop band: The Hub. As usual, there’ll be visuals from Antonio Roberts.
The piece XYZ written for BiLE by member Shelly Knotts has been festured in a new e-zine, CNCPTN by Simon Kinch. The e-zine is available online at: http://cncptn.com/ and is also available as a downloadable pdf. The e-zine aims to showcase music from young composers with a strong conceptual or design element. BiLE have performed XYZ in Oslo, Venice and Birmingham and it was also recently performed at ton:art 2011 by Benoit and the Mandelbrots.
10 works by 10 young composers and artists; where each piece has been conceived not only with the final sonic result in mind, but also to express or represent some pre-conceived concept or design.
CNCPTN is a new bi-monthly e-zine focusing on the concepts and designs behind the work by selected young composers and artists.
Each issue will profile the concepts and designs behind this type of composition and artwork, providing a platform for composers and artists to display more than just the audio they create, no matter how detailed or abstracted the original stimulus may be.’
John Kennedy of Brum Live did a great review of SONICpicnic, including a little bit about our performance:
In terms of conceptual originality and visualisation (Antonio Roberts) their performance, in three movements, was pushing the envelope into event horizons.
Read the full review over at brumlive.com.
Ross Cotton from Area Culture Guide also did a review of the event and our performance:
The highly anticipated BiLE (Birmingham Laptop Ensemble) swiftly followed, warping the sounds of pots and pans and cowbells through their laptops and handset gadgets, developing a new, tension-building weapon to entice listeners through harshness and hypnosis.
Full review over on Area Culture Guide
Here’s two videos from the performance:
Back to Front (Electroacoustic Sonata for Cello).
Partially Percussive
I just got round to consolidating BiLE’s aims in starting a laptop ensemble into something coherent… Thoughts, comments, criticisms welcome!
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On the forming of a Laptop Ensemble:
- Democratic approach: BiLE rejects the notion of an autocratic ensemble with a top down approach in which the roles of composer/programmer, leader, performer are discrete and hierarchical. BiLE instead supports the approach of integration, collaboration and the blurring of the distinctions between, composer-performer-collaborator in a democratic non-authoritarian ensemble.
- Collaboration: BiLE supports the production of scores and collaborative compositions where the framework is such that each composer-performer is free to interpret the sound production elements of the piece. Thereby allowing each member to contribute their ideas and imagination to every performance.
- Musicality: BiLE asserts that Musicality should be at the forefront of the priorities of any music making ensemble. Therefore technological concerns are subservient to musical intentions and musicality is central to the criteria set out to define the ensemble.
- Inclusivity: BiLE is an inclusive ensemble with criteria for membership based on similar musical aesthetics and a high quality and complementary musical output rather than specific technical skills. This makes BiLE a creatively rather than technically focussed ensemble. BiLE members should be experienced in Composition and/or performance and dedicated to ensuring all creative output is of high quality.
- Cross-Platform: BiLE’s commitment to inclusiveness necessitates the ensemble to be cross-platform. Any ensemble member is free to use the software they feel is most suited to the performance and their technical skill level. BiLE has developed their own networking tools in order to facilitate this cross-platform approach.
- Open Support Forum: BiLE members should support each other in the creation of quality musical performances and in the production of new works through technical and musical guidance shared with other members of the ensemble. The rehearsals should be an open forum for ideas and discussion on music, technology, performance, improvisation and other matters relating to the ensemble.
- Communication: BiLE are committed to sharing their creative output with their audiences in as inclusive a way as possible. BiLE feel that visual aspects are an important communication tool in any performance and as such include visuals and movement as appropriate to the aesthetics of the piece being performed. BiLE shall also engage in talks and demo’s before or during performances to facilitate audience understanding of BiLE’s creative process and performance aesthetic
- Progressive Experimentalism: BiLE should be a progressive ensemble priotritising experimentalism over historicism. BiLE should consider and utilisie the possibilities available by virtue of being a networked laptop ensemble and should not rely on old musical forms and structures to develop their creative output. Exploring the new forms and creativity that can be developed by the use of this technology is desirable so long as an emphasis on musicality is maintained.
(Author: Shelly Knotts)
BiLE will be performing alongside a whole host of musicians at SONICpicnic on 29th July at VIVID in Birmingham, UK.
You may remember that we had our very first performance at the first SOUNDkitchen event, so we’re really happy to be performing again.
We’ll be performing a few pieces including XYZ, which was recently played in Venice at the Laptop Meets Musicians Festival. You can see a preview of the visuals below:
