Aleksander Kolkowski

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Aleksander Kolkowski
Born1959 (age 63–64)
Origin London, England
GenresHistorical, contemporary, experimental
Occupation(s) Composer, musician
Instrument(s) Violin, viola, phonograph, gramophone
Years active1980–present

Aleksander Kolkowski (born 1959 in London) is a British musician and composer whose work combines instruments and machines from the pioneering era of sound recording and reproduction (Stroh violins, [1] wind-up Gramophones, shellac discs and wax-phonograph cylinders) to make live mechanical-acoustic music. He lives and works in London, England.

Contents

About

Kolkowski studied music at the University of London, Goldsmiths College, violin with Clarence Myerscough at the Royal Academy of Music. Taught by John Tilbury, Hugh Davies and in 1982 participated in seminars and performances directed by John Cage.

Over the past 25 years he has worked internationally as an improvising violinist, interpreter, solo performer and composer for dance, theatre and film (Sasha Waltz, Rose English, Corinna Harfouch and Anzu Furukawa among others). He created several mixed-media projects in the UK and in Germany together with artists, film-makers and choreographers. From 1996 to 2003 he was resident in Berlin.

His latest work combines instruments and machines from the pioneering era of sound recording and reproduction (Stroh instruments, wind-up Gramophones, shellac discs and wax-cylinder Phonographs) to make live mechanical-acoustic music. Since 1999, he has actively explored the potential of pre-electronic sound reproduction technology in live performance. This work has been shown in Germany, Holland, Poland, Italy, Austria and the US, and featured on WDR and Deutschlandradio radio stations.

In 2002 he founded Recording Angels, a series that examines our relationships to recorded sound using antiquated home-recording devices such as Phonographs and acetate record cutters in performances and installations. Projects include "Voices and Etchings" for 6 singers and Gramophones (Staatsbankberlin, 2003) and "Mechanical Landscape with Bird" (MaerzMusik, Berlin 2004), featuring live singing canaries, wax cylinder Phonograph recordings and a rotating horned string quartet. Collaborations with artists include: Martin Riches, Apartment House, Kairos Quartett, Ute Wassermann, Anna Clementi, Aki Takase, Tony Buck, Hayley Newman, Phil Minton, Tristan Honsinger, Tony Oxley, Evan Parker, Sainkho Namchylak, Louis Moholo, Jon Rose, Matt Wand, Richard Barrett, Phill Niblock, Christian Wolff, Claus van Bebber, Boris Hegenbart, and many, many others.

Since 2013 Kolkowski is a collaborator in The X-Ray Audio Project by The Real Tuesday Weld frontman Stephen Coates. In 2015 Kolkowski was selected for a residency with the British Library Sound Archive.

Selection of works with gramophones and phonographs (2003–2007)

Composition of a live score for the classic polish baroque fantasy movie by Wojciech Has, British Film Institute, London

Installation-workshop for Transmediale 07, Berlin and Edition Edison. Academy of Arts, Berlin

Stroh String Quartet composition. Kettle's Yard, New Music Commission. Performed by Apartment House String Quartet, Kettle's Yard, Cambridge, UK BBC Radio 3 live recording and performance May/June 2007

Duo performance with Boris Hegenbart [#/TAU] Mechanical-acoustic music from a Stroh violin, Gramophone and Phonograph electronically manipulated and played back through the very same horns of the antique instrument and machines.

Solo performance with Stroh cello, 2 musical saws, CD players, speakerdrivers and custom built electronics. Festival Experimentelle Musik Munich

for Stroh violin, Serinette (bird organ), Gramophone, Phonograph with specially made recordings of birdsong on wax cylinders and 78 rpm acetate records – A collaboration with sound artist Martin Riches. Commissioned by Stare über Berlin Birdsong symposium and new music festival, Berlin. Seltsame Music, Festival, Klangforum Krems, Austria, Festival Experimentelle Musik Munich, and Festival of Exiles, Berlin

Schools project with artists Hayley Newman & Matt Wand. Field recordings, record cutting and cover art with pupils aged 11–13 years. Ikon Gallery, Birmingham

Collaboration with sound-artist and record producer Matt Wand (Hot Air). Record cutting and Phonograph recordings of electronic music, Futursonic Festival, Manchester

for 8 singing canaries, Serinette (bird-organ), 2 Phonographs and a rotating string quartet with horned instruments. Commissioned by Maerz Musik – Festival für aktuelle Musik, Sophiensæle, Berlin

Festival Experimentelle Musik, Munich

For flute, trombone, 2 Stroh violins and 4 Gramophones with self-recorded acetate discs.

Installation work with self-recorded Wax cylinders and Phonograph with attached earpieces. Outer Ear Festival of Sound, Chicago

Theatre music and Gramophone/horn installation for Female Line. Sophiensæle, Berlin

Richard Wagner – Historic recordings on 78rpm and wax cylinders. Concert series with original archive recordings, historic Gramophones and Phonographs. Deutsches Musikarchiv and Staatsbankberlin, Berlin

Electric and acoustic reproduction. Podewil and Staatsbankberlin, Berlin

Concert and live Phonograph recordings with Anna Clementi and Phil Minton – vocals. Quattro Ex Machina Part 2 for 4 singers, acetate disc recordings. Staatsbankberlin, Berlin, Seltsame Musik Festival, Munich and Kontraste, Krems/Austria

A musical séance for Stroh violin, violinophone, tuba, Gramophones and Phonographs. Konzerthaus Berlin

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Phonograph</span> Device for the analogue recording of sound

A phonograph, in its later forms also called a gramophone or since the 1940s called a record player, or more recently a turntable, is a device for the mechanical and analogue recording and reproduction of sound. The sound vibration waveforms are recorded as corresponding physical deviations of a spiral groove engraved, etched, incised, or impressed into the surface of a rotating cylinder or disc, called a "record". To recreate the sound, the surface is similarly rotated while a playback stylus traces the groove and is therefore vibrated by it, very faintly reproducing the recorded sound. In early acoustic phonographs, the stylus vibrated a diaphragm which produced sound waves which were coupled to the open air through a flaring horn, or directly to the listener's ears through stethoscope-type earphones.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Phonograph cylinder</span> Medium for recording and reproducing sound

Phonograph cylinders are the earliest commercial medium for recording and reproducing sound. Commonly known simply as "records" in their era of greatest popularity, these hollow cylindrical objects have an audio recording engraved on the outside surface, which can be reproduced when they are played on a mechanical cylinder phonograph. In the 1910s, the competing disc record system triumphed in the marketplace to become the dominant commercial audio medium.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Berliner Gramophone</span> First disc record label

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Edison Records</span> Early record label

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Edison Disc Record</span> Type of phonograph record produced by Edison Inc. from 1912 to 1929

The Edison Diamond Disc Record is a type of phonograph record marketed by Thomas A. Edison, Inc. on their Edison Record label from 1912 to 1929. They were named Diamond Discs because the matching Edison Disc Phonograph was fitted with a permanent conical diamond stylus for playing them. Diamond Discs were incompatible with lateral-groove disc record players, e.g. the Victor Victrola, the disposable steel needles of which would damage them while extracting hardly any sound. Uniquely, they are just under 1⁄4 in thick.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Stroh violin</span> Mechanically amplified stringed musical instrument

The Stroh violin or Stroviol is a type of stringed musical instrument that is mechanically amplified by a metal resonator and horn attached to its body. The name Stroviol refers to a violin, but other instruments have been modified with the amplification device, including the viola, cello, double bass, ukulele, mandolin, and guitar. John Matthias Augustus Stroh, an electrical engineer in London, invented the instrument in 1899.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Graphophone</span> Phonograph

The Graphophone was the name and trademark of an improved version of the phonograph. It was invented at the Volta Laboratory established by Alexander Graham Bell in Washington, D.C., United States.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sound recording and reproduction</span> Recording of sound and playing it back

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Eldridge R. Johnson</span> American businessman and engineer

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">History of the violin</span>

The violin, viola and cello were first built in the early 16th century, in Italy. The earliest evidence for their existence is in paintings by Gaudenzio Ferrari from the 1530s, though Ferrari's instruments had only three strings. The Académie musicale, a treatise written in 1556 by Philibert Jambe de Fer, gives a clear description of the violin family much as we know it today.

The history of sound recording - which has progressed in waves, driven by the invention and commercial introduction of new technologies — can be roughly divided into four main periods:

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A dictation machine is a sound recording device most commonly used to record speech for playback or to be typed into print. It includes digital voice recorders and tape recorder.

Eduard Melkus is an Austrian violinist and violist.

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The Volta Laboratory and the Volta Bureau were created in Georgetown, Washington, D.C. by Alexander Graham Bell.(19/20th-century scientist and inventor best known for his work on the telephone)

A phonofiddle is a class of stringed musical instruments that are played with a bow and use a phonograph type reproducer as a voice-box.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mute violin</span> Violin without or with a very shallow sound box

The mute violin is a violin without or with a very shallow sound box. The instrument has a quiet, lean sound. The mute violin can be used as an exercise instrument in situations where the sound of a violin is experienced as annoying by neighbouring people. Mute violins are known to exist since the eighteenth century, but their use never became widespread. Leopold Mozart made mention of the instrument in his Versuch einer gründlichen Violinschule (1756).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Charles D'Almaine</span> Musical artist

Charles D'Almaine was an American violinist with the New York Metropolitan Opera, a chiropractor, and a pioneer recording artist.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Music technology (electric)</span> Musical instruments and recording devices that use electrical circuits

Electric music technology refers to musical instruments and recording devices that use electrical circuits, which are often combined with mechanical technologies. Examples of electric musical instruments include the electro-mechanical electric piano, the electric guitar, the electro-mechanical Hammond organ and the electric bass. All of these electric instruments do not produce a sound that is audible by the performer or audience in a performance setting unless they are connected to instrument amplifiers and loudspeaker cabinets, which made them sound loud enough for performers and the audience to hear. Amplifiers and loudspeakers are separate from the instrument in the case of the electric guitar, electric bass and some electric organs and most electric pianos. Some electric organs and electric pianos include the amplifier and speaker cabinet within the main housing for the instrument.

Konstantía Gourzí is a Greek composer and conductor. She is professor of ensemble conducting and new music at the University of Music and Performing Arts Munich.

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References

  1. ↑ Couture, François. "Biography: Aleksander Kolkowski". AllMusic . Retrieved 20 May 2010.
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