Friday, June 25th, at 1pm ET, ISSUE is pleased to host an online event for ISSUE Members with French composer Pascale Criton, violinist Silvia Tarozzi, and cellist Deborah Walker, in conversation around the Sounding Limits series of compositions.
ISSUE is planning to begin welcoming audiences back to events in Fall 2021. During October 2021, ISSUE will present the premiere East Coast performances of Criton’s Sounding Limits pieces, two of which were co-authored in close collaboration with Tarozzi and Walker. These special performances mark the first time Criton will be in New York City to present her work. The program includes three compositions: Circle Process (Criton-Tarozzi, 2012) for solo violin, Chaoscaccia (Criton-Walker, 2014) for solo cello, and Bothways (Criton, 2015) for violin and cello.
Since the 1980s Pascale Criton has been exploring sound variability, microtunings, multisensory reception and the spatialization of listening. Between 1974 and 1987, Criton was the music advisor of the philosopher Gilles Deleuze. Criton’s work focuses on the sound continuum, informed by these experiences as well as studies with microtonal pioneer Ivan Wyschnegradsky, spectralist Gérard Grisey, contemporary music composer Jean-Etienne Marie, and training in electroacoustic and musical computing. Her compositions use non-standard tunings of string instruments often referred to as a scordatura, which have become a trademark of her technique.
Silvia Tarozzi and Deborah Walker are actively involved in the fields of contemporary experimental music and free improvisation. Together with Pascale Criton they have been exploring microtonal extended techniques and gestural processes on a violin and a cello tuned in 1/16 of a tone. The compositions that have resulted from this process are considered as corporal scripts. They challenge the perception of form and the role of interpretation, transforming it into a creative process. Time and motion are no longer defined by pitches and metrical systems but are embodied as diagrams and moods.
The conversation and Q&A will be moderated by ISSUE's Communications Director & Assistant Curator Nick James Scavo.
The June 25th conversation will be accessible via Zoom for ISSUE Members and invited guests with RSVP. For more information please contact Corinne Daniel, Development Director, at corinne@issueprojectroom.org
Join as an ISSUE Member for RSVP access. ISSUE Members directly support artists and ISSUE’s ongoing programming initiatives and commissions during this challenging time for performing arts.
Pascale Criton studied composition with Ivan Wyschnegradsky, Gérard Grisey and Jean-Etienne Marie. She also received electro-acoustic training at the CIRM (International Centre for Musical Research, Nice) from 1980 to 1982, as well as in a musical computing course for composers at the IRCAM (Paris) in 1986, and earned a PhD in musicology (1999). In the field of musical research, since 1980, Criton has explored sound variability, instrumental techniques and the spatialization of listening. A specialist of microtonality, she uses highly specific tuning systems – scordatura –particularly of stringed instruments, guitars and piano, combined with orchestral instruments and digital synthesis. She edited Gilles Deleuze, la pensée-musique, Symétrie (2015), a testimony of her encounter with the french philosopher Gilles Deleuze regarding music, and Ivan Wyschnegradsky, Libération du son, Ecrits 1916-1979 (2013).
Silvia Tarozzi is a violinist, composer and improviser. The oral transmission of music and the form created through a deep immersion into the sound are traits of her musical research and find expression in several collaborations with composers as Éliane Radigue, Pauline Oliveros, Pascale Criton, Cassandra Miller, Martin Arnold, Pierre-Yves Macé, and Philip Corner. Her projects are released by I dischi di Angelica, Unseen Worlds, New World Records, Potlatch. Her concerts have been recorded and broadcasted by BBC Radio and France Musique. She performs regularly in festivals and venues in Europe, North America, Canada, Mexico. In duo with Deborah Walker, and as a member of Ensemble Dedalus, she has worked with Christian Wolff, Jürg Frey, Michael Pisaro, Catherine Lamb, Sébastien Roux, and many others.
Italian cellist Deborah Walker is a new music performer and improviser based in Berlin. She is interested in multiple forms of music creation related to the exploration of sound and interaction with other art forms. She has played at many festivals such as Tectonics, Italia Wave, ZKM, Centre Pompidou, and tours regularly in International venues and Festivals. She is a member of the French ensemble Dedalus and of the improviser orchestra ONCEIM. She has premiered solo works of composers like Pascale Criton, Éliane Radigue, Philip Corner and Phill Niblock. For more than 15 years, she performs regularly in duo with violinist Silvia Tarozzi. Their repertoire includes both contemporary and experimental works, as well as transcriptions of Italian traditional folk songs. After receiving a Masters in Music and sound composition at the University of Paris 8, Deborah completed a PhD at the University of Lorraine on the work of Fluxus artists in Italy, with a focus on the American cellist Charlotte Moorman.
