Leila Bordreuil opens her 2016 Residency with the premiere of Piece for Cello and Double Bass Ensemble at ISSUE’s 22 Boerum Theater. A new work, the piece overly amplifies all instruments in order to make corporal micro-gestures and hushed overtones audible to the human ear. Pitches and melodies are rare, as the basic sonic capabilities of the instruments dictate the musicality and structure of the piece.
The piece features Brandon Lopez, Sean Ali, and Zachary Rowden on double bass. The premiere is followed by a second improvisational set featuring Leila Bordreuil, Joanna Mattrey (viola) and Sean Ali (bass).
Leila Bordreuil is a Brooklyn-based cellist and composer from France. Her cello playing is often improvised, and focuses on the relationship between the human body and the inherent sonic qualities of her instrument. Essential to her musical aesthetic is the expression of humans’ neuro-somatic imperfections, which she chooses to magnify through extreme amplification of very quiet playing, revealing microscopic gestures that are otherwise inaudible to the human ear. Her composed works draw from a similar aesthetic but also focus on sound through space and the distortion that arises from spatially organized sound sources. Leila’s collaborative projects include duos with Michael Foster and Tamio Shiraishi, a trio with Sean Ali and Joanna Mattrey, and the no-wave band “Signal Break” with Austin Jullian (Sediment Club) and Evin Huguenin (Sects). She has performed at the Whitney Museum, The Kitchen, The Stone, MoMA PS1, Roulette, the Performa Biennale, Ftarri (Tokyo, JP), the Heresy Series for Women in Sound (Manila, PHL), and many basements across the U.S.
