Arnold Dreyblatt is an American media artist and composer, born in New York, 1953.
One of the second generation of New York minimal composers, Dreyblatt studied music with Pauline Oliveros, La Monte Young, and Alvin Lucier and media art with Woody and Steina Vasulka.
Arnold has charted his own unique course in composition and music performance. He has invented a set of new and original instruments, performance techniques, and a system of tuning. Often characterized as one of the more rock-oriented of American minimalists, Dreyblatt has cultivated a strong underground base of fans for his transcendental and ecstatic music.
“ I have often heard "you can't grab air", but of course you can, it just visits your hand for a moment. But with Arnold Dreyblatt, the air grabs you, and you can stay as long as you like. (and turn it up.....)" - Jim O'Rourke,
PERFORMERS..
ARNOLD DREYBLATT
https://arnolddreyblatt.bandcamp.com/music
https://www.dreyblatt.net/
ROJIN SHARAFI
Rojin is an exciting young Iranian musician pushing the ideas of electronic tones and emotion. Rojin’s work is unsurprisingly layered with deep emotion relating to her Iranian family and background.
Rojin is a sound artist, performer and composer of acoustic and electronic music that freely crosses the borders between genres. She creates entirely unique musical textures through the use of analogue, acoustic and augmented instruments, as well as with digital tools of her own design. Sharafi has worked with a wide range of collaborators and taken part in numerous co-productions in film and dance.
Her work has been presented at festivals and venues throughout the world. She is a SHAPE 2020 artist and recipient of the 2018 Austrian Women Composers prize. Rojin Sharafi is currently pursuing her masters in sound engineering and composition at the University of Music and Performing Arts in Vienna where she is intensively engaged with digital music performance.
“ This is some of the most ecstatic and fiercely original music you’ll come across.” - The Quietus
https://rojinsharafi.com/
https://rojinsharafi.bandcamp.com/album/kariz
BEAM SPLITTER
Beam Splitter are the duo of Tawian American vocalist Audrey Chen and Norwegian Trombonist Henrik Norstebo.
Utilizing the pure sounds of acoustic and closely amplified trombone and voice, together they exemplify the joining of these two individual voices into a distinct dialog that delves beyond the borders of the corporeal elements of extended technique and sound.
Audrey's work delves deeply into her own version of narrative and non-linear storytelling. A large component of her music is improvised, is completely un-processed and her approach to this is extremely personal and visceral, using only her natural voice and the many sounds it can produce.
Henrik is a musician and sound artist based in Berlin and Trondheim, focusing on trombone performance and a wide range of compositional and cross disciplinary projects.
They join together their two individual voices into a distinct language that delves beyond the borders of the corporeal elements of un-processed voice and trombone, while utilizing analog electronics to offset their hyper extended physical play.
"Always inventive, often deeply emotive, this is a beautiful duo." — Chris Abrahams (The Necks)
“BEAM SPLITTER is highly improvised, extremely crafted and held in an iron will for experimentation.” — Jean Louis Fernandez, La Nacion
https://neithernorrecords.bandcamp.com/album/beauties
ali robertson
Ali Robertson is an improvising musician based in Edinburgh. Active in the experimental music scene for more than twenty plus years, he has toured his work across three continents, becoming a regular on the international music festival circuit.
Ali Robertson has been making himself & others blush as the Giant Tank Institute For Low-Brow Avant-Thought’s resident organiser/improviser for more than two decades. Until recently he courted public shame in the duo Usurper, but now exercises his unfunny bone as one half of Off Brand while sporadically pleading for redemption via the altogether more wholesome Sonic Bothy Ensemble.
Ali has collaborated with countless artists from around the world. Since 2000 Ali has operated the imprint Giant Tank, promoting experimental music via an ongoing series of concerts in Edinburgh and releasing dozens of CDs, cassettes, LPs and publications.
“ Voices babble and scrunch while plastic horns emit gastric juices and the whole experience feels like a loving tongues-first kiss from a flatulent scrapyard. Close the doors and let Off Brand flood your sinkholes." - Euan Andrews (Journalist/ thinker/ nice guy/ TFEH regular/ Giant Tank disciple, 2024.
https://gianttank.bandcamp.com/album/the-instrumentalest
https://duffandrobertson.bandcamp.com/album/dont-turn-your-hog-out
http://www.sonicbothy.co.uk/ali-robertson/
BREATHING HEAVY
Formed in late 2021, Breathing Heavy is the London-based duo of Ciaran Mackle and Sam Andreae. Mackle plays a sampler filled with snippets of him blowing into reeds, whistles and recorders which Andreae plays over, under and through. Their music is a skronking, bleating, at points slightly avian-sounding miasma with a fascinating sense of antagonism, the pair egging each other on to ever more inhuman extremes.
Live performances involve each member responding to the others methods and playing, thus creating an exclusive one off experience for both artist and audience.
Through improvisation and composition they explores a music of colliding sound gestures and aural detritus, built up from an intentionally fractured instrumental language and playful spontaneity. Compositions place a focus on gestural processes which in their unraveling reveal a trail of sound artefacts to be picked through.
https://breathingheavy.bandcamp.com/
EOMAC
EOMAC is a truly talented Irish electronic producer who’s work spans sound design explorations while keeping dancefloor techniques and inspirations loud and clear.
Eomac has released a host of genre-spanning electronic music via legendary labels such as Planet Mu, The Trilogy Tapes, Bedouin Records, Killekill, Phantom Limb, Emika Records and more.
Ian also runs the label Eotrax and again is a long standing member of duos Lakker, no everything and Lena Andersson.
The Eomac sound draws from obscure samples and raw sound design in an ongoing exploration of intense, visceral music for body and soul.
He has taken this sound across the globe in numerous live and DJ sets at festivals such as Unsound,Lunchmeat, MIRA and clubs like Berghain, Tresor and Circus Tokyo.
An active collaborator he has worked with a long list of musicians including: Lair, Arad,Paula Temple, Kyoka, MC Yallah, Demian Licht, Sean Carpio, Kamikaze Space Programme, Roger Doyle and many more.
We are very thrilled and excited for Eomac to hit the stage at the Friday night opening party!
https://eomac.bandcamp.com/
Concepcion Huerta
Concepción Huerta is a highly accomplished multidisciplinary artist from Mexico who employs tapes to manipulate recordings of everyday objects and electronic instruments. The fruit of these experimental methods is an intense, heavy take on dark ambient and noise music: a densely atmospheric exploration of sound driven by narrative, more akin to storytelling than songwriting.
Concepción Huerta has a storied background in audiovisual media and a deep focus on the sound spectrum. She is an active solo performer as well as a member of the experimental ensemble Amor Muere with Gibrana Cervantes, Camille Mandoki, and Mabe Fratti, with whom she has collaborated on several releases.
"Though it’s very early days, it will have to be an outstanding year for the genre for Huerta not to show up as one of our 2024 choices.."
— Samuel Rogers, A Closer Listen
https://concepcionhuerta.bandcamp.com/
https://concepcionhuerta.bandcamp.com/track/contenedor-de-fantasmas-ghost-container
gibrana cervantes
Gibrana Cervantes is a Mexican violinist, composer, and improviser. She is widely recognized for her innovative and experimental approach to music, which seamlessly blends classical and metal influences to create a truly distinctive style. Gibrana combines melody and noise in her compositions, resulting in emotive and contemplative pieces. Her performances include shows at CTM Festival 2023 in Berlin, The Royal Albert Hall, Iklektic and The Old Church in London. Beyond her work as a musician, she is also the co-founder and curator of 316centro in Mexico City. A space dedicated to showcasing emerging forms of sound art in Latin America.
She is an active solo performer as well as a member of the experimental ensemble Amor Muere with Concepcion Huerta,Camille Mandoki, and Mabe Fratti,with whom she has collaborated on several releases.
https://gibranacervantes.bandcamp.com/
natalia beylis
Nestled at the center of Natalia Beylis’ music is an intertwined practice of listening and creating. She regularly foregrounds both field recordings and found instruments, building worlds around the curious sounds she comes upon and letting the process of recontextualization create meaning out of unexpected meetings. The picture that emerges is one of her having a profound connection to her environment, whether that is a community of human beings or the vast non-human living world that surrounds her.
Natalia Beylis' music revolves somewhere between sonic story-teller and multi-instrumental explorer. She has released over 40 albums between solo works and collaborations and has appeared on numerous compilations. While she regularly records on a variety of traditional instruments (mainly pianos, organs, keyboards and mandola), she is just as likely to use non-musical sound sources within her compositions. For example, she recently released an album using just the sounds created by a domestic sewing machine. In her live performances, Natalia layers seemingly incongruous sounds atop of each other to spawn strange juxtapositions and garbled parallels by exploring the sonic potentials of domestic appliances, found objects, cassette tapes and field recordings.
“From the first floating tones, she conjures a magical radiance, like the kind that emanates from rediscovered memories and unearthed finds..” -The Quietus
https://nataliabeylis.bandcamp.com/
willie stewart
Irish improv percussionist Willie Stewart maybe better known for his role in the magnificent Woven Skull, but more recently has shown his affection for the humble floor tom, with live gigs and recordings having Willie only performing using the minimal drum set up.
Willie also runs a brilliant independent record label based in Ireland,named Nyahh Records, which is described as a “home for sound collectors, noise makers and music builders”, releasing a fantastic, wonderful, deep variety of artists ideas and recordings.
https://nyahhrecords.bandcamp.com/music
https://nyahhrecords.bandcamp.com/album/willie-stewart-lets-explore-the-floor-tom
LOULA YORKE
Yorke’s musical universe has been expansive over the past decade. She spent six years in live rave duo TR-33N, which took her from playing underground warehouse parties to the all-night area of Glastonbury, before her debut solo release on techno veteran Marshall Applewhite’s Detroit label Junted in 2019. On top of climbing the steep learning curve of modular synthesis – which soon became her instrument of choice for composing and playing live – she spearheaded a sonic arts project Atari Punk Girls, running electronic instrument-building sessions with groups of teenage girls, culminating in a commission by international performance festival SPILL in 2020, the same year her work was recognised with a Special Commendation from the prestigious Oram Awards.
In 2024 she released two albums – the stripped-back pointillistic Volta on her own imprint Truxalis, and the hefty drone-led speak, thou vast and venerable head on ambient concept label quiet details – with a lead single chosen as track of the day by Mary Anne Hobbs on BBC 6Music and a coveted Album of the Week spot from The Quietus.
“Practice made perfect” The Wire
https://loulayorke.bandcamp.com/
Mohammad syfkhan
Mohammad Syfkhan is a Kurdish/Syrian singer and bouzouki player known for his unique blend of Middle Eastern and North African music influences. Born in Raqqa, Syria, he began his musical career in the 1980s while studying nursing, later forming The Al-Rabie Band. This band gained popularity for its performances at various events across Syria, playing a mix of Kurdish, Arabic, Turkish, and Western songs.
Mohammad's music creates an atmosphere of pure joy, love and happiness. We are delighted to have Mohammad perform on the opening Friday night!
“Syfkhan takes his domestic influences and fuses them with music from beyond those regions, from North African folk rhythms to Turkish psychedelia. It’s a glorious alembic not bound by borders, where Mohammad himself brings a cultivated exuberance to his playing that belies his vintage.”
- The Quietus
https://nyahhrecords.bandcamp.com/album/mohammad-syfkhan-i-am-kurdish
korhan erel
Korhan Erel is a non-binary electronic musician, improviser, composer and sound artist based in Berlin. Erel’s music covers free improvisation, conceptual sound performances as well as structured and composed pieces, music for contemporary dance, theater and video art. Erel performs solo, duo and group performances with musicians, dancers, in ensembles and orchestras.
Korhan work spans across multiple genres including free improvisation, electroacoustic music, and experimental sound art.
We have been fans of Korhan for sometime now so it's a real pleasure to welcome Korhan onto the Boundaries programme!
http://korhanerel.com/
https://korhanerel.bandcamp.com/
archipelago
North East trio Archipelago fuse jazz, alt-rock and left field song forms underpinned by improvisation. Fronted by the incredibly talented Faye MacCalman on saxophone/clarinet/vocals/synth, John Pope (Bass/FX) & Christian Alderson (Drums/Percussion) complete this collaborative lineup.
Boundaries is very excited to announce that the acclaimed jazz trio Archipelago has been commissioned to debut a newly composed piece at this year's event. Known for their innovative and genre-defying music, Archipelago promises to deliver an exciting and unique performance.
‘A quiet fire ...a gently held back power and energy that I absolutely love’ - Corey Mwamba- BBC Radio 3 Freeness
'**** Superb...epically adventurous... An impressive unity of vision' - Jazzwise
https://archipelagobanduk.bandcamp.com/
catgut
One of the many amazing reasons to support and celebrate live performances is that you're often hit with something you've never heard before and it completely blows you away and almost levitates your brain in to new ways of thinking! THIS was how I felt when I walked into a gig in London and was consumed by the unbelievable CATGUT. A whirlwind of drums, vocals, chaos, drum machines and loud moves! Total Total Buzz Buzz!
CATGUT is a three-piece experimental electronic project that delivers bass-heavy, high-octane noise. With blistering live drums, confrontational dual vocals and a sound that is both intense and visceral, they are unapologetically loud. Their live sets are designed to make you move.