Aaron Moorehouse has just had an article published in Tempo, titled ‘Where are we going? And what have we done?’, which focuses on the way composers consider the psychosocial impacts of their work. It’s something that often gets ignored, with a focus on the work rather than what it does in the world. Aaron’s research […]

Elena Biserna’s amazing collection of walking scores has now been published, and it includes work by Lab composer Oliver Ginger. His set of scores from borders #1 (2019) is part of his longer borders project which is an intensive investigation of the soundscape of Andover where Oliver has lived for most of his life. There’s […]

We made our first TV studio project after Covid last week, recording four new pieces by Lab members. It was great to be working with the studio crew again, and we had a fun couple of days trying out some new kit and making some sounds. We recorded two new pieces by Harry Matthews – […]

Lab members Aaron Moorehouse, Harry Matthews, and Oogoo Maia have a joint-authored article in Organised Sound published today. The article, titled ‘Post-sonic Perspectives on Socially Engaged Compositional Practices: Composing ‘after sound’ and beyond music’, addresses the precedence given to sound in musical analysis and argues that socially engaged composers might reconsider the importance they place […]

Goni Peles, Elliot Simpson and James Saunders presented papers at two conferences in January. Goni and Elliot presented their work at the New Mimesis: simulation, models, metaphors and data in music symposium run by Orpheus Instituut and Canterbury Christ Church. Elliot presented his work with animator Mandy Toderian on the sonification of f-curves and keyframe […]

Caitlin Rowley has recently completed two new sets of WALKS videos with her collective Kaths Kaff with artists Katie Hanning and Jon England. WALKS 5-8 and 9-12 are a small digital artwork commission from Electric Medway, created for the online programme of their 2021 festival. These videos are the latest elements of Kaths Kaff’s Walks […]

Lab composers Oliver Ginger and James Saunders both have pieces in Claudia Molitor’s lockdown book Hausmusik Kollektiv, published by Colin Sackett. Oliver’s piece window scene from 2020 imagines the masked soundscapes contemplated through a closed window, and forms part of his ongoing borders project. James’s piece, evolution occurs slowly or not at all, was made […]

Harry Matthews and Aaron Moorehouse have had a recent article on socially engaged practice published in issue 6 of Question journal. The article, titled Evaluating Socially Engaged Practices in Art: The Autonomy of Artists and Artworks in Community Collaborations, discusses issues concerning socially engaged practice, autonomy, and narrative in art alongside Claire Bishop’s critique of […]

Misha Penton and Caitlin Rowley (Bastard Assignments) have both been selected for Classical:NEXT’s Encore Showcase this year. Misha will be showing her (micro)REQUIEM while Bastard Assignments will show the first performance of Alexander Schubert’s Browsing, Idling, Investigating, Dreaming from their series of Lockdown Jams. More information on the series and links to the performances can […]

Vassilis Chatzimakris is presenting a new paper on interfacial scores at the Annual Plenary Conference of the Society for Musicology in Ireland (SMI) on 28 May, which will be online via Zoom. Vassilis’s paper ‘Activity, Time and Space in the Composition and Performance of Interfacial Scores’ will outline his recent work on interfaciality and interdisciplinary performance, […]

We are very pleased to announce that Misha Penton successfully completed her viva today. Congratulations Dr Penton! The online viva was an absolutely fascinating and engaging discussion. The work, titled Vocality as / in Composition: solo and collaborative creation of new postopera works, comprised a portfolio of two substantial new media monodramas and a site-specific […]

Caitlin Rowley and Goni Peles will present their work at the forthcoming Music and/as Process conference on Networked Collaborative Processes. Caitlin will be talking about recent work with fellow Bastard Assignments composer Josh Spear, focusing on their experience of their Lockdown Jams project which has really pushed the various platforms as creative tools. Caitlin has […]

Wednesday 28 April 2021, 12-2pm [online via Minerva] A combination of discussion of some recent works, a polemic, and a plea: on the importance of the body and its motions, postures and rhythms in everything to do with notated music: not only the performance, not only the material, but the score and even the act […]

Wednesday 21 April 2021 [2-4pm, online via Minerva – NOTE CHANGE OF TIME] Michael will talk about and play some recent (and not so recent) work that attempts to touch the infinite stream of the world with multitudes of small sounds. Michael Pisaro-Liu (born 1961 in Buffalo, New York) is a long time member of […]

Wednesday 14 April, 12-2pm [online via Minerva] Catherine Lamb talks about the in-between, notions of impurities, perspectivism, Sruti as harmonic thinking, spirals, and multi-dimensional realities. We will also listen to some music. Catherine Lamb is an active composer exploring the interaction of tone, summations of shapes and shadows, phenomenological expansions, the architecture of the liminal (states […]

Wednesday 17 March 2021, 12-2pm [online via Minerva] Matthew Shlomowitz will discuss ways he sets up a quasi-theatrical scenario through music and sound, without recourse to image or text, in his recent composition Graveyard and Slot (with guest appearance). In advance, you can look at a performance of the work given by Ensemble Nikel at the 2020 […]

We’ve been meeting every Friday afternoon for an online lab, where we’ve been discussing our recent work and trying pieces out where some participatory testing is needed. Over this year we’ve been focusing on playfulness as an area of focus, driven in part by some of the group making game pieces, and the general sense […]

Congratulations to Dr. Maia who has now completed his PhD! Oogoo’s fascinating project focused on developing a vigilant musical practice, which he describes as exploring three main principles: non-normative cognitive states (how the performer thinks); embodied multimodal imagery across a full effort scale (the images a performer draws with their presence); and inter-personal communication (the […]

Leo Chadburn talks about his work from the last decade: music that is concerned with the musicality and theatricality of the speaking voice, found text, lists and stream-of-consciousness writing. He has drawn upon models borrowed from visual art, such as the installation work of Susan Hiller and the films of John Smith and Peter Greenaway, […]

Wednesday 17 February 2021, 12-2pm, online via Minerva. Exploring the ready-made scores through speculative listening to create sound compositions that demands other listening spaces. A Kurdish composer, improviser and sound artist, Hardi Kurda began his music education at the Institute of Fine Art, Slemani (violin). He obtained his BA (2009) and MA (2012) degrees in […]

Wednesday 26 January, 12-2pm (online via Minerva) Lim’s Sex Magic was premiered by American flutist Claire Chase on Dec 18 2020 and livestreamed from The Kitchen in New York. It is a 50-minute work for contrabass flute, electronics and an installation of kinetic percussion, about the sacred erotic in women’s history. Please see links for […]

Wednesday 20 January 2021, 12-2pm [Online via Minerva] Tom Johnson discusses his latest mathematical music, not with 12-tone rows, but with (12,4,3) block designs. The 12 notes all have equal importance, but there is no octave equivalence and the rules are quite a bit more rigorous than in the Second Viennese School. Tom Johnson, born […]

Wednesday 6 January, 12-2pm [online via Minerva] For a long time I considered my work to be about the relationship between sound, history and memory, using recorded spoken word and field recordings as my primary materials. However over the last decade or so, I realise that my recent work is all about stories – the […]

Wednesday 9 December, 12-2pm [online via Minerva] In this presentation, Australian composer and performer Cat Hope talks about her animated notation practice and how it is used to facilitate the inclusion of electronics in a series of small and large scale works. Originally engaged to enable a focus on very low sound, glissandi and long […]

In this talk I will present resent research that explores how contemporary music technologies trace their ancestry to previous forms of instruments and media. I will look at how new digital music technologies have origins in traditional instrument design, musical notation, and sound recording. The scope will range from ancient Greek music theory, medieval notation, early […]

Wednesday 18 November 2020, 12-2pm [online via Minerva] Some of my music includingsome general thoughts about:Instruments as objectsandObjects as instrumentsAbout composing pitches versus composing sound complexes, composing video, composing light, composing performance. Michael Maierhof is a composer based in Hamburg. He studied mathematics and music in Kassel and art history and philosophy in Hamburg. He […]

Wednesday 11 November, 12-2pm [online via Minerva] Aaron Cassidy will discuss two recent quartets based on the work of the painter Gerhard Richter—Self-Portrait, Three Times, Standing (15.3.1991–20.3.1991) (2018–19) and Self-Portrait, 1996 (2020)—that together form the collection A way of making ghosts. Since he has given some recent online lectures about the relationship between the pieces […]

Wednesday 7 October 2020, 12-2pm [online via Minerva] Ryoko Akama will present some recent projects, and will consider the way her work has developed over recent months without the possibility of live performance.  Ryoko Akama works with installations and sounds and approaches listening situations that magnify silence, time and space. Her sculptural work engages with mundane objects and […]

Wednesday 30 September 2020, 12-2pm [online via Minerva] Composer Laurence Crane will show a selection of his music. Drawing on over 35 years of work in composition, he will talk about some of his recurring preoccupations as a composer over this period. Laurence Crane was born in Oxford in 1961 and studied composition with Peter […]

Wednesday 19 February, 12-2pm, CM107 In recent years, experimental music has defined itself as an aesthetic and a “sound” identified by specific pieces and composers. In this talk I will try to shift the discussion back to experimentation as a central part of the composition process regardless of an aesthetic or sound. In my own […]

Weds 22 Jan, 12-2pm, CM105 James and Matt will each look through a recent piece and discuss their working process, from initial ideas and planning, through to completion and realisation.

Wednesday 11 December 2019, 12-2pm and 2-4pm, CM105 In Lab 29 we welcome artist and composer Martijn Tellinga. His work focuses on sound, place and process, and he will present some recent work in the lab. In the morning he will talk about some recent work, and in the afternoon session we will work on […]

Wednesday 27 November 2019, 12-2pm, CM105 Artist and researcher Davide Tidoni will explore the themes and principles underlying his work. Starting from his research on sound impulses and acoustic space, the first part of the presentation will explore the physical aspects of sound and the active role of the listener. The second part of thepresentation […]

Wednesday 20 November 2019, 12-2pm, CM105 Lab 27 is the first of a few additional sessions this year with a shorter morning session from 12-2 with a visiting artist. We are really pleased to have Rie Nakajima with us to show her work with objects as instruments and sculpture, positioning sounds, and making something happen […]

Wednesday 13 November 2019, 12-4, CM105 Talk 12-2pm In the first phase of the afternoon, Berlin-based composer, contrabassist, curator, and researcher Christopher A. Williams (http://www.christopherisnow.com) will offer a brief theoretical background and practical musings on two recent collaborative compositions with and for improvising musicians: Ansage, a radio piece featuring vocalist/performer David Moss and a choir […]

Wednesday 9 October 2019, 12-4, CM105 The fourth season of Open Scores Lab opens with Harry Matthews presenting some recent work that explores the subjectivity of noise pollution. Harry will talk about composed and installed pieces that draw on personal testimony. In the afternoon session we will test some new work using portable speakers. Harry […]

Harry Matthews‘ installation Sound, Unseen will be active at the National Trust’s Leith Hill Place in the autumn. The work features locally sourced field recordings and voiceover where Harry contemplates what might have happened to the audible environment if oil drilling had been allowed to start. You will be able to listen to the work […]

Wednesday 8 May 2019, 12-4, CM107 In the final lab of the year we welcome Marcus Kaiser from Düsseldorf to talk about his installation and performance work. In the morning session Marcus will present his living space installations, and in the afternoon we will talk as a group about work that translates one space to […]

Wednesday 3 April, 12-4, CM107 Join us and go back to nature in Lab 23. Composer and sound artist Paul Whitty will talk about his recent site-specific work, field recording (literally), and football. In the afternoon session Matthew Sergeant will show his current work on materiality with a new piece for gravel and instruments. Paul Whitty: I […]

Wednesday 6 March, 12-4, CM107 In Lab 22 Maya Verlaak joins us from Amsterdam to present some recent work stemming from her lived experience and viewing work from the outside. In the second half of the lab, Goni Peles will try out his current work developing an app that governs relationships between musicians drawing on […]

Wednesday 13 February, 12-4pm (CM.107) Emmanuelle Waeckerlé: Playing (with) and becoming I will share a few projects, VINST, JUNGLE FEVER, PRAELUDERE, Ode (owed) to O, specualting on where my attachment to spoken/written language and the voice may come from, and how a few conceptual strategies I have used over the years have recently led to […]

Wednesday 9 January, 12-4pm (CM.107) We focus on play in Lab 20, with visiting composer Michael Wolters considering interdisciplinary approaches that stem from playful approaches to ideas and concepts. In the second half, James Saunders will present some work that deals with playfulness in performance, showing a recent piece and trying out some new ideas. […]

Wednesday 5 December, 12-4pm (CM.107) In Lab 19 Andy Ingamells joins us to talk about playfulness and fun in serious music, followed in the afternoon by Robert Luzar considering thinking, politics, and art. Both Andy and Robert are regularly involved in performances of their own work, and we will consider approaches to thinking through practice […]

Wednesday 14 November, 12-4pm (CM.107) For Lab 18 we welcome composer Thomas Meadowcroft from Berlin to talk about his recent work, focusing on composing and neoliberalism. In the second half of the Lab, PhD composer Goni Peles will present his recent CompositionCloud project, with some opportunities to create content and explore distributed creative practices.   12-2pm […]

Wednesday 3 October, 12-4pm (CM.107) The first lab of the year features a visit from composer-performer Laura Bowler, who will talk about extremes and autobiography in her work. In the second half of the lab, Alex Mah and Harry Matthews report back from the KLANGRAUM and CAMP summer schools that they attended this year, and will […]

This year we had two more filming sessions in the Bath Spa TV Studios. In January, Alex Mah and James Saunders performed Luke Nickel’s Transcribing, a piece Luke wrote for Parkinson Saunders to play at the Wellcome Collection in London, broadcast by BBC Radio 3. In July Anton Lukoszevieze and Amnon Wolman recorded two of […]

Wednesday 9 May, 12-4pm (12-2pm, CM107 / 2-4pm CM137) The final lab or 2017-18 features two visiting artists exploring interaction between bodies, technology and environment. Australian artist and musician Alexandra Spence presents recent work using resources drawn from specific locations as compositional material, while Atau Tanaka considers the body as a musical instrument, capturing physiological […]

Wednesday 18 April, 12-4pm (12-2pm, CM107 / 2-4pm CM137) This month we welcome Bristol-based double bassist, improviser and composer Dominic Lash to talk about his work with Éliane Radigue on her Occam Ocean series. Dominic will play the piece and discuss the working process for making the piece with Radigue. In the first half of the lab, […]

Wednesday 14 March, 12-4pm (12-2pm, CM107 / 2-4pm CM137) In Lab 14 we welcome composer and vocal performer Andrea Young, who will present her Digital Voice Interface and discuss vocality in relation to her work. In the second half of the lab, composer Ron Herrema will present recent work focused on audiation and specification, ending […]

Here are videos of the two pieces by Amnon Wolman performed by Anton Lukoszevieze in the Michael Tippett Centre last week.

Anton Lukoszevieze (cello and voice) Amnon Wolman (electronics) Wednesday 7 February 2018 7.30pm, Michael Tippett Centre, Bath Spa University Cellist Anton Lukoszevieze presents recent pieces for cello, voice and electronics by composer Amnon Wolman as part of their ongoing collaborations. A’s Album (2013) Dangerous Bend (1999) Use Crosswalk (2017) I have known Anton the cellist […]

Wednesday 7 February, 12-4pm (CM107 / CM137) Visiting Research Fellow Amnon Wolman will present his work in Lab 13, focusing on his collaborations with cellist and inter-disciplinary artist Anton Lukoszevieze. Amnon and Anton will present some new work exploring narrative fiction for discussion in the first session (12-2pm, CM107), prior to their performance in the […]

We recorded a new piece today in the Bath Spa University TV studios, following the session last year with Bastard Assignments. As part of our developing series of videos of new work, we filmed Luke Nickel’s Transcribing, a piece written originally for Parkinson Saunders and premiered at the Wellcome Collection in London in October, broadcast […]

Hearing Motion in the Moment – New Forms of Interactive Soundmapping Eric Powell (Concordia University) Wednesday 31 January, 3.00-4.30pm / CM.107 Presentation and workshop co-hosted by the Research Centre for Environmental Humanities, the Open Scores Lab, and the Global Academy of Liberal Arts. Eric Powell is a PhD candidate, sound-artist, and researcher in the Communications Department at […]

Wednesday 10 January, 2-4pm (CM119 / CM106) Claudia Molitor will present some recent work in Lab 12 that explores listening and looking in relation to environment, and ways this is altered through technology. In the first half of the lab, Louis d’Heudieres and James Saunders will test some new work involving instructions, consensus, and association. […]

Wednesday 6 December 2017, 12-4pm We welcome Berlin-based composer Joanna Bailie in Lab 11 to talk about her recent audio-visual work and its use of synchronisation and sampling. In the first half of the lab, Caitlin Rowley will discuss her recent work using handmade boxes as scores, and Matthew Sergeant will demonstrate a new project […]

We’ve begun to film performances of work related to the Lab’s focus in the Bath Spa University TV Studios. In July, Bastard Assignments came in for a day to shoot two pieces, Josh Spear’s Extended Play and Edward Henderson’s Blow/Suck. We did a lot of takes, working with three cameras and green screen, then Josh and Edward […]

Wednesday 8 November 2017, 12-4pm In Lab 10 our visitor is celebrated composer Howard Skempton. Howard joins us as part of a two-day celebration of his music, with performances by staff and students. As a founder of the Scratch Orchestra with Cornelius Cardew and Michael Parsons, Howard has been at the forefront of exploratory music […]

Three pieces by Lab members Caitlin Rowley, Luke Nickel and James Saunders were presented last weekend as part of BBC Radio 3’s Why Music? The Key to Memory series at the Wellcome Collection. Caitlin’s Aides Memoire was performed by Bastard Assignments, framing memories evoked by her personal field recordings accompanied by live photography of the performance space. […]

In the first lab of our second season we welcome back recent PhD graduate Luke Nickel, who will present a new piece for performers transcribing speech, in advance of its live premiere on BBC Radio 3 on 14 October as part of the Why Music? The Key to Memory event at the Wellcome Collection in London. Luke will […]

We are pleased to announce the visitors for the 2017-18 labs following on from our first series in 2016-17. Each lab is on the first Wednesday of the month in term time from 12-4pm, and features a visiting speaker alongside presentations by staff and PhD students from Bath Spa. The lab is a mix of […]

The September issue of The Wire includes an article by Tim Rutherford-Johnson on scores that are brought to life by performers bodies. It includes discussion of work by current and former lab composers Louis d’Heudieres and Luke Nickel.

Lab members Matthew Sergeant, Louis d’Heudieres and James Saunders have presented papers at three international conferences so far this summer. James’s paper ‘What’s the point? Balancing purpose and play in rule-based compositions’ was given at the Performing Indeterminacy conference at University of Leeds on 30 June, followed by a performance of his piece sometimes we do […]

London-based collective Bastard Assignments were with us this week filming in the Commons TV Studio. This is part of a new project we’re beginning to develop, bringing in performers to make films that use the studio as a resource, trying to do more than is normally possible with concert documentation. Today we filmed two pieces […]

We’re really pleased to announce that Amnon Wolman will be a Visiting Research Fellow in the lab from January-April 2018. Amnon will be developing his work on scores that investigate memory and imaginary sound during his residency. He says ‘In the last fifteen years my research-based music composition focused the use of text to initiate […]

New pieces by Lab members Louis d’Heudieres and James Saunders are being broadcast on BBC Radio 3’s Hear and Now programme on successive weeks in June. On 3 June, James’s new orchestra piece alternate between attention and ease was broadcast as part of the feature on the Tectonics Festival in Glasgow where the piece was premiered […]

Last week Material were joined by OUT-TAKE Ensemble from Southampton to perform a set of pieces in the Ludo2017 conference at Bath Spa University. This is part of a developing collaboration between composers at the two universities, and it was great to perform together for the first time. In addition to new pieces by Oogoo […]

Wednesday 3 May, 12-4pm, CM108 In the final lab of the year, composer Tim Parkinson will talk about material and post-history in relation to his recent work. In the first half of the lab, Roger Clarke will present his Record Player Orchestra. 12-2pm: Roger Clarke – Introduction to the Record Player Orchestra Roger Clarke will […]

Wednesday 5 April, 12-4pm, CM108 In Lab 7 we welcome Cathy van Eck who will present recent work that explores microphones and loudspeakers as instruments, as well as ongoing work by Lab composers Louis d’Heudieres, Oogoo Maia and James Saunders. 12-2pm: Cathy van Eck – Air, Electricity and Movement Cathy van Eck composes relationships between everyday objects, human performers, […]

Wednesday 8 March, 12-4pm, CM108 In Lab 6 we investigate interdisciplinary approaches to scoring, considering uses of different media and modes of realisation. Caitlin Rowley explores the hidden space of the rehearsal as a site for performance, and Vassilis Chatzimakris looks at interfacial scores. Our visitor is Peter Ablinger, one of the most consistently inventive […]

Wednesday 1 February, 12-4pm, CM108 In Lab 5 we feature work that uses found materials and processes, considering the way music references and translates aspects of the world. We welcome Matthew Shlomowitz, who will discuss his Popular Contexts series, and he is joined by two of his PhD students from Southampton, Ben Jameson and Alex Glyde-Bates. The […]

Wednesday 11 January, 12-4pm, CM131 In the fourth lab we explore physicality and scoring. Robert Luzar will present recent video demonstrations and discuss their relationship with live performance, and Oogoo Maia considers the musician’s body as a site of music-making through a series of interactive games. In the second part we welcome composer/performer Jennifer Walshe who will present […]

Open Scores Lab members Louis d’Heudieres and James Saunders had pieces played in November at series in London and Manchester. Louis’s new piece Vox Pop was performed at Bastard Assignments’  New Teeth 3 show at Block 336 in Brixton on 4 November. The piece extends his use of audio scores, using Wagner as source material for a […]

Wednesday 7 December, 12-4pm, CM131 The third lab considers the nature of scoring and its relationship with digital technologies. We welcome composer David Pocknee to talk about the grid, completeness, and divination, following a presentation and discussion led by Andrew Hugill on human and machine creativity and their impact on score paradigms. 12-2pm: Andrew Hugill […]

Wednesday 2 November, 12-4pm [12-2pm, CM131 / 2-4pm CM225] The second Lab focuses on vocality and verbal communication, featuring a visit from Canadian composer Cassandra Miller. Cassandra’s Duet for Cello and Orchestra was performed at last year’s Tectonics festival in Glasgow, and she will speak about transcription and vocal quality. The Lab will also include new […]

Matt Robertson is performing in Vocal Vertebra Bcn on 5 October at Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona. The performance is drawn from his work with the experimental poetry workshop Writers Forum initiated by Bob Cobbing at Goldsmiths College and ‘invites the audience to the sound and visual exploration of gestures, accents, sounds and movements of the performance.’ […]

Robert Luzar and Francesco Gagliardi’s collaborative video and text work Demonstrations is available to view at SKELF virtual project space. Demonstrations is a group of four videos, showing how certain actions may or may not be made by viewers. The first piece, How To Outline Through Elastic and Red Tape, is now available to view and the whole series […]

Caitlin Rowley‘s Fortune Favours the Brave was broadcast on Hear and Now last weekend. It was part of a programme curated by Bastard Assignments, the London-based cross-arts collective that she works with. Caitlin’s piece for flute and objects was played by Jenni Hogan and uses a crafted silk and rice paper hand scroll that the performer works […]

Lab 1: Wednesday 5 October, 12-4pm, CM131 In the first lab of the year we welcome American composer Michael Winter who will talk about combinatorics in his recent work. For more information about Michael, please see his website. Michael will also be speaking to the Centre for Creative Computing on 11am on Thursday 6 October in the Riding […]