A lively improvisation lead by a quartet of instrumentalists blending drone and chamber music.
The tracks of the album Esox Lucius were recorded on high end analogue technique at the Czech Radio Broadcasting Studio in Prague. Four exceptional instrumentalists (Isabelle Duthoit, clarinet, voice; Franz Hautzinger, quartertone trumpet; Matija Schellander, modular synthesizer; Petr Vrba, trumpet, vibrating speakers) are creating bubbling and zizzling chamber music, they are blurring the edges of their instruments, but contemporarily dialoguing with a precise and unique vocabulary. The record is based on minimal drones, refined with analogue trumpet glitches and extended vocal techniques. Brass is bubbling, feedbacks are shrieking, it sounds as if a red glowing wire is cutting into a block of ice. Under predatory hissings evaporates a tinny morse alphabet. What remains are sublime minimal highlights, set with pinpoint accuracy.
Limited edition of 300 hand numbered copies.
Isabelle Duthoit trained as a classical clarinetist and has always been interested in the voice. She has developed a singular vocal technique, seeking "a language before language, a voice of origin". She has collaborated with Georges Aperghis, Gilbert Amy, Daniel d'Adamo and Klaus Huber, then turned to free improvisation, working with many artists of the international experimental scene such as
Phil Minton,
Dieb13 or Angelica Castello. She is a member of several groups such as Hiatus, Système Friche, Where is the sun, Uruk, Iki, NYX. She regularly performs in dance and theater.
The trumpeter Franz Hautzinger (born in 1963 in Burgerland, Austria), figure of the Viennese jazz scene in the 1980s, then turned to improvised music and experimentation, developing a very personal playing technique to explore the sound possibilities of his instrument. He has played with
Derek Bailey,
John Tilbury, Sachiko M,
Otomo Yoshihide,
Ekkehard Ehlers, Keith Rowe,
Axel Dörner, Tetuzi Akiyama,
Bertrand Gauguet,
Xavier Charles,
Jean-Philippe Gross,
Lionel Marchetti, etc.
Matija Schellander (born 1981 in Bilčovs, Austria) is a composer mostly using modular synthesizer, double bass, and speakers: processing input, moving air output. Schellander regularly works with Maja Osojnik in their electroacoustic duo Rdeča Raketa. The ensemble Low Frequency Orchestra (founded by Angelica Castello, Thomas Grill, Maja Osojnik and Matija Schellander) started in 2003. They have realized several projects, including a CD with Wolfgang Mitterer and sound/text piece with author Anja Utler. Schellander also collaborates with Attila Faravelli, who released the sound object "freie aerophone" (from his series Aural Tools) inspired by Schellanders solo double bass music in 2012. Schellander has worked with musicians and composers, including Enrico Malatesta, Ryu Hankil, Burkhard Stangl,
Franz Hautzinger, Wolgang Mitterer,
Dieb13, Noid, Klaus Filip,
Okkyung Lee, Michael Bruckner,
Isabelle Duthoit, Kazuhisa Uchihashi, Hannes Lingens, Christof Kurzmann, Jin Sangtae, Bernhard Lang, Jorge Sanchez-Chiong, Tom Johnson, Martin Brandlmayr, Bernhard Breuer and many more.
Petr Vrba is a Czech experimental free improvisator, trumpet and electronics player. His unrelenting explorations of non-idiomatic improvisation using trumpets, clarinet, vibrating speakers, egg cutters etc., made him one of the most active experimental musicians in Prague. His most intensive collaboration arose from meeting with American musician/composer George Cremaschi (doublebass, electronics) with whom they established Prague Improvisation Orchestra, Los Amargados duo, an international dance-visual-music project Arthuur, etc. In 2010 Petr Vrba became one of the founding members of improvisation ensemble IQ+1. In 2011 he constituted Yanagi duo with Korean experimenter Ryu Hankil (alarm clock, typewriters). Among others Petr Vrba has recorded or played with musicians like Tiziana Bertoncini,
Xavier Charles,
Isabelle Duthoit, Kai Fagaschinski,
Franz Hautzinger, Chris Heenan, Susanna Gartmayer, Matthew Goodheart, Irene Kepl, dd Kern, Christof Kurzmann, Thomas Lehn, Ava Mendoza,
Seijiro Murayama,
Ivan Palacký,
Matija Schellander,
Ingrid Schmoliner, Jaroslav Šťastný (aka Peter Graham), Miro Tóth, Michael Zerang. Since 2010 he curates the musical programme of Communication Space Školská 28. Since 1994 he plays as a DJ at Radio 1 in Prague, and was also a temporary student of gamelan music at Institute of Art of Indonesia in Yogyakarta (1997-1998).
