ELECTRA
Ensemble for new music
ELECTRA
Ensemble for new music
ELECTRA
Ensemble for new music
“viscerally thrilling ... with an explosive energy”
(New York Times)
“a thrilling show and brilliantly constructed production”
(de Volkskrant)
MICHAELA RIENER...voice
SUSANNA BORSCH...recorder
SASKIA LANKHOORN...piano
& keyboard
MICHA DE KANTER...sound
The all-female group ELECTRA unites internationally renowned performers in an unusual line-up with a battery of resources: violin, electric violin, voice, keyboards, recorders, percussion, effects, and electronics. Hailed by the New York Times as “viscerally thrilling…with an explosive energy”, ELECTRA is a powerful mix for a twenty-first century ensemble. Based in the Netherlands, and coming from different countries (USA, Austria, Germany, the Netherlands), ELECTRA works with established composers and discovers new collaborations, combining the latest new music with visual and theatrical elements. The ensemble performs amplified, creates highly original and critically lauded programs, and is constantly exploring new territory.
LAST PROGRAM: FACE
Face is a multimedia composition for voice, violin, recorders, piano, live electronics and video, based on notions of face, not only as a manifestation of emotion and identity, but as a data set to be collected and used by external powers. The piece navigates between the problematic practice of anthropometry in the early 20th century, specifically the measurement of cranial features to determine character types, to the current use of emotional face recognition software to collect data about the emotional engagement of consumers.
see also Yannis Kyriakides' website
MUSIC Yannis Kyriakides
IMAGE Johannes Schwartz
TEXT Maria Barnas
No concerts planned at this moment
Selected other programs
The Newest Math (future)
ELECTRA verleidt drie Haagse componisten tot het (her)schrijven van muziek waarin zij de precisie van het getal aanwenden voor hemelbestormend krachtige en prachtige muziek. Startpunt is The new math(s) dat Louis Andriessen (1939), de eminence grise van de Haagse School, in 2000 schreef voor ELECTRA en dat hij nu bewerkt voor de bezetting met piano in plaats van marimba. Peter Adriaansz (1966) maakte zelf school met de fragiele schoonheid en solide zeggingskracht die hij creëert door het rekenen aan boventonen en microtonen. Aurélie Lierman (1980) vielen de schellen van ogen en oren toen zij zich als maker van bijzondere radiokunst meldde bij het Koninklijk Conservatorium en een componist werd. Zij gaat aan de slag met de 23 duizend jaar oude Ishango-botjes uit de Democratische Republiek Congo, mogelijk de allereerste rekenlinealen ooit.
Rache (2016/17)
Vier maal een bevrijdende moord - Rache is een muzikaal-theatrale voorstelling van vier scènes voor solistenensemble ELECTRA, gecomponeerd en geschreven door Boudewijn Tarenskeen en gedramatiseerd door de musici zelf. Zij laten hun vondsten fijnslijpen door artistieke zwaargewichten aan de zijlijn - een scenograaf, een regisseur, een dramaturg en een podiumbeest. De vergadering van componist, musici en theatermensen die Rache tot stand brengen mag gerust een dream team heten.
Boudewijn Tarenskeen - muziek en tekst
Paul Koek - theateradviezen
Wende Snijders - theateradviezen
Marc Warning - scenografie
Cecile Brommer - dramaturgie
Micha de Kanter - geluid en theateradviezen
Nico de Rooij - scenografie en lichtontwerp
Djana Kovic - scenografie en lichtontwerp
Whirly Girls (2013)
rly Girls, Electra, the four-piece, all-female ensemble, presents a musical ode to five women who played an important role in the history of women’s emancipation: Emmeline Pankhurst, champion of women’s right to vote; Rosie the Riveter, nickname for all women who contributed to the war economy from 1942-1945; Gertrude Stein, the well-known American writer who played an important part in the Paris art scene; and Amelia Earhart and Hanna Reitsch who both performed daredevil feats in the field of aviation. Composers Renske Vrolijk, Vanessa Lann, Lucas Wiegerink, and Michiel Mensigh show their admiration for these heroins, which through their intelligence, daring, and perseverance captured a place in history. The idea was conceived by Renske Vrolijk; she also wrote the title composition Whirly Girls about aviatresses Amelia Earhart and Hanna Reitsch. Expect a concert full of militancy, courage, and adventure alternated with video images and theatrical elements.
Industrial Landscapes (2012)
In Industrial Landscapes, musicians of ELECTRA emphasize and unite their individual powers, both as ensemble players and as soloists. The ensemble pieces are written for ELECTRA , and the solo works are specially arranged or composed for each of them. Each of the pieces is a dramatic performance, incorporating such elements as distortion, electronics, pure metal installation (scaffolding) and the fragility and strength of human voice versus mechanism and industry. ELECTRA explores the nature of the industrial experience, contrasting the many facets of what could be seen as a relatively recent phenomenon and showing its contradictions in a dramatic reflection of the questions at the heart of modern society. Video projections, including Tonnus Oosterhoff’s ‘floating poem’ MESTRA, guide the public through the show. Industrial Landscapes is structured around four solo works shrouded by two large scale ensemble pieces written specially for the project. Michael Gordon’s phenomenal Industry for adapted violin and distortion, a variety of industrial environments in Ned McGowan’s Workshop for recorder, Louis Andriessen’s explosive Workers Union for solo percussion and installation, Klas Torstensson’s whirling Urban Solo, Guus Janssen’s large-scale new work MESTRA and the deceptively titled, hard-hitting Sweet Love by Cornelis de Bondt
.
Electra's Second Life (2010/11)
A few years ago, the Second Life website was all over the news. The site’s visitors can choose an alter ego and lead a second life in a virtual fantasy world: a world that has an uncanny resemblance to the real world. The grey area between reality and illusion is the inspiration for the new show:
ELECTRA’s Second Life
The result of a lengthy exchange of ideas and research with the U.C.C. (Utrecht Composers Collective), this project heralds two new adventures for
ELECTRA: working with a team of composers (the U.C.C.), and integrating a fifth player into the band (Sonsoles Alonso, piano/keyboard).
All Andriessen (2004)
As the title suggests, this program consists largely of works by the internationally renowned Dutch composer : Louis Andriessen.
Louis Andriessen’s presence and inspiration have deeply influenced the musicians of ELECTRA.
This collaboration has led to an exciting and varied program of solo and ensemble pieces in which the many different facets of this extraordinary composer are brought to light.
Featured on the ALL-ANDRIESSEN program is the score & soundtrack ‘The New Math(s)’ (2000), written for and recorded by ELECTRA for New York filmmaker Hal Hartley’s highly acclaimed film, in a co-production of the NPS and the BBC. When the English version of ‘Shopping List of a Poisoner’ was brought out in 2002, ELECTRA created their own theatrical version, featuring four voices and a nail on sandpaper. Other highlights in the program are the metallically explosive ‘Workers Union’ from 1976 in a solo percussion version created by Tatiana Koleva together with Paul Koek and De Veenstudio, and the 2005 solo violin/voice piece, Xenia.
ELECTRA's history in pictures
ElECTRA's history in pictures 1999-2017
photo by Anne Reinke 2015
1999
photo by Marco Borggreve
1999
photo by Marco Borggreve
1999
photo by Marco Borggreve
2000
photo by Philip Mechanicus
2004
photo by Klaus Tummers
2004
photo by Wouter van den Brink
2004
photo by Wouter van den Brink
2004
2004
photo by Anne Reinke
2006
photo by Anne Reinke
2006
2006
2006
2011
photo by Hans Hijmering
2011
photo by Hans Hijmering
2011
photo by Hans Hijmering
2011
photo by Hans Hijmering
2011
photo by Hans Hijmering
2011
photo by Hans Hijmering
2011
photo by Hans Hijmering
2011
photo by Anne Reinke
2011
photo by Anne Reinke
2011
photo by Anne Reinke
2015
photo by Anne Reinke
2015
photo by Anne Reinke
2016
photo by Anne Reinke
2016
photo by Anne Reinke
2016
photo by Anne Reinke
Board of Advisers / Comité van Aanbeveling
Monica Germino - artistic adviser
Pauline Terreehorst - Director Nat Lab, journalist
Former member of the board of Advisers:
Louis Adriessen - composer: we are missing him dearly
BOard of Directors / Bestuur
Shane Burmania - chair
Jacqueline Oskamp - secretary
Caroline Bakker - treasurer
