Archive of Graindelavoix. Please place an introductory heading that contains keywors that are useful for search engines like Google. Not more than 4 or 5 lines of text please.

Graindelavoix Introphoto

There would be no ‘graindelavoix’ without some crucial events & encounters in the life of Björn Schmelzer: turning points not only between living people, but also between old materials, images and strange transmitters of time…

Some scenes of Werner Herzog’s cult movie Herz aus Glas for example, the memorable moment with Thomas Binkley sitting on a rock accompanying a high voice that intones the trouvère song ‘chanterai por mon courage’; the first time Schmelzer saw and heard the confratelli of Castelsardo in Sardinia, singing a four-voice falsobordone in their headquarters, a vocal practice that shakes the fundaments of western music history; the encounter with Bart Meynckens, Paul De Troyer, Koen Laukens, Arnout Malfliet and Lieven Gouwy, singers who made it possible to turn dead traces into living vibrations, giving back to polyphony its geo-political and cosmic dimensions, connecting distant time and geographic layers.

Many other impulses could be added: an LP by the Hilliards with strange sound climates in the Dunstable motets; the Roland Barthes essay (misunderstood by everybody according to Schmelzer) that would give the emblematic name to the group. What interested Schmelzer in the ‘grain’, in the ‘grittiness’ was not the timbre as such, or the voice technique (although it’s a strange phenomenon why certain voices sound completely neutral to us and others reveal worlds, histories, territories, climates…). In the second part of the essay Barthes compares two opera protagonists, Boris and Mélisande, and writes about la mort au travail: one understands that the grain is not a state of being, but a way of acting, of doing.

The voice should not be engaged in representing a repertory, but in immediate injection, producing what Barthes would call a non-pathetique pathos, a savage pathos. The grain is the condition of the voice to become a voice of the past, of the other, of an automatism, of a gesture.
Not without surprise, from the start, the approach and sounding results of graindelavoix were surrounded by controversy. Probably graindelavoix is the only ensemble in the early and classical music world, with one or two exceptions, that brings up every time so many different reactions, leading to discussions about aesthetical values, parameters, historical performance etc…

Sometimes you get even the impression that some critics were waiting for a new cd or concert-program to be able to break the usual boredom of early music releases. Some critics and public reactions evoke misunderstanding or misconception of what is at stake for graindelavoix. While some critics don’t hide their reservations or scepticism, others feel personally provoked and answer these provocations with emotional attacks.

Many times the combination of a certain conceptual approach (in reviews sometimes dismissed as pseudo-intellectualism) with the appearance of naturalism (in reviews sometimes called spontaneism) is received as a confusing and disturbing provocation, resulting in opposite reactions, in such a way that what some call naturalistic or spontaneistic, is called forced, artificial and hyper-manneristic by others.

Y Björn Schmelzer always writes exhaustive cd-booklets without an illustrative or explanatory goal. For him they give an extra essayistic dimension for listeners that like to provoke their own thinking and like to go deeper into conceptual issues involved in the sounding result. Nevertheless, the booklet-essays are often described as pseudo-intellectual, unreadable, hermetic or esoteric, etc…

Y The combination of different sorts of singers, with different timbres and expressive and articulated phrasing, is often understood not as a result of musicological research and artistic choice, but as pure provocation and ‘bad taste’.

Y Often the reviews and commentaries, are the result of the shock of a cd or a concert program that worked as a catalyser, revealing something of the hidden prejudices that not only critics but also academics in human science still bear about past and patrimony and which are suddenly erupting, mostly uncovering the true implications and intentions of the writer’s ideological background.

Disco Excepcional for Josquin The Undead

Josquin The Undead received a “Disco Excepcional” from Scherzo Magazine July-August.

Read the very fine review by Javier Serrano Godoy:

Josquin Des Prez por Graindelavoix: ‘O mors inevitabilis…’    

He perdido la cuenta de cuantos CD de Josquin Des Prez llevo en mi brevísima trayectoria como crítico discográfico. Lo he escuchado en su escolástica y rígida versión a cappella, a voz sola con acompañamiento instrumental, y hasta con ondas martenot y sintetizador. Llevo quince años completamente encandilado por su música y la de aquellos que más o menos lo rodean (Dufay, Ockeghem, Binchois, Busnois, etc.), y me resulta de un atractivo infinito tanto el personaje como la persona. Y, sin embargo, aún tengo la oportunidad —y la alegría— de quedarme clavado en el sofá con un disco sobre el bardo de Hainaut.

La culpa de este ‘nirvana’ la tienen, una vez más, los muchachos de Graindelavoix, viejos compañeros junto con Gesualdo de mi encierro coronavírico. Björn Schmelzer y su equipo son de los pocos que me dan lo que pido a una interpretación: un sonido original y reconocible hasta en medio de un huracán, obra de unas voces nada convencionales y de una ornamentación que a más de un casposo resulta chocante; variedad en las aproximaciones, ya sea disparando cánones al aire como homofonizándose solemnes; y cuidado a los detalles, acaso el rasgo más evidente del artesano musical. La premisa de unificar dos conceptos como Josquin y la muerte ya me resultaba irresistible desde la proposición (y desde la carátula), pero su consumación supera todas mis expectativas.

Cómo se puede llegar a semejante nivel de expresión, de sutileza, de control y de frescura es un completo arcano para mí. Todo cuanto suena aquí rezuma antigüedad y modernidad de un solo golpe: en cada énfasis cromático, en cada movimiento que rompe el estatismo, en un acompañamiento prodigioso. No hay necesidad en las notas de justificación ni de explicación; ni de Adorno ni de Freud: música total, Josquin en el centro y la nada, alrededor. O mors inevitabilis…

Javier Serrano Godoy

Josquin The Undead at Radio France

Le Disque classique du jour

L'ensemble belge Gaindelavoix a sorti en octobre dernier un enregistrement consacré à Josquin Desprez. Björn Schmelzer et son ensemble apportent leur vision particulière sur le compositeur. On écoute !

Björn Schmelzer et son ensemble apportent leur vision particulière en cet anniversaire Josquin Desprez . Avec la conviction que Josquin, durant ses dernières années, a produit des œuvres en vue de sa propre mort, Graindelavoix rend des compositions incluses dans l'estampe anversoise de 1545 de Tielman Susato ( Septiesme livre de chansons , publié 24 ans après la fin de la vie du compositeur). Avec un ensemble vocal entièrement masculin et un accompagnement instrumental subtil, Graindelavoix dépasse à nouveau tous les standards et présente une autre interprétation inédite d'un répertoire bien connu.

Aux compositions de Josquin s'ajoutent trois complaintes sur sa propre mort, écrites par Gombert, Vinders et Appenzeller . La déploration de Gombert Musae Jovis est l'une de ses compositions les plus époustouflantes, se terminant par une exceptionnelle danse à l'antique dans laquelle des éléments souterrains, terrestres et célestes s'adonnent ensemble à l'éloge du compositeur mort-vivant Josquin.

Aby Warburg’s Concept of "Gute Nachbarschaft”

Tomorrow (around noon) Björn Schmelzer talks about bibliomania, musical anxiety and Aby Warburg’s concept of "Gute Nachbarschaft” in a conference at the Orpheus Institute in Ghent, dedicated to the newly acquired library of Ton Koopman.

You can watch it all on youtube!

Schmelzer at Orpheus Institute

Les Libertins d'Anvers

Launch of a new performance and research project (concerts, seminars, lecture-performances), featuring 16th century Antwerp, a new Babylon, as it was called by moralists of the time. Very pleased and honored to collaborate with musicologist Jorge Martín of Ars Subtilior Editions, providing us with new scores of unknown repertoire, including a lot of never performed polyphony (Severin Cornet, Hubert Waelrant,…!)

The libertines in the title (taken from the novel by Antwerp writer Georges Eekhoud) are not to be confused with later doctrinal libertinism: it is an umbrella name for the heterogeneous and diverse population of artists and thinkers, and common people politically or religiously engaged in a profound criticism and rethinking of the global situation reflected in contradictory economic, religious and cultural tendencies experienced in the city of Antwerp, leading to the iconoclasm of 1566 and the so called Dutch revolt. Antwerp was in the middle of the 16th century, be it only for a small time, a haven of relative freedom and emancipation (“la grande libertade” as Giovanni Zonca called it), in the midst of political wars and confusion, religious ruptures, rising colonialism, plugged into the exceptional boom of mercantile wealth, paving the way for later world capitalism, and our modern condition…

Art and music are not a direct reflection of the historical situation, neither are they just a nostalgic escape, evoking a realm of harmony and without contradiction. Rather they are explorations of (new) subjectivity, giving a twist to symbolic culture, capable of evoking its conflicts and ruptures. Are the paintings by Bruegel and colleagues sentimentally conservative or critically modernist avant-la-lettre? Even more difficult is the engagement with musical works of the same period. Instead of bypassing this question, this project engages with the unsolvable, intrinsic contradiction of art works and how they involve subjectivity through performance, and that’s how they still speak to us today.

Severin Cornet & Hubert Waelrant

Last week we launched a new program with unknown (16th century) Antwerp masters: the inventive Severin Cornet and the fabulously modern and expressive Hubert Waelrant…repertoire we will further develop in the near future.

Many thanks to Jorge Martín of Ars Subtilior Editions to provide us transcription scores specially for this project!

with Andrew Hallock, Albert Riera, Gabriel Belkheiri, Marius Peterson, Arnout Malfliet and Björn Schmelzer

(photos: Sabina Leysen)

Gesualdo review in La Vanguardia

Review of Gesualdo concert in Barcelona by Jorge de Persia in La Vanguardia

Gesualdo Review in Scherzo

Is this the end of the Graindelavoix controversy? Another nice review by Lluís Trullén for Scherzo

BARCELONA / Graindelavoix, excelencia vocal para Gesualdo    

Barcelona. Monasterio de Sant Pau del Camp. 5-V-2022. Graindelavoix‎. Director: Björn Schmelzer. Obras de Gesualdo y Magrané.

El conjunto vocal Graindelavoix volvía a Barcelona tras su memorable actuación acaecida en febrero de 2020, dedicada aquel entonces a obras del Medievo y páginas renacentistas. Dirigidos por su fundador, Björn Schmelzer, en esta ocasión han actuado en el monasterio románico de Sant Pau del Camp, dentro del festival Llums d’ Antiga, con un programa dedicado al sobrecogedor Tenebrae Responsoria de Carlo Gesualdo y acompañado por el estreno del Miserere mei Deus de Joan Magrané y del mismo Salmo 50 Miserere mei Deus musicado por el propio príncipe de Venosa. La antológica grabación llevada a cabo por Graindelavoix de los Responsorios ya recibió la calificación de excepcional en 2020, convirtiéndose en uno de los referentes de esta obra. Su interpretación en directo escuchada por las afortunadas ciento cincuenta personas que desde días atrás agotaron las entradas del reducido aforo, reprodujo y si cabe aumentó, el estadio extático que emerge de la grabación.

El mismo equipo vocal de dicha grabación, con la salvedad de las dos sopranos ocupadas en la noche del jueves por las espléndidas Teodora Tommasi y Florencia Menconi, volvió a encumbrar el conjunto con motetes inscritos en la música testamentaria de Gesualdo, para sumergirnos bajo la afinación absolutamente perfecta que muestra cada una de las ocho voces (seña de identidad del conjunto) en un mar de claroscuros, de cromatismos y disonancias que discurrían con la serenidad transmitida por la precisa dirección de Schmelzer.

Gesualdo, compositor controvertido donde los haya (da habida cuenta de ello la monografía de Denis Morrier traducida por José Luís García del Busto publicada el pasado junio y publicada por Musicalia Scherzo), propone un juego de sombras ante un alud de disonancias que agudizan cada una de las sentidas palabras de los hechos de la Pasión. Austeridad compartida con un empaque entre las voces que se discernían con total claridad ante la inevitable resonancia producida por la bóveda románica del altar mayor. La impactante voz del bajo Arnout Malfliet (como siempre, cantando descalzo) sigue poseyendo una espectacularidad en el grave nunca reñida con una diáfana claridad de proyección. Estuvieron espléndidos los tenores Albert Riera, Andrés Miravete, Marius Peterson y Adrian Sîrbu, cuatro voces de una calidez sobrecogedora aunque sean tan distintas en su color, Y, por supuesto, emergió la luminosidad del alto Razek-François Bitar, que es la guinda que termina de redondear este conjunto excepcional.

Magrané toma como referente a Gesualdo para su Miserere, expresamente pensado para las ocho voces de Graindelavoix. A igual que en el Salmo 50 del compositor italiano, la alternancia entre el canto llano y la polifonía discurre bajo una escritura que ahonda en el misticismo, bellísima en lo expresivo y que no escapa en su escritura a cinco voces de los postulados legados por los grandes polifonistas renacentistas. Obra estéticamente cuidada hasta el más mínimo detalle, que requiere una notoria exigencia técnica por sus líneas modulantes y demanda de afinación y que, como desveló el propio Magrané, supone la primera obra que un compositor ha escrito y ha sido estrenada por el conjunto vocal belga.

Hubo un sinfín de momentos álgidos, como el acaecido en el responsorio a seis voces Tristis est anima mea para el primer Nocturno del Jueves Santo. Su juego de claroscuros vocales (que en símiles visuales enlazaría con el pintor Caravaggio), el modo de elevar el sentido religioso y doloroso de las palabras reflejando la serenidad que emerge de la figura de Cristo, bastaría por sí solo para caer absortos ante tal magnetismo interpretativo de una música portadora del más alto contenido espiritual.

Lluís Trullén

Enthusiast Gesualdo Review in El Periodico

One more nice review from the Barcelona concert by Pablo Meléndez-Haddad for El Periodico.

Inoblidable cloenda del Festival Llums d’Antiga amb Gesualdo i Magrané

Inoblidable cloenda del Festival Llums d’Antiga amb Gesualdo i Magrané
El conjunt vocal Graindelavoix va interpretar una estrena mundial del compositor de Reus i obres del músic italià sota la direcció de Björn Schmelzer

Espectacular cloenda del Festival Llums d’Antiga de l’Auditori al Monestir de Sant Pau del Camp amb un concert pel record de la formació belga Graindelavoix dirigida per un formidable Björn Schmelzer, interpretant els Tenebrae Responsoria de Carlo Gesualdo, el motet Miserere mei deus del mateix autor i una estrena mundial de Joan Magrané, qui versiona el mateix psalm.

Possiblement sigui aquesta una de les millors obres del compositor reusenc, en mantenir-se fidel a la seva línia estètica, sempre plena d’emoció, però poques vegades evident, de colors definits i viatges quasi narratius gràcies a un ús gairebé descriptiu de la música. Com ja es va veure a la seva Missa a 6 veus, potser sigui en el món coral (i potser religiós?) on adquireix un grau de sofisticació i refinament més elevat.

Intentar descriure la composició no li faria justícia, s’hauria de parlar de totes les breus seccions, ben diferenciades, que se succeeixen, les diferències que les caracteritzen, els diversos estats emocionals que suggereix cadascuna, les diferents textures que demanen (els falsets meravellosos dels tenors, per exemple)… Una joia plena de fantasia i que va funcionar perfectament dins el programa Gesualdo de la vetllada, tant per varietat de l’obra com per un ús visceral del teixit musical.

Poca cosa a dir de l’obra magistral que són els Tenebrae Responsoria, una epopeia de dues hores carregada d’emoció, violència i bellesa capaç de rivalitzar amb la Passió segons Sant Mateu de Bach pel que fa a contingut dramàtic. És en moments com el «Seniores Populi», on una lleu melodia es repeteix al verb exierunt, tercera persona del plural del verb sortir (surten), passant de primera veu femenina a segona, després a tenor, on el drama és descrit, caracteritzat i capturat, per exemple en el motiu primer descendent i després ascendent, i com aquest va canviant de color (i ornamentació!) en funció de la veu que el canta. Impossible no deixar-se endur per la força emotiva que resideix en cada detall de l’obra de Gesualdo.

Amb el text davant i sentint un enregistrament dels Responsoris (per exemple el que tenen els mateixos Graindelavoix, on repeteixen alguns dels intèrprets que vam sentir ahir) un no pot parar de percebre nous detalls, i recomanaria sobretot, tornar-los a sentir en viu perquè és una experiència sensorial extraordinària.

Simplement sensacional el director Schmelzer, extraient el màxim potencial de totes les veus que van inundar el Monestir. Les dues veus femenines en estat de glòria (Teodora Tommasi i Florencia Menconi), un baix de timbre de primera qualitat i execució finíssima (Arnout Malfiet), un tenor que liderava el psalm que tancava el concert amb una convicció pròpia d’altres temps (Marius Petersen) o el tenor de Granollers Albert Riera destacant per la precisió com atacava cada nota i modulava el color en funció de la situació amb una exactitud fora de sèrie. És possible que la descripció de cada intèrpret es pugui aplicar a tota la resta de l’ensemble perquè l’estat de la formació era altíssim: veus calibrades, equilibrades, punyents, de timbres purs i bons efectes vocals. La resta de la formació van ser Razek-François Bitar (alto), Andrés Miravete (tenor) i Adrian Sîrbu (tenor).

Una obra com els Tenebrae Responsoria (i també el Miserere de Magrané) exigeixen un conjunt de persones exposades, disciplinades i amb un talent genuí, i Graindelavoix no només va oferir això, sinó també una vetllada històrica. Irrepetible, però de les que se’n volen més.

Rehearsal Magrané and Gesualdo at Sant Pau del Camp

Rehearsing Gesualdo/Magrané in the fabulous Monastir de Sant Pau del Camp. Concert tomorrow!

Epitaphs of Afterwardness at Lunalia Mechelen

Souvenirs from the new program Epitaphs of Afterwardsness at Lunalia Festival Mechelen,

a collaboration with Jan Michiels, featuring Machaut's messe de Notre Dame and compostions by Kurtag, Ligeti, Bach and Xenakis

with Florencia Menconi, Andrew Hallock, Albert Riera, Andrés Miravete, Tomàs Maxé and Arnout Malfliet

photos by Festival photgrapher Frank Emmers

Collaboration with Jan Michiels at Lunalia Mechelen

Tonight Lunalia Festival in one of Belgium’s best acoustics: the gothic OLV over de Dijlekerk in Mechelen…looking forward!

With Jan Michiels (pianos) and Florencia Menconi, Andrew Hallock, Andrés Miravete, Albert Riera, Tomàs Maxé, Arnout Malfliet, Björn Schmelzer (artistic direction)

Next Week's Concerts in Mechelen en Barcelona

Excited for next week’s concerts in Mechelen and Barcelona: Machaut vs Ligeti (with the fabulous Jan Michiels!) and Gesualdo vs Magrané (premiering his new Miserere, tailor made for our Tenebrae program!)

https://lunalia.be/en/programme/epitaphs-of-afterwardsness

https://www.auditori.cat/en/gesualdo-tenebrae-responsoria

Première of Epitaphs of Afterwardness in Ghent

Tonight we inaugurate a new exciting collaboration with piano player Jan Michiels…join us tonight in the Ghent Carmelite Church for Machaut Bach Kurtag Ligeti…

With Florencia Menconi, Andrew Hallock, Albert Riera, Andrés Miravete Arnout Malfliet, directed by Björn Schmelzer with Jan Michiels on piano.

Caecilia Award of Belgian Music Press for Josquin The Undead

Brussels by night… Last year Graindelavoix received a Caecilia Award for Gesualdo’s Tenebrae from the Belgian Music Press, the most prestigious prize for classical music, unfortunately there was no celebration…
This year we were awarded once more for their best CD’s of 2021 with Josquin The Undead…
Times are not less difficult now and celebration was justifiably modest but we received a nice Caecilia medal.
Thanks to Alex Fostier, Arnout Malfliet, Andrew Hallock, Tomás Maxé, Lukas Henning, Albert Riera, Adrian Sîrbu, Andrés Miravete, Philippe Malfeyt, Marius Peterson, Stefano Gervasoni and Fondazione Spinola Banna per l’arte, Carlos Cester and Glossa, and all comrades involved to make this recording possible and the late Leon Merken for his indispensable support.

Let yourself guide by Björn Schmelzer at Time Regained exhibition in Gent

Björn Schmelzer rehearsing as a tour guide for the weekend (join him in De Bijloke Gent, 11h or 14h, 26 or 27 March), ruminating on self-ruination in art…

Rondleidingen bij de Finissage van Time Regained

Rondleidingen bij de finissage van Time Regained door Björn Schmelzer op zaterdag 26 en zondag 27 maart om 11:00 en 14:00 De Bijloke Gent.

Van Eyck Diagrams in Warsaw

What better remedy in times like these than a comedy?
Today at 17h in Warsaw: VAN EYCK DIAGRAMS by Schmelzer and Graindelavoix…With the same actors as last night!
Aftertalk with Łukasz Kozak and Björn Schmelzer.

On the Road to Poland

After Antwerp concert, on the way to Poland…Join us tomorrow for Josquin in Warsaw at 19h!

Koorlink brings Josquin The Undead to Amuz

Very happy to be invited once again by Koorlink to perform our “Antwerp Josquin” (no surprise half of the 1545 Susato publication is a hoax...) in Antwerp at Amuz…Our first concert with them must have been almost 20 years ago!! Join us Sunday Morning 6 March in the wonderful acoustics of St Augustine’s Church!

Newsletter March 2022

Sunday 06.03.2022 Amuz / Koorlink Antwerpen

11.00 Josquin the Undead concert

Monday 07.03.2022 New Epiphanies Festival Warsaw

19.00 Josquin the Undead concert

Tuesday 08.03.2022 New Epiphanies Festival Warsaw

17.00 Van Eyck Diagrams film projection & after talk

JOSQUIN, THE UNDEAD - CONCERTS ANTWERP & WARSAW
March 6th & 7th

Laments, Deplorations and Dances of Death
In 1540, almost 20 years after the death of Josquin des Prez, the German publisher Georg Forster wrote mockingly that he heard from an illustrous person that Josquin composed more works after his death than during his life. This joke stresses the extreme proliferation of posthumous fake Josquin compositions articulating the legendary status of the composer.Immortality seems to be anticipated by Josquin himself in his late style, be it in the guise of its much darker counterpart, featuring an extreme musical repetition compulsion, making movement and dynamic emerge out of the inertia and stickiness of the musical and poetic material itself.Graindelavoix’s latest program and CD is an exploration and mapping of this idea, based on the carefully chosen and organized selection of 5 and 6 Voice chansons in Tielman Susato’s Seventh chanson book. This book, printed in Antwerp in 1545 and including some impressive epitaphs for Josquin by other composers, can be regarded as the first commemoration of Josquin who died in 1521, a little more than 500 years ago.

In 1540, bijna 20 jaar na de dood van Josquin des Prez, schreef de Duitse uitgever Georg Forster schertsend dat hij een illuster iemand hoorde zeggen dat Josquin meer werken componeerde na zijn dood dan tijdens zijn leven. Deze grap wijst op de woeker aan postume Josquin vervalsingen en de legendarische status van de componist.Josquin zelf heeft op die onsterfelijkheid geanticipeerd in zijn late stijl (zij het vermomd als haar duistere tegenhanger) die wordt gekenmerkt door een haast compulsieve herhalingsdrift die beweging en dynamiek genereert uit de inertie en kleverigheid van het muzikale en poëtische materiaal zelf.Het programma en de laatste release van Graindelavoix exploreren deze idee verder met als uitgangspunt de zorgvuldig samengestelde selectie 5- en 6-stemmige chansons in Tielman Susato’s Septiesme Livre. Dit in 1545 in Antwerpen gedrukte liedboek bevat naast werken van Josquin enkele indrukwekkende lamentaties voor de componist van jongere tijdgenoten en is de eerste echte herdenking van Josquin die in 1521 stierf, vorig jaar 500 jaar geleden.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   GRAINDELAVOIX/ Directed by Björn Schmelzer with Andrew Hallock, Albert Riera, Andrés Miravete, Marius Peterson, Adrian Sîrbu, Tomàs Maxé, Arnout Malfliet (singers)
Floris De Rycker (lute), Philippe Malfeyt (cittern)

VAN EYCK DIAGRAMS

The Legacy of Gerard Van den Acker, Art Historian

After screenings in Hannover (KunstFestSpiele Herrenhausen), Ghent (De Bijloke) and Antwerp (De Cinema), we are happy to announce Van Eyck Diagrams in Warsaw. The film is Graindelavoix's critical contribution to the Van Eyck Year in Flanders. Schmelzer and Graindelavoix created a performance with polyphony as a salute to the life and work of their faithful friend and art historian Gerard Van den Acker, whose untimely death abruptly ended a promising and sensational Van Eyck research.As a result of the crisis situation, Van Eyck Diagrams was given new impulse as a feature film. It is not just a tribute to Van Eyck's universe and to his visionary interpreter, but also an evocation of the artist’s struggle to be heard, seen and understood.Polyphony portrait, art historical documentary, philosophical film noir or just Flemish Covid comedy? Van Eyck Diagrams is all that and much more.

VAN EYCK DIAGRAMS

The Legacy of Gerard Van den Acker, Art Historian

Na screenings in Hannover (KunstFestSpiele Herrenhausen), Gent (De Bijloke) en Antwerpen (De Cinema), kondigen we met trots de vertoning van Van Eyck Diagrams in Warschau aan. De film is Graindelavoix' kritische bijdrage aan het Van Eyck jaar in Vlaanderen. Schmelzer en Graindelavoix creëerden met Van Eyck Diagrams een voorstelling met polyfonie als eresaluut aan het leven en werk van hun trouwe vriend en kunsthistoricus Gerard Van den Acker, wiens vroegtijdige dood abrupt een einde maakte aan een beloftevol en opzienbarend Van Eyck-onderzoek.Van Eyck Diagrams kreeg door de coronacrisis een nieuwe adem als langspeelfilm, niet alleen als hommage aan het universum van Van Eyck en als hulde aan zijn visionaire interpreet, maar ook als evocatie van de strijd die kunstenaars moeten leveren om gehoord, gezien en begrepen te worden.Polyfonieportret, kunsthistorische documentaire, filosofische film noir of gewoon Vlaamse Covid comedy? Van Eyck Diagrams is dat allemaal en veel meer.

Written, directed and edited by Björn Schmelzer
Margarida Garcia, Co-Director
With Alain Franco, Andrew Hallock, Albert Riera, Marius Peterson, Arnout Malfliet, Marlies De Munck, Bert Timmermans, Timothy Foubert, Paul Robbrecht, Babucarr Joof, Jana De Lange, Lisa Roelands, Sophie Hellemans, Peter Malfliet, Dauwe Bogaerts, Cas Ezzy, Sasha Lima, Manuel Mota, David Maranha, Margarida Garcia & Björn Schmelzer
Felipe Pipi, Director of Photography
Olivier Blanc, Anton Vodenitcharov & Alex Fostier, Sound
music performed by Graindelavoix
Willem Van Vooren & Katrijn Degans, Production
In coproduction with Music Centre De Bijloke Ghent and KunstFestSpiele Herrenhausen with the support of the City of Ghent and Flemish Community.                        

"Bronnen zat voor deze filosofische roadmovie: complottheorieën (…), Borgesiaanse mystificaties, zelfs een licht-hilarische variant van de film noir. Naast lichtvoetigheid krijg je ook een overvloed geserveerd aan talking heads, en dat van niet-professionele acteurs (…) Schmelzer bracht een prachtverzameling fragmenten bijeen, onversneden meerstemmigheid van Guillaume Dufay en Gilles Binchois, maar ook van minder ­bekende meesters als Matteo de ­Perugia of Jacob Senleches. Tussen de gotische gewelven bloeien de ­sobere stemmen helemaal open.”


“Plenty of sources for this philosophical road movie: conspiracy theories (…), Borgesian mystifications, even a slightly hilarious variant of the film noir. In addition to light-heartedness, you are also served an abundance of talking heads, and that of non-professional actors. (….) Schmelzer brought together a wonderful collection of fragments, unadulterated polyphony by Guillaume Dufay and Gilles Binchois, but also by lesser-known masters such as Matteo de Perugia or Jacob Senleches.The sober voices blossom between the Gothic vaults.”

Geert Van der Speeten in De Standaard

Josquin The Undead on Bestenliste of the Preis der Deutschen Schallplattenkritik!

Very happy with Josquin The Undead on Bestenliste of the Preis der deutschen Schallplattenkritik!!
Eloge to the performative paradoxes of our cd: gracefulness without superficiality, hypnotic tempi and floating gravitas, past present!

https://www.nmz.de/kiz/nachrichten/preis-der-deutschen-schallplattenkritik-die-bestenliste-12022-ist-erschienen

Auditions for singers!

Graindelavoix organiseert audities voor zangers die zich verwant voelen met de stijl en het repertoire van het gezelschap.Zangers hoeven niet per se gespecialiseerd te zijn in oude muziek: we appreciëren jouw expertise en algemeen muzikale en vocale kwaliteiten!Stuur je kandidatuur naar katrijn@graindelavoix.be samen met wat je relevant lijkt: CV, klank of video opnames/fragmenten, andere info die nuttig zou kunnen zijn…De audities vinden plaats in Muziekcentrum De Bijloke in Gent op 2, 3 en 4 maart 2022.
We kijken ernaar uit je te verwelkomen!

 

Graindelavoix organizes auditions for singers of all genres and kind who feel close to the ensemble’s approach and repertoire.Singers don’t have to be specialized in any kind of style: we appreciate your expertise and general musical and vocal skills!Please, send your application to katrijn@graindelavoix.be accompanied with what you think could be relevant: CV, sound and/or video examples, other stuff you might imagine as useful…The auditions will take place in Muziekcentrum De Bijloke in Ghent (Belgium) on March 2, 3 & 4 2022.
Looking forward to receive your letter!  

Schmelzer op Klara over expo Time Regained

Herbeluister Björn Schmelzer op Klara in Pompidou, met Anne-Mie Vankerckhoven en geïnterviewd door Heleen Debruyne.

Onderwerp: de Time Regained expo in De Bijloke Gent

Controversy and critic

Since its inception, Graindelavoix has stirred up quite a bit of commotion and caused a good dose of controversy. The critics have not always been equally gentle or understanding of the idiosyncratic approach that the collective stands for.

The ideas and artistic projects that propose new views on early repertoires resulted in multiple cds. These are mostly enthusiastically received as a welcome refreshment and vital boost more than needed in a musical landscape that suffers from aesthetic sclerosis and stereotypical approaches. Graindelavoix never provoked without explanation and never renewed in a fashionable or cheap way. If graindelavoix builds with every project on a track of another aesthetics, it is by reframing the repertoires and questioning the way we approach tradition and history, religion, practice and culture, beyond the cultural categories, following the statement of Bruno Latour that ‘we have never been modern’… Seeing early repertoires again as artistic or operative practices more than as ‘classical music’ already inscribed in accepted formats, graindelavoix tries to activate the potentials that were often, intentionally or not, excluded by classical music paradigms and parameters, dismissed as amateurism, mere tradition, ‘non-informed performance’, untrained vocality, improvisation, ornamentation that distracts from the essence of a transparent counterpoint, etc…

Not without surprise, from the start, the approach and sounding results of graindelavoix were surrounded by controversy. Probably graindelavoix is the only ensemble in the early and classical music world, with one or two exceptions, that brings up every time so many different reactions, leading to discussions about aesthetical values, parameters, historical performance etc…

Sometimes you get even the impression that some critics were waiting for a new cd or concert-program to be able to break the usual boredom of early music releases. Some critics and public reactions evoke misunderstanding or misconception of what is at stake for graindelavoix. While some critics don’t hide their reservations or scepticism, others feel personally provoked and answer these provocations with emotional attacks.

Many times the combination of a certain conceptual approach (in reviews sometimes dismissed as pseudo-intellectualism) with the appearance of naturalism (in reviews sometimes called spontaneism) is received as a confusing and disturbing provocation, resulting in opposite reactions, in such a way that what some call naturalistic or spontaneistic, is called forced, artificial and hyper-manneristic by others.

Y Björn Schmelzer always writes exhaustive cd-booklets without an illustrative or explanatory goal. For him they give an extra essayistic dimension for listeners that like to provoke their own thinking and like to go deeper into conceptual issues involved in the sounding result. Nevertheless, the booklet-essays are often described as pseudo-intellectual, unreadable, hermetic or esoteric, etc…

Y The combination of different sorts of singers, with different timbres and expressive and articulated phrasing, is often understood not as a result of musicological research and artistic choice, but as pure provocation and ‘bad taste’.

Y Often the reviews and commentaries, are the result of the shock of a cd or a concert program that worked as a catalyser, revealing something of the hidden prejudices that not only critics but also academics in human science still bear about past and patrimony and which are suddenly erupting, mostly uncovering the true implications and intentions of the writer’s ideological background.
Many other impulses could be added: an LP by the Hilliards with strange sound climates in the Dunstable motets; the Roland Barthes essay (misunderstood by everybody according to Schmelzer) that would give the emblematic name to the group. What interested Schmelzer in the ‘grain’, in the ‘grittiness’ was not the timbre as such, or the voice technique (although it’s a strange phenomenon why certain voices sound completely neutral to us and others reveal worlds, histories, territories, climates…). In the second part of the essay Barthes compares two opera protagonists, Boris and Mélisande, and writes about la mort au travail: one understands that the grain is not a state of being, but a way of acting, of doing.

The voice should not be engaged in representing a repertory, but in immediate injection, producing what Barthes would call a non-pathetique pathos, a savage pathos. The grain is the condition of the voice to become a voice of the past, of the other, of an automatism, of a gesture.
Not without surprise, from the start, the approach and sounding results of graindelavoix were surrounded by controversy. Probably graindelavoix is the only ensemble in the early and classical music world, with one or two exceptions, that brings up every time so many different reactions, leading to discussions about aesthetical values, parameters, historical performance etc…

Sometimes you get even the impression that some critics were waiting for a new cd or concert-program to be able to break the usual boredom of early music releases. Some critics and public reactions evoke misunderstanding or misconception of what is at stake for graindelavoix. While some critics don’t hide their reservations or scepticism, others feel personally provoked and answer these provocations with emotional attacks.

Many times the combination of a certain conceptual approach (in reviews sometimes dismissed as pseudo-intellectualism) with the appearance of naturalism (in reviews sometimes called spontaneism) is received as a confusing and disturbing provocation, resulting in opposite reactions, in such a way that what some call naturalistic or spontaneistic, is called forced, artificial and hyper-manneristic by others.

Y Björn Schmelzer always writes exhaustive cd-booklets without an illustrative or explanatory goal. For him they give an extra essayistic dimension for listeners that like to provoke their own thinking and like to go deeper into conceptual issues involved in the sounding result. Nevertheless, the booklet-essays are often described as pseudo-intellectual, unreadable, hermetic or esoteric, etc…

Y The combination of different sorts of singers, with different timbres and expressive and articulated phrasing, is often understood not as a result of musicological research and artistic choice, but as pure provocation and ‘bad taste’.

Y Often the reviews and commentaries, are the result of the shock of a cd or a concert program that worked as a catalyser, revealing something of the hidden prejudices that not only critics but also academics in human science still bear about past and patrimony and which are suddenly erupting, mostly uncovering the true implications and intentions of the writer’s ideological background.

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Photo of performance in a church
Zoomed in photo of performance in a church