The Squid's Ear Magazine


Cuni, Amelia / Alex Mendizabal: Stimmen Aus Himmel Und Holle (ANTS Records)

Translating to "Voices from Heaven and Hell", the meeting of two Berlin artists--Amelia Cuni, whose vocal work is described as in/voluntary singing; and Alex Mendizabal, a sound artist who here electronically manipulates the voice of Cuni--using texts from poet Erin Honeycutt as the two apply diverse, fascinating and sometimes unnerving approaches to voice, utterance and expression.
 

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product information:

Personnel:



Amelia Cuni-vocals

Alex Mendizabal-electronics, composer

Erin Honeycutt -text


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Label: ANTS Records
Catalog ID: AG25
Squidco Product Code: 32403

Format: CD
Condition: New
Released: 2022
Country: Italy
Packaging: Cardboard Gatefold
Recorded at home, in Berlin, in 2021

Descriptions, Reviews, &c.

"Stimmen aus Himmel und Holle is a searching work. Search for a new voice. The appropriation of new living and sound spaces. The title "Voices from Heaven and Hell" has multiple meanings that intersect, revealing themselves to our ears.

There is the literal meaning, and therefore we hear (and sometime we "see") heaven and hell in sounds, through sounds. There is the meaning of the game ("Himmel und Holle" is the German name of the "Hopscotch" game which is often also called "Campana" or "Paradise" in Italy), where the soul - that stone thrown into the boxes drawn on the ground - starting from it arrives, in intermediate stages, in paradise. A path full of obstacles, difficulties, adversities, but also of great joy.

It is the meeting of two souls and many sounds. Amelia and her revolution of in/voluntary singing. Alex who literally brings together the voices, in a shared game of changes and reflections. It is an inverse path that generates music, outside the box of any music, through an exchange that becomes help and support, as a new language that is "created" from nothing, but which lives on knowledge, interdependence and coexistence of art and everyday life in the world."-ANTS


Artist Biographies

"Amelia Cuni was born in Milan and lived in India for more than 10 years learning dhrupad singing from renowned masters (i.e. R. Fahimuddin Dagar and Bidur Mallik, Pt. Dilip Chandra Vedi). She also studied kathak dance and pakhawaj drumming. She received a three year scholarship from the Indian government. Since 1987, she performs internationally: i.e. solo concerts at Nehru Centre in Bombay, Kamani and I.I.C. in N.Delhi, the House of World Cultures, Podewil, Hebbel-Theater, Akademie der Kunste and Schauspielhaus in Berlin, Gasteig in Munich, Zentrum f. Kunst u. Medientechnologie in Karlsruhe, Barbican Centre, Institute for Contemporary Arts and Purcell Room in London, Jisbreker and Tropical Museum in Amsterdam, Yerba Buena Center in San Francisco, Filarmonica and Auditorium in Rome, Merkin Hall in NYC, Casa da Musica and Serralves Museum in Porto etc.

Since 1992, she is based in Berlin. Her music is featured on several solo CDs and collaborations. She has recorded for radio and TV productions. Amelia's projects are of traditional and experimental orientation as well. She collaborates with artists from various backgrounds (early and new music, electronica, ambient, experimental, jazz, folk, dance and theatre.) With her own works she has taken part in international festivals in the UK, Germany, Italy, France, Switzerland, Belgium, Holland, Hungary, Poland, Spain, Portugal, India, China, Brazil, Canada and the USA. Together with Werner Durand she has been awarded an ARTIST IN RESIDENCE grant at the Podewil - Zentrum fur Aktuelle Kunst in Berlin for 1999. The City of Berlin has featured them in the Festival of Vision 2000-Berlin in Hong Kong and Berlin_London 2001.

She has conceived and performs worldwide the multimedia work ASHTAYAMA - Song of Hours. Composers like Terry Riley, Roland Pfrengle, Chico Mello, Fernando Grillo, Maria de Alvear have written for her voice. She has collaborated on experimental projects with David Toop, Paul Schutze, David Moss a.o. In 2005.

She performed with Terry Riley in a duo concert titled RAGA D�OLTREOCEANO (Contempo/Montefalco, Contemporanea/Udine, CentrodArte/Padova).At the new music festival Maerzmusik/Berliner Festspiele (Berlin, March 2006) she premiered the complete John Cage's SOLO 58 (18 microtonal ragas) from his SONG BOOKS (1970) coproduced and hosted by: Expozice nov hudby in Brno (Czek Rep.); Musicadhoy in Madrid; Autumn Festival in Budapest; Casa da Musica, Porto; Voix Nouvelles - Fondation Royaumont; Handelsbeurs, Gent; in 2007, Amelia will presented this production at the festivals: Ultima, Oslo and Stavanger and the Venice Biennale. Also in California: in Berkeley and Los Angeles.

She teaches Indian singing at the Conservatorio di Vicenza and at the University der Kunste in Berlin."

-Amelia Cuni Website (http://www.ameliacuni.de/f_home.php?lang=0)
3/13/2024

Have a better biography or biography source? Please Contact Us so that we can update this biography.

"Alex Mendizabal (Donostia, 1961) deals with pause and silence. His works include blind films, poems soaked with sound, concerts in movement or underwater music. Alex will perform one of his renowned battimenti, using balloons and whistles to invoke psychoacoustic phenomena such as Tartini tones."

-Rhizome (https://rhizome.org/community/47056/)
3/13/2024

Have a better biography or biography source? Please Contact Us so that we can update this biography.

"Erin Honeycutt (1989) writes poetry, exhibition reviews, and a variety of texts in collaboration with artists. She studied Art History (MA, University of Iceland) and Religion (MA, University of Amsterdam) and now lives in Berlin."

-Erin Honeycutt Website (https://erinhoneycutt.persona.co/)
3/13/2024

Have a better biography or biography source? Please Contact Us so that we can update this biography.


Track Listing:



1. Aria 3:32

2. Ezina Nai Ez, Ze I An An I Ze 1:52

3. Bambu 2:32

4. The Folk Metaphysics 1:04

5. Voci In Campana 3:00

6. Assai 4:00

7. So To Speak 3:03

8. Hopscotch Ba Z Be 1:27

9. Una 2:20

10. Orologio 3:44

11. Pop Off 0:27

Related Categories of Interest:


Electro-Acoustic
Unusual Vocal Forms
Electronic Forms
Spoken Word
European Improvisation, Composition and Experimental Forms
Duo Recordings
New in Experimental & Electronic Music
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