regular news about vocal instant composition ensemble Genetic Choir
Genetic Choir will give this Saturday morning a concert in the Jungle in Amsterdam, as part of the Song of Yoga series: A yoga class combined with a concert. Illustrious improvisers like Ernst Reijseger and Erik Bosgraaf were in the monthly line-up this year, so we are in great company.
Bring your mat and experience the Genetic Choir who will accompany, deepen and trigger the yoga practice of the yogi/listeners! —> Reservations here.
Saturday 16 November 2024
11:00 until 12:30
Venue: Jungle Amsterdam, Tweede van Swindenstraat 26, Amsterdam
Our dementia project goes to Brabant!
We made plans, together with contemporary music festival November Music to bring the Stem&Luister project to Den Bosch in the coming year. In preparation of that, two Genetic Choir workshops by Kristien Sonnevijlle and the documentary film “Beyond Words” by Kim Brand will be part of the festival this year already!
You can join on either 8 or 15 November 2024 – 14:00-17:00 – Stem&Luister workshop in the Verkadefabriek
The workshops are free, but you need to reserve your spot here:
https://www.novembermusic.net/programma/stem-luister-genetic
From 8 till 12 November 2024, the documentary film about the Stem&Luister project – “Beyond Words” (20 min) – is shown in the hall of the Verkadefabriek – in a specially prepared glasshouse – in a continuous loop during festival times.
Nina Stefanovski, – a journalist from the Dutch nationwide newspaper NRC – followed us in our Stem&Luister project, where we make contact with people with last-phase dementia and wrote a beautiful article about it!
Here is the online article on the NRC website, but if you are not let in, you can also read this pdf of the article as it appears in the printed newspaper:
When there are sounds or silence, there is TIME. There is no escaping it, so as improvisers, we better explore the substance of time and get to know it intimately. Let’s get our hands dirty with all the different aspects of time – beginnings, endings, phrasing, suspense, and of course beats and pulse and rhythm, to just name a few. But also in a single long tone, and in the delivery of a song, there are layers and layers of time to explore.
This Autumn’s Friday Morning Sessions will look through the lense of TIME at Genetic Choir training and at improvising together!
Time is the friend of improvisers, although sometimes, it can feel like the opposite is true.
The Friday Morning Sessions deliver Genetic Choir training in eight workshops on Friday mornings, to which you subscribe as a whole. Each Autmumn and Spring, there is a new take on the proven Genetic Choir principles of instant composing, facilitated by artistic director Thomas Johannsen. Vocal work and body work is intertwined to train you in all aspects of voice improvisation.
The commitment of the group strengthens the training and ensures that we can go deep into the matter quickly, on every consecutive session.
The set of dates this Autumn are:
4, 11 & 18 oktober
8 & 15 november
29 nov, 6 & 13 december
Eight workshops of 2,5 hours: 248 euro
Times: 10:00-12:30
More info here – direct link to reserve your place is here.
New to Genetic Choir? Note that you should do an Intro Workshop first. Look here for the dates.
The Amsterdam television channel AT5 has made an item about the Stem&Luister project, which also features – for the first time outside the cinema – sequences of the black-and-white documentary of Kim Brand!
Watch it here, and please share with people who might be interested to join the project as singers: https://www.at5.nl/artikelen/227342/zangkoor-helpt-dementerende-ouderen-om-uit-isolement-te-komen
The documentary film by Kim Brand about Genetic Choir’s Stem&Luister project is selected by the Sheffield DocFest, one of the biggest documentary festivals in the world! The world premiere is set to 15 June 2024 – next week Saturday – and will thus happen in Sheffield, England.
Follow this link: https://www.sheffdocfest.com/film/beyond-words
There is also a trailer in the making, but for now we can make you excited about it with a set of stills from the film:
It was a wonderful ride to make this film, together with Kim Brand and her filming team. Thanks again to everyone involved.
Stem&Luister is training anyone who would like to become a singer-volunteer!
(How? Click here.)
To make meaningful contact via musical listening and a playful voice with people in the last phase of dementia.
If you are curious and want to get involved, please get in touch with Lina (lina@genetic-choir.org) and/or have a look at the project webpage:
This Sunday @WORM, Rotterdam: an open studio where Genetic Choir singers will share their performance research for a new project!
Worktitle of the project is Absence/Presence.
UBIK in Worm
Boomgaardsstraat 69-71, 3012 XA Rotterdam
more info / reserve here
During a small residency at Worm this week, Genetic Choir singers explore the state of being absent and being present. We do this through sound and music, coupled with a sound-reactive light system and the swarm composition approach of the Genetic Choir. Collaborators for these research days are: NOW (Marion Tränkle and Ivo Bol)
You are welcome to join the last afternoon of research, in an open studio setting from 14:30-16:00.
Invited by theartofvoice.nl, Thomas will give another masterclass weekend in intimate setting (max. 6 singers) in the cosy living-room studio of Yinske Silva in Amsterdam. It will be two days of training in a safe and supportive setting one of the most exposed situations of being a vocal improvisor : The Solo and the Duet.
When?
29 + 30 June – 10:00-17:00 – lunch included!
How much?
235,- euro
Where?
Roelantstraat 10, Amsterdam
How to reserve a place?
https://theartofvoice.nl/singing-as-a-swarm-solo-and-duo-improvisations/
And what will we do?
Improvising in front of an audience is a special skill that asks a lot from your technique and attitude as an improviser. In this masterclass, based on Genetic Choir’s Singing as a Swarm approach, we will totally focus on this special situation: How to create meaningful music when the music is not prepared and set? We have a small group and therefore can focus on your personal habits of standing in front of an audience with your bare hands. It is a masterclass for improvisers with experience. Maybe you have improvised a lot in different workshop circumstances already but seldom as a solo or duet performer and you want to develop that skill. Maybe you already have a lot of experience as a solo improviser but want to be challenged on what you usually do and get new inspiration through the Genetic Choir approach of instant vocal music. We will have a playful and absorbing weekend as we will perform Duets (in fact an extended solo situation), as well as Solo’s (which is a duet with yourself ). Singing duets will teach us about singing solo and vice versa.
See you on the weekend!
Invited by the University of Cologne, Germany, there will be a Zoom lecture to join for those of you interested in the dementia project of the Genetic Choir and our recently published article.
Here the official invitation:
Dear Research Community,
we cordially invite you to our next exciting lecture of the “Phenomenology of Dementia and Aging Network” on Monday, 22.04.2023, 14.00-15.30 (CET, online via Zoom), held by Thomas Johannsen (Amsterdam).
The title of the talk is: “Making Dementia Matter Through Sound – The Stem&Luister project of the Genetic Choir”
Thomas Johannsen is artistic director of the Genetic Choir Ensemble in Amsterdam and co-author of the recently published article “Making Dementia Matter through Sound – The Stem&Luister project of the Genetic Choir”: https://geneticchoir.wordpress.com/2024/03/11/scientific-paper-published-making-dementia-matter-through-sound/
He will give an introduction to the article’s findings and the Stem&Luister project itself, in which singers of the Genetic Choir employ an experimental approach to the voice and ensemble improvisation to make meaningful contact with people in advanced phases of dementia. The project has been running for four years now in a care home in Amsterdam, followed by anthropologist Marjolein Gysels, who is the main author of the article.
Everyone is welcome, so please spread the word to anyone interested.
Zoom-link: https://uni-koeln.zoom.us/j/91365214213?pwd=cWFRQnZKcjlMY3RzNEdISHMzU09GUT09
Meeting-ID: 913 6521 4213
Password: 252346
Best wishes from Cologne and Kassel,
Dr. Erik Norman Dzwiza-Ohlsen, M.A. Ragna Winniewski & M.A. Christine Keller,
Phenomenology of Dementia and Aging Network,
Husserl Archives Cologne/a.r.t.e.s. Graduate School for the Humanities Cologne/NAR
Just a note today about the way Genetic Choir practice is spreading internationally…
Last week, Thomas was invited to give a Genetic Choir workshop to the young, international singers of the NKK NXT programme of the Dutch Chamber Choir (Nederlands Kamerkoor).
A week before, he spent two days in Brugge, Belgium, sharing Genetic Choir practice with the students and teachers of the Buckminster College, an initiative of the Vrije Universiteit Brussels to “reimagine international, interregional, intercultural education for ages 10-18”.
Upcoming is an online lecture for the University of Cologne, Germany, and the “Phenomenology of Dementia and Aging Network”, about Genetic Choir’s take on working with people with dementia in the Stem&Luister project. In the lecture, Thomas will give an introduction to the recently published article ‘Making Dementia Matter Through Sound‘.
We’ll share the Zoom link for the lecture as soon as it comes available.
UPDATE –> it’s on Monday 22 April, 14:00-15:30 and the Zoom link is here!