Composition, Alternative Performance and Performance Art

Creative musicians gather to examine varied approaches to composition and make new music.

Larry Goves composer
Hanna Hartman sound artist & composer
Tim Parkinson composer
Amber Priestley composer
James Saunders composer
Juliet Fraser soprano
and members of The House of Bedlam

Led by leading figures in contemporary music with interest and practice overlapping with experimental performance art, this new course broadened the perspectives of open-minded composers and performers. Rather than dividing participants into categories, it seeks only to encourage the creation of new works.

Starting with an alternative narrative of historical performance art (traced through Dada, Bauhaus, and Fluxus) and how it shapes current experimental musical practice, participants will then work collaboratively in the forging of original works. Topics included different approaches to instruments; different roles in the creative process for performers and composers; fluidity between graphic, tablature and traditional notation; considering devised, composed and improvisation practice as equal stimuli in the creation of new music.