Music for My Oma

A line-up of concerts and sound performances organized by Kunstinstituut Melly in partnership with the Amarte Foundation, as part of the 'Melly X Amarte' sound art and music program. The program was initiated in September 2023 with an open call for existing or newly proposed music or sound pieces inspired by grandmothers or ancestral knowledge. This is the line-up of performances, taking place throughout the galleries and spaces at Kunstinstituut Melly from 8-10 December 2023.

Friday 8 December 5 – 9 pm

6 PM
Channa Boon, Khachapuri

Channa Boon will play a 20-minute sound piece using 64 ceramics, each in the shape of Khachapuri, a traditional Georgian bread. Boon co-creates with the ‘Acoustic Body’, a term she coined that speaks to an experience of presence and energy in the inanimate and inaudible. Although her family restricts any conversations about the dead, Boon has always felt her grandmother as a presence, one that is strong, loving, and supportive; in that sense, this piece is performed for her as well.

7 PM
Elsa van der Linden, In binnen in

Elsa van der Linden performs a solo set that embarks on a search for polyphony within the self. Wondering whether she might resemble the younger version of her grandmother, or if her mother might share features with her great-grandmother, or whether her mother might be represented in a future generation.. As a saxophonist, Van der Linden can only play one tone at a time, but through improvisation, graphic scores, and performative objects, she questions how to make consonance with herself.

7:30 PM
Cosmic Bride, A performance in _____

Natalia Kharetskaya: voice, body, sensors
Tomas Valečka: sound engineer
Raz van Isac: visual artist

Cosmic Bride, the artistic act of Natalia Kharetskaya, presents A performance in _____, a 30-minute immersive experience. Described as ‘3D audio,’ the piece foregrounds its setting to welcome the audience into the music itself, conceived as a piece of sonic architecture. The audience can wander around and hear and feel the music spatially, as it travels above their heads and behind their backs. Through wearable sensor technology, Cosmic Bride alters the sounds of both her own voice and the accompanying string quartet.

8 PM
Het Duo Leve: Jasperina Verheij and Mathilde Lettinga

Performing compositions by:

J. Dowland (1563-1626) / J. van Eyck (1589-1657) - Flow my Tears
L. Malossi (1996) - RUZIE (2023)
E. Beunk (1999) - Vacuüm (2023)
G. Jacob (1895-1984) - Flow my Tears

Jasperina Verheij and Mathilde Lettinga perform a series of compositions spanning between the 1500s and today, sharing songs that build on each other through improvisation and re-interpretation. A primary component of the work is a poem that used to hang in the bathroom of Mathilde’s grandmother’s house; poetry now permeates the music both artists play. Central to the piece is an intergenerational conflict born from misunderstanding, that becomes ultimately resolved in an emotional and connected manner.

8:30 PM
12 Tribes of Mars, Past Times​

Andrius Dereviancenko - saxophone/fx
​James McClure - trumpet/fx
Azubike Onwuk- - bass guitar
Franky Douglas - guitar
Dario Trapani - guitar
Onno Govaert - drums

Performing their original music at Kunstinstituut Melly, Tribes of Mars will share a set made for dancing. Originating from diverse age groups and cultural, musical, and geographical backgrounds – from improvisation to pop to funk, from Africa to the Caribbean – the group will combine their sounds into a seamless composition. In between songs, they will explore the acoustics of the gallery space, blending and processing them live with effects. Challenging both the spatial dynamics and the rhythm of the listeners, they will incorporate quick mood changes and surprising extensions to keep listeners on their toes.

Saturday 9 December, 2 – 6 pm

5 pm
Melvin Moti, Rootless

Melvin Moti extends the idea of ‘rootless voicing’ – a term closely associated with the piano style of jazz pianist Bill Evans – to the idea of the rootless self. Generations of (im)migration in Moti’s family have created a certain rootlessness. But like in jazz, where there are no wrong notes on a piano, so every chord, no matter how rootless, has a home, the artist sees familial rootlessness also as a good thing. Having to adapt to new environments and figure things out for oneself encourages a familiarity with change. For My Oma, Moti performs a piece beginning with noise and chaos, from which musical ideas will appear. The electronic music, ranging from aggressive to minimal, will reflect a feeling of rootlessness.

5:30 pm
Peter Scherrebeck / Misty Superdeluxe, Hide my Face

Choreography/Composition/Performance: Peter Scherrebeck / Misty Superdeluxe

Performance:
Paca Faraus
Ceramics / Counseling:
Christin Johansson

Peter Scherrebeck / Misty Superdeluxe with Paca Faraus present Hide My Face, a work based on a praxis they developed called ‘Mouth Singing.’ Performing a song written by Scherrebeck en route to Portugal, on a journey through the maternal line and intergenerational trauma, two figures take up various positions as they sing into each other’s mouths. As they sing, their bodies use one another as a resonance chamber, and they become vessels through which the past, present, and future flow. Accompanying the performers is a video installation inside a ceramic vase, displaying another iteration of the performance.

Sunday 10 December, 2 – 6 pm

3:30 pm
Maria Magdalena Kozłowska, COMMUNE

For My Oma, Maria Magdalena Kozłowska along with Teresa Costa (flute), Beatrice Miniaci (flute) and Bjørk Delcroix Semey (double bass) will perform a selection of songs written for her opera COMMUNE, conceived as a tribute to her own grandmother, who appears in the piece as a hybrid between herself and Rosa Luxemburg. In the work, the ghost of a communist grandmother teaches young musicians how opera can be used as a form of resistance.

4 pm
Eveline Ypma, 10

Eveline Ypma shares a new ambient work that commemorates her grandmother, who passed away in February this year. Wanting to find places where her grandmother had felt happiness, Ypma was drawn to the beach campsite where her family had holidayed every summer for ten years. Made along the route from the campsite’s entrance to the sea – a journey her grandmother would often make – Ypma’s piece, 10, combines local environmental sounds, instrumental compositions, and voice, lasting the same 17 minutes of the walk’s duration.

4:30 pm
Gabriel de Oliveira, Where Dona Nina Saw The Fire

Gabriel de Oliveira: 8-string guitar, electronics, vocals
River Adomeit: double bass, vocals
Zenzele Mthembu-Salter: electric bass, vocals
Sberna: vocals

Gabriel de Oliveira presents a new commission that reveals how the musicality embedded in his grandmother Nina’s life, struggle, and surroundings has paved the way for his own creativity, aiming to make a bridge between their timelines. The series of new compositions collects songs, spoken word, instrumental scores, and samples of Nina’s speech, performed and arranged by a small mostly acoustic ensemble. Much of the material is translated from a spontaneous audio recording of an interview with Nina, made by the artist in 2021 upon a visit to his father’s hometown of Guarulhos, Brazil. The recording captures not only Nina’s stories, but the organic and day-to-day sounds of her household. Departing from this sonic information, de Oliveira’s work incorporates songwriting, regional Brazilian rhythms, and choral singing. The series imagines the spaces of his grandmother’s stories, sonically mapping the geographies of her life.

5:30 pm
Mallet Collective, Mallet Collective plays Keiko Abe, grandmother of marimba

Mallet Collective play works composed by Keiko Abe, the ‘grandmother of the marimba.’ Abe, a Japanese marimba player and composer, who invented the marimba as we know it today, makes music that always has a connection with nature and rituals. Her music is a big inspiration for Mallet Collective, who have worked and performed with her in Japan. The collective also draws on the work of other composers who build on Abe’s unique style. Responding to Abe’s wish to expand her audience and preserve her work, Mallet Collective, as ‘grandsons of Abe,’ are happy to make music in conversation with her legacy.