De Cock Tom. Increasing efficiency in the performance practice of contemporary percussion repertoire.
This research project focuses on specific contemporary repertoire for percussion. The compositions studied from the twentieth- and twenty-first-century repertoire are analyzed from a performance perspective. In addition, each work is provided with technical, practical , and interpretive support and guidelines. The output of this research process will be published on the online platform Living Scores Learn, which serves as an international open-source database and knowledge platform for percussion students from around the world. Master students of Koninklijk Conservatorium Brussel are involved in this research project through audio and video recordings of the studied compositions. These recordings, made by the students under the supervision of the researcher, will be added to the platform as a reference.
The artistic output of this research project is twofold. On the one hand, the researched works, which are selected annually within the Living Scores trajectory, serve as artistic starting points and inspiration for co-compositions with composer-performers such as Benjamin Van Esser, Frederik Croene, Cédric Dambrain, Joris Blanckaert, Ruud Roelofsen, Andrea Mancianti, Eva Reiter, etc. On the other hand, there is also the further development of the Micro-Percussion Hybrid Setup, the instrument designed in the framework of a FRArt grant (Liège, 2019–20). The instrument will be further developed and refined in function of the artistic process of the co-creations. This part of the research is additionally supported by Ictus and ChampdAction, and will be presented on Belgian concert venues.
Stragier Maarten. The hands that make works: Experiments with contemporary relations of musical production.
This research focuses on the contemporary functioning of the composer-performer relationship in the Western classical tradition, and on its implied notions of creative property. I develop this inquiry along two tracks. The first track consists of case studies on music written in the past half century. The works the researcher is particularly interested in fall into two categories: those of which the actual realization problematizes the notion of authorship latent in their surrounding discourse; and those that challenge dominant notions of the score as a means for mass-reproduction in the classical music industry. The second track consists of experiments with material conditions that cause the lines between composer and performer roles to shift and blur. These experiments are part of long-term collaborations with other musical creators, and their wide-ranging effects are the subject of continuous analysis.
Collective Creation
The research group Collective Creation explores and questions the contemporary functioning of creative roles inherited from the Western classical music tradition. Our activities develop along two tracks.
The first track consists of case studies of recent works. In these studies we investigate the relationship between composer, score, and performer in actual musical practice. We compare this practical reality to notions of authorship that might be present in the discursive context surrounding the work.
The second track is geared towards setting up collaborative creative structures that aim to move and potentially blur the lines between traditional roles like composer, performer, and audience. In so doing, we wish to examine the power structure these roles imply, and their effect on musical production.