Tenor 2018

Tenor’18 Performances – May 26

Tenor’18 Presentations – May 26

Tenor’18 Photos – May 26

Tenor’18 Performances – May 25

Tenor’18 Photos – May 25

Tenor’18 Performances – May 24

Tenor’18 Presentations – May 24

Tenor’18 Photos – May 24

Tenor’18 Photos – May 23

The first three TENOR conferences (2015 Paris, 2016 Cambridge, 2017 A Coruña) have established the growing relevance of emergent technologies of notation and representation for a wide range of musical practices: composers, performers, theoreticians, performance researchers, historians, ethnomusicologists, archivists etc.

The term “Technologies of Notation and Representation” encompasses the two principal modes of approaching performing arts by way of another medium: in order to either provide performers with a set of references or instructions that guide their performance (notation); or in order to de-ephemeralize (mostly: visualize) performance praxis for offline analysis or archiving (representation).

The core conference will be three-days long, one day at each university. In keeping with methodologies of research-creation, we will issue a call for scores alongside the call for papers. Works selected will be presented in workshop concerts / readings by well-known local ensembles such as Ensemble Supermusique, Quatuor Bozzini, and CLOrk (Concordia Laptop Orchestra). We will also offer, in parallel, a 5 day Performers’ Lab, for performers from all traditions interested in expanding their practice by performing scores that use new notational technologies.

The fourth TENOR conference will continue to offer a lively forum for current research into situative scores, softwares, hardwares, performance practices and theories of music notation and representation, but we also intend to expand the scope of the conference by calling for papers on:

critical, aesthetic and sociological examinations of the interactions between new notation technologies and performance
notation technologies for non-eurological and/or non-art music (incl. never-before-notated music)
notation/representation technologies for time-based arts beyond music (dance, performance art,  theatre, circus arts, animation, film etc.
notations for space, gesture, movement etc.
non-visual notation systems (tactile, aural, olfactory, etc.)
digital games as notation (music as game)
notation and neurocognition (how does music notation work? which interactions/relationships can exist  between specific notation technologies and neurocognition?)

In addition to papers, TENOR 2018 also calls for musical works using animated, rule-based, reactive, interactive or other situational and technology-based scores, to be read or performed during the conference.

Elliott Sharp

New York

Elliott Sharp, composer, producer, and multi-instrumentalist, leads the projects Orchestra Carbon, SysOrk, Tectonics and Terraplane. His work has encompassed the use of fractal geometry, chaos theory, algorithms, genetic metaphors, and graphic notation. Sharp has developed strategies using graphic editing software to process the score itself with techniques similar to ones used for processing sound: modulation, feedback, filtering, layering, distortion. This yields notation that both catalyze a synesthetic approach to musicmaking as well as functioning as retinal art.

May 24, 2018
8:00AM – 11:00 AM
A-607, Wirth Music Building, 527 Sherbrooke Street West

This workshop is limited to 12 people. Please apply at matralab (at) concordia.ca

$20 registration fee for the workshop – Register

Participants are strongly urged to bring their own computers with Max installed; an Ableton Live installation would be an additional boon. MaxScore will be installed at the beginning of the workshop; all participants will also receive a temporary JMSL license, required to run MaxScore. If you have an iPad, please bring it to demo Maxscore’s network capabilities.

May 25, 2018
9:00 AM -12:00 PM
Salle De Réunion, SB-4245 UQAM Montreal

This workshop is limited to 12 people. Please apply at matralab (at) concordia.ca

$20 registration fee for the workshop – Register

The workshop will introduce you to the world of “bach”, a Max library for real-time computer-aided composition, and of its related libraries “cage” and “dada”.

You will learn how to take advantage of bach to create and modify musical scores, and how to use them as timelines to control sound synthesis or other DSP processes. Scores can be used as symbolic buffers, to be recorded and played back. Traditional computer-aided composition processes will be presented, along with hints to more advanced capabilities (microtonality, constraint solving, quantization, meta-scores, database handling…). You will learn how to import/export data in MIDI and MusicXML format, and how to import SDIF analysis files. You will also learn the basics of how to handle bach nested lists, the hierarchical structures containing information about notation items and scores.

May 22-26, 2018

TENOR 2018 offers a workshop for performers during which participants will study and learn selected situative scores. These will be presented at an outcome concert at the close of the TENOR conference, on May 26th.

Terri Hron, an experienced performer/composer, will lead the Performer Lab and its participants through the different aspects important in performing a variety of situative scores.

Situative Scores are defined here as animated, rule-based, reactive, interactive or other situational and technology-based scores.

The workshop comprises the following:

aspects of the history and pedagogy of extended/situative scoring, including working on seminal pieces
practical experience with scores that engage a different focus: auditive, visual and interactive
discussions on working out the various (technological) challenges (we will have a tech coordinator on hand)
study sessions of existing scores, scores by TENOR composers and scores from the TENOR 2018 conference call and keynote speakers
workshops with two selected composers who will be present to rehearse and lead their pieces

Registration Fees	Can $
Regular early bird (before March 15)	120
Regular late	150
Student early bird (before March 15)	60
Student late	100
Day Passes (incl. Workshop Readings)	20
Performers Lab registration	150

Please note: We have been notified that our system sometimes does not accept credit card information. If you experience any difficulties processing your payment, please contact Jen Reimer, matralab (at) concordia.ca

Should you contact us about this problem before March 15, the early bird rate will always apply regardless of when we figure out your payment issue.