sequenza

..Ein Blick über das verlassene Zentrum Berlins am Potsdamer Platz am Ende der 60er. Musik: Eruption (Conrad Schnitzler, Klaus Freudigmann, Wolfgang Sequenza Seidel The deserted center of Berlin at the end of the sixties with the atmospheric music of music by: Conrad Schnitzler, Wolfgang Seidel, Klaus Freudigmann.)
recorded ca 1972, released 2006 by QBICO (www.qbicorecords.com)

The Wire-November 2005 issue 261:
"Eruption was a multidisciplinary freeform ensemble put together by cellist, violinist and early electronic improvisors Conrad Schnitzler in 1970 as an adjunct to his work with Kraut bahamoths Tangerine Dream and Kluster. They seem to have functioned more as a thinktank for the then explosive Krautrock scene than a straightforward gigging group, with a revolving memebership that at points included members of Embryo, Ash Ra Tempel and Agitation Free. Details of Eruption's Berlin actions have appeared in most comprehensive German rock overviews, but up until now there has been no audio documentation, making Qbico's archival unearthing of a 1970 live performance from Studio Freudigmann, Berlin all the more significant. Although the picture on the back features footage of a big band show with members of Amon Dulul and Ash Ra Tempel, the LP documents a trio set from Schnitzler, Wolfgang Seidel and Klaus Freudigmann that is much more punk than the group's links to such centres of kosmische boatfloat might suggest. The music starts out fairly fragmented, with sustained violin drones caught in a flux of scattershot percussion, short passages of silence and wowing effects. Although it feels a little tentative at first, this slightly more deliberate approach is borne of a hard-thinking improvisatory ethos, based more on exploring aspects of interactive dialogue than free rock gush. But after the parameters of the exchange have been fully established, the trio start to move the music out, with tracks based around oscillating analogue tones, feral violin and distorted improvised vocals that sound uncannily like the freeform punk of Dylan Nyoukis's Blood Stereo and Decaer Pinga. Side two feels a little more of its time -a good thing- with fuzz-wah, organ and drums generating circular hymns to nada that are as ferociously monosyllabic as anything by Klaus Dinger's La Dusseldorf. The inspired combination of rock dynamics, freely improvised dialogue and manhandled electronics makes this another one of those historically upending releases that captures a moment of conceptual precognition decades before it would be fully assimilated. But all the jawdropping formal considerations aside, Eruption makes for a thrilling stand-alone ride" David Keenan

> see video

another video one from the same session:



> see video

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Conrad Schnitzler: The Cassette Concerts

.. Conrad Schnitzler, German pioneer of cold, hard, electric sound, has refused to stay dormant in the 35 years since his collaborations with Tangerine Dream and Kluster, as well as his own legendary group, Eruption. He has spewed forth a phenomenal amount of sound and noise in every format, from player piano rolls to MP3s. ...

... But Schnitzler's grounding in modern art has had more of an effect on the way he makes music than he might be willing to admit. Notoriously publicity shy, it has been several decades since he last performed in public, preferring to delegate the duties to two appointed 'conductors', one based in New York and one in Berlin, who are given a set of prerecorded CD-Rs and the leeway to realise whatever mix of the four they feel like on the night! Indeed, high concept art actions have always been Schnitzler's preferred way of presenting his music. He has performed while daubed, Otto Muehl-style, in body paint, and elsewhere participated in street actions involving a specially constructed motorcycle helmet with built-in loudspeaker, the highlights of which were included on CONvideo70s, briefly available from Qbico and now out of print.

"Oh, that was a nice story," Schnitzler beams. "This was around the time that I was fed up trying to keep it together to feed myself and was trying to work out how to make my art but still get enough money to eat. I had a transport bicycle with an amp attached to it and a tape recorder, and then my white leather gear and my helmet with a loudspeaker horn built in. If I played my music on the street, the police would always come along and tell me to move, so this way I could just walk on but keep playing the music out of the helmet. People would say, 'What's this? Crazy music? Can I buy it?' I just reached around into my knapsack where I had a bunch of handmade cassettes. I would make about 100-120 marks just by walking around and I was getting money every day. It was amazing. Sometimes my friends would recognise me and come up to me, say, 'Hey, Con, what are you doing?' I would just speak to them in a robot voice through the loudspeaker. 'I do not understand. I am not Con. Would you like to buy a cassette?"'
The Wire, UK (issue 267, May 2006)

Alles, was ich als einer der beiden "appointed 'conductors', one based in New York (siehe Blog) and one in Berlin" für ein Kassetten-Konzert brauche: CDs (ja, die Kassetten sind auf praktischere CDs überspielt), CD-Player und Mischpult.

All I need as one of the "appointed 'conductors', one based in New York (see my blog) and one in Berlin" for a cassette concert fits as in one case (yes, the original cassettes have been transferred on cd).

Auschnitt aus einem Kassetten Konzert in der Galerie Transition, Berlin 2003. (mehr im blog...)

A cassette concert at Galerie Transition , Berlin 2003
Music composed by Conrad Schnitzler, conducted/remixed by Wolfgang Seidel Video instalation by Dani Haerle on multiple monitors
for more information see my blog...

see video


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Changing Channels - London Biennale Pollinations

Vernissage 24. August 2003 - 20 Uhr
Borders
by Ryan S. Lemke

Vibraphone performance: Wolfgang Seidel

mehr / more information: www.zero-project.org


> see video

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