BREATH & HAMMER: THE TIES THAT BIND US
Breath & Hammer: The Ties that Bind Us is an immersive concert experience that envelops the audience in an array of sound and images. Originally designed for the Pierre Boulez Saal’s multi-level, in-the-round hall, Breath & Hammer: The Ties That Bind Us is a new incarnation of the Breath & Hammer Electric program transformed into a live videography, spatialized surround-sound multisensory concert experience.
The Breath & Hammer project is a passionate, eclectic and highly personal musical journey representing the confluence of many streams: the strong foundations of both performers as classical concert musicians, Krakauer’s years as a klezmer innovator, composer, band leader and avant-garde experimentalist, and Tagg’s multi-faceted career creating and performing for the stage and theater, as well as her skills as an arranger and producer. Krakauer & Tagg share a constant quest to redefine the sounds and roles of their instruments and push far outside the boundaries of the traditional clarinet and piano recital by including extended techniques, loops and samples (all generated from either the piano or the clarinet). In the words of Krakauer & Tagg: “Fundamentally, Breath & Hammer is about connections between people and a celebration of identity through music. The program is a mix of our own compositions along with our arrangements of song-form pieces gifted to us by our brilliant friends and collaborators from totally different backgrounds, genres and musical points of view.”
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For this fully immersive show, Breath & Hammer: The Ties That Bind Us, Tagg created a brand new set of “tape piece” interludes that act as bridges between the different pieces on the program. These interludes travel throughout the space within the hall through a surround-sound speaker configuration, creating a sonic representation of musical offerings from one piece to the next as well as a nod to the ties that connect us to one another no matter how far apart we may seem. Some interludes begin with elements from the preceding piece that may be unrecognizable in their new context, and that then invite elements of the next piece to join them and lead into the next piece.
Through the use of live cameras and videographer Jesse Gilbert’s original audio-reactive visual instrument, SpectralGL, the audience is invited to form a more immediate and intimate relationship with the performers and their creative process as it unfolds. The original video design, projected onto a translucent hexagon of scrims surrounding the performers, was custom-made for the in-the-round performance space of Berlin’s Pierre Boulez Saal. However, Breath & Hammer: The Ties That Bind Us is able to adapt to the unique needs of each performance space and is equally at home in a proscenium or in-the-round hall.
Through the use of live cameras and videographer Jesse Gilbert’s original audio-reactive visual instrument, SpectralGL, the audience is invited to form a more immediate and intimate relationship with the performers and their creative process as it unfolds. The original video design, projected onto a translucent hexagon of scrims surrounding the performers, was custom-made for the in-the-round performance space of Berlin’s Pierre Boulez Saal. However, Breath & Hammer: The Ties That Bind Us is able to adapt to the unique needs of each performance space and is equally at home in a proscenium or in-the-round hall.
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