INDUSTRY trailer

Trailer for video clip of INDUSTRY, released in May 2015 on Cantaloupe Music. DOWNLOAD on iTunes  DOWNLOAD at Cantaloupe Music
Music: Michael Gordon. Video: Marcel Wierckx. Modified violin: Monica Germino. Recording & sound design: Frank van der Weij.
"...In her fiery performance of composer Michael Gordon's "tour-de-force of slowly rising intensity" [The Daily Telegraph], violinist Monica Germino revels in pushing the signal-processed limits of her instrument in collaboration with sound designer Frank van der Weij. Filmed and edited by video artist Marcel Wierckx, Industry captures a bold, futuristic and ultimately high-voltage vision of one of the most compelling works in new classical music." 

A personal note about Michael Gordon's Industry:
For years I have been fascinated with Michael Gordon's modern-day classic piece, Industry (written in 1993, for solo cello and distortion). He translated his vision of the cello as "an instrument made of steel and the size of a football field" into sound. The piece has an incredibly slow, intense build-up and sounds nothing like a classical solo string piece. It defies categorization. Michael asked me to create the definitive violin version of Industry, and sent me the cello score. I kept the score around and puzzled with it off and on for a couple of years. I came up with a rather extreme solution: using an adapted, amplified, extreme scordatura violin plus octave machine and distortion. I worked closely with my sound engineer Frank van der Weij to accomplish this feat. This combination of adapted violin and effects has been referred in the press to as 'elegant rock' (Trouw, NL) and 'a tour-de-force of slowly rising intensity' (Daily Telegraph, UK)
Many thanks to the FPK, the Dutch Foundation for the Performing Arts, for supporting the groundbreaking work we did in this area. --Monica Germino

 
 
 
 

Live on Podium Witteman, fragment from MUTED for singing violinist by Louis Andriessen

Molly Joyce: Shapeshifter

New Amsterdam Records
From the new single "Lean Back and Release"

Featuring Monica Germino on violin
Composed by Molly Joyce
 

Annie Gosfield: Long Waves and Random Pulses (excerpt)- Live at NOTU in Tivoli, Utrecht

Monica Germino, violin | Frank van der Weij, sound engineer
LIVE at NOTU (Night of the Unexpected) in Tivoli; Utrecht, The Netherlands

You're listening to excerpts from:
Annie Gosfield's Long Waves and Random Pulses (2012), for violin and electronics

Video by Aad van Nieuwkerk for VPRO www.radio4.nl/eigentijds

notes by the composer:
Long Waves and Random Pulses is a duet for violin and jammed radio signals. I composed and researched the piece at the American Academy in Berlin, using original recordings of jamming sounds that were used to block radio transmissions in Italy, Germany, and the Soviet Union in World War II. The violin merges and emerges, shifting from music, to noise, to pure signal while fading in and out of the sounds of intentional radio interference. The electronic backing track includes a repeated six-note figure that was drawn from original recordings of an Italian radio jamming device, a buzzing pitched pulse from a German jamming device, a quote from J. S. Bach's Chaconne in D Minor as it could have been heard in a jammed broadcast, and many extended techniques that evoke the sounds of these otherworldly radio signals. The violin part alternates between virtuosic and textural playing, shifting between notes and noise, custom made for Monica's great technique and dramatic performance skills. I considered how a listener might perceive these unpredictable shifting sounds when he or she turned on the radio and was confronted with the odd results of two very different signals competing for the same wavelength, as well as the constant transformation and the dynamic tension between music, noise, and the interference of pure signal. As for the title, Long Waves refers to the long wave radio frequencies that many of these interrupted signals were broadcast on. Random Pulses represents a method of radio jamming that uses a random pulse noise to override the program broadcast on the target radio frequency.
-Annie Gosfield

fragment: Julia Wolfe's With a blue dress on

(US premiere), Bang on a Can Marathon in NYC

for live violin/voice, 4 prerecorded violins & 4 prerecorded voices, performed by one player & one sound designer.

Monica Germino, violin/vocals/backing track. Frank van der Weij, sound design

 
 

Louis Andriessen's La Girò: excerpts from the world premiere at MITO

Excerpts from the world premiere of Louis Andriessen's La Girò, for violin and large ensemble. MITO Settembre Musica Festival - 5 September, 2011, Milan, Italy.
Monica Germino, violin/voice
David Atherton, conductor
London Sinfonietta
Sound Intermedia

Read more

excerpts from the world premiere of Louis Andriessen's La Girò, for violin and large ensemble. MITO Settembre Musica Festival - 5 September, 2011, Milan, Italy. Monica Germino, violin/voice; David Atherton, conductor; London Sinfonietta;
Sound Intermedia

Louis Andriessen's La Girò for violin and large ensemble features Monica Germino as soloist, and has a distinctly Italian theme as the composer explains: "When Enzo Restagno asked me to write a piece for this year's MITO Festival, I was honoured because in the early sixties I lived in Italy for a year, and ever since then I have felt a strong bond with that country.
In La Girò I am musing about a composer I admire a lot: maestro Antonio Vivaldi. The title refers to Anna Girò, Vivaldi's favourite singer. The piece would not have become the 'performance' it is without its dedicatee, the violinist Monica Germino. The soloist (La Girò, perhaps?) does not only play the violin. She also sings an Italian song, whispers and talks, tells stories and dreams. The ensemble consists of a small chamber orchestra, with an added piano, harp, cimbalom and some percussion. The piece has four parts: the first three form a kind of concertino while the actual musical drama takes place in the fourth, slow part."

selected performances:

World premiere: 5 September
MITO Settembre Musica Festival (2011), Milan and Turin, Italy
Teatro Dal Verme; Milano, Italy - Live broadcast by Italian National Radio 3

6 September: Conservatorio Giuseppe Verdi; Torino, Italy
Monica Germino, violin/voice; David Atherton, conductor; London Sinfonietta;
Sound Intermedia
info London Sinfonietta: www.londonsinfonietta.org.uk
info MITO: www.mitosettembremusica.it
info Boosey: www.boosey.com

Netherlands premiere: 12 January 2012
Donderdagavondserie - PROMS: The dreams of Anna Girò;
Muziekgebouw aan 't IJ in Amsterdam
Monica Germino, violin/voice; Reinbert de Leeuw, conductor; Asko|Schönberg
Live broadcast by Dutch National Radio 4 (NTR)
info: www.muziekgebouw.nl
info: www.askoschoenberg.nl

USA premiere: 28 February 2012
Green Umbrella Series: Walt Disney Hall, Los Angeles, CA, U.S.A.
Monica Germino, violin/voice; Cristina Zavalloni, voice; Reinbert de Leeuw, conductor; L.A. Philharmonic New Music Group
info: http://latimesblogs.latimes.com

13 July 2012: International Bartók Seminar and Festival, Hungary
http://www.bartokfestival.com/en/fest...

3 September in Utrecht, NL
…and more!

My Private Odyssey with Club Guy & Roni

My Private Odyssey is a co-production with Club Guy & Roni, the German company tanzmainz, and the musical dream team of composer David Dramm, composer and pianist Tomoko Mukaiyama, violinist Monica Germino, and fluitist Anne La Berge. The three musicians are on stage with ten dancers, accompanied by the images of WERC video collective and a text by Ko van den Bosch (Alex d’Electrique, NNT). Martin J. A. Lambeek, sound. Choreography by Guy Weizman/ Club Guy & Roni. Dancers: Mariya Bushuyeva, Angela Herenda de Kroo, Sofiko Nachkebiya, Tijana Prendovic, Marc Borras, Camilo Chapela, Adam Peterson, Igor Podsiadly, Lewis Seivwright, Zachary Chant

Heiner Goebbels: Bagatellen Part 6, for amplified violin & distortion, sampler

Heiner Goebbels: Bagatellen Part 6, for amplified violin & distortion, sampler
Premiered by Monica Germino, amplified violin & distortion effects
Tomoko Mukaiyama, sampler
An adventurous new work by German composer/theater director Heiner Goebbels, written on the request of Stichting Prime and Monica Germino.
The music was later used as an integral part of Club Guy & Roni's dance production 'Poetic Disasters', which toured throughout Europe.

Donnancha Dennehy: Overstrung (excerpts)

Donnacha Dennehy: Overstrung (2010) - excerpts
for amplified acoustic violin and soundtrack

written for Monica Germino (violin) and Frank van der Weij (sound)

The New York Times, about OVERSTRUNG:
"Monica Germino Puts Electronics and Violin Together, and Myriad Sounds Ensue"

"In Donnacha Dennehy's "Overstrung" for amplified acoustic violin and soundtrack, a few well-placed pizzicato notes helped to ground the static flyaway sound of digitally processed harmonics. It felt sometimes as if the overtones of the notes themselves had entered into a conversation with one another."
- by Corinna da Fonseca-Wollheim, June 2013

Donnacha Dennehy: "The attraction of doing anything with electronics or recorded sound for me is in trying to create some sort of imaginative world not possible in the purely acoustic realm. For a while now I've been drawn to the idea of exploring the textural/harmonic world created by using overtone-based harmony. The electronic part is made by multi-tracking various violin lines (and special thanks is due to Monica for her enormous assistance here). The player produces many of these lines solely by executing patterns of harmonics, usually played in a very deliberate flautando fashion. In order to produce different harmonies, the same patterns were done with different scordaturas (producing harmonics on F#, Bb, B, etc.), as I didn't want a limited overtone-harmonic world confined to the normal open-string tuning of the violin. Not wishing either to be limited to the first 8 or so easily obtainable harmonics of each string, many patterns were re-tuned precisely using a piece of software to produce higher harmonics such as 11, 13 etc. You could say that the soundtrack metaphorically supplies the overtone-strings to the normal strings of the live player. Overstrung was written for Monica Germino and commissioned by Gaudeamus Muziekweek/Muziek Centrum Nederland and Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival."
- Donnacha Dennehy

Donnacha Dennehy (IE) (1970) lives in Dublin. He founded the Crash Ensemble, Dublin's now-renowned amplified new music band, in 1997. The New York Times described his music as "magnificently energetic" and "viscerally thrilling". In 2007, NMC Records in London released Donnacha's first full-length album, Elastic Harmonic. The Wire declared "Donnacha Dennehy has a sound world all of his own."

Arnoud Noordegraaf: FUGUE, for violin solo, samples, video projection & light

a piece for violin solo, samples, video projection, light. composed and directed by Arnoud Noordegraaf written for Monica Germino (violin) & Frank van der Weij (sound engineer) commissioned by NFPK+ and AFK premiered: November 23, 2010. Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival, UK for more info: http://www.inexcelsisvideo.net/Arnoud_Noordegraaf/Arnoud___Fugue.html

The New York Times, about FUGUE: "Monica Germino Puts Electronics and Violin Together, and Myriad Sounds Ensue"

"There were multiples of Ms. Germino in attendance at Thursday evening’s concert, too. In Arnoud Noordegraaf’s psychologically dark and unsettling “Fugue” they even took on visual form as she played standing behind a sheer screen. Recorded video images of her performing flickered over this screen at unpredictable intervals, creating an arresting duality of sound and image. A distinctive aspect of Ms. Germino’s playing is her earthy and sharp pizzicati, and in this piece they seemed to trigger the recorded images like snapping brain synapses." - by Corinna da Fonseca-Wollheim, June 2013

Arnoud Noordegraaf: Fugue (2010) Fugue: a composition that is not a fugue, at least in a musical sense. The title refers to a dissociative disorder, a term used to describe a disruption of the psyche: a perceived detachment of the mind from the emotional state or even from the body. A traumatic past often lurks behind this disorder. This composition deals with the theme of dissociation in its own distinctive manner, contrasting transparent, thready and prolongated passages with powerful fast outbursts. Fright and suppression, always roiling just beneath the surface, give way to a hyper, child-like energy. Each time, the composition falls back on uncertain, dark ground. Nothing is safe, nothing is certain. The real Monica and her visual and sound images turn round one another, in a solo duet construction. Monica plays against her double, which appears in the video samples. In a sense Fugue does have something in common with a fugue after all: multiple voices that complement and/or suppress one another. Monica triggers four-channel audio samples, video cuts and her own light cues all from a single foot pedal. Fugue is dedicated to Monica Germino and Frank van der Weij, with financial support from the Fonds Podiumkunsten (Performing Arts Fund NL). - Arnoud Noordegraaf

INDUSTRY live in Paradiso

excerpt from INDUSTRY, by Michael Gordon. Version for adapted violin and effects; live in Paradiso, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
-This was recorded through mixing desk- so, bit of a sound approximation here...therefore also the distortion & difference tones aren't really balanced within the sound. You'll have to come hear it live!
A personal note about Michael Gordon's Industry:
For years I have been fascinated with Michael Gordon's modern-day classic piece, Industry (written in 1993, for solo cello and distortion). He translated his vision of the cello as "an instrument made of steel and the size of a football field" into sound. The piece has an incredibly slow, intense build-up and sounds nothing like a classical solo string piece. It defies categorization. Michael asked me to create the definitive violin version of Industry, and sent me the cello score. I kept the score around and puzzled with it off and on for a couple of years. I came up with a rather extreme solution: using an adapted, amplified, extreme scordatura violin plus octave machine and distortion. I worked closely with my sound engineer Frank van der Weij to accomplish this feat. This combination of adapted violin and effects has been referred in the press to as 'elegant rock' (Trouw, NL) and 'a tour-de-force of slowly rising intensity' (Daily Telegraph, UK)
Many thanks to the FAPK, the Dutch Foundation for the Performing Arts, for supporting the groundbreaking work we did in this area. --Monica Germino Telegraph review

Michael Daugherty: LEX

Fragment from live performance of the concerto LEX at Gaudeamus Music Week in Muziekgebouw aan't IJ.
Version for electric violin solo & percussion ensemble.
Peter Prommel, conductor. Monica Germino, Violectra (electric violin)

Monica Germino talks about Louis Andriessen's La Girò

Monica Germino talks about Louis Andriessen's La Girò (2011), for violin & ensemble. Andriessen wrote La Girò for a violinist who also sings and speaks. The voice is meant to be untrained and casual in style. This trailer is an initiative of the Asko|Schönberg ensemble; produced by MvdVMedia. Partially subtitled (Dutch to English).

Andriessen: "In La Girò I am musing about a composer I admire a lot: maestro Antonio Vivaldi. The title refers to Anna Girò, Vivaldi's favourite singer. The piece would not have become the 'performance' it is without its dedicatee, the violinist Monica Germino. The soloist (La Girò, perhaps?) does not only play the violin. She also sings an Italian song, whispers and talks, tells stories and dreams. The ensemble consists of a small chamber orchestra, with an added piano, harp, cimbalom and some percussion. The piece has four parts: the first three form a kind of concertino while the actual musical drama takes place in the fourth, slow part."

WHIRLY GIRLS

A short compilation from the project WHIRLY GIRLS:
"one show - 5 new pieces - inspired by 5 groundbreaking women"
ELECTRA, in collaboration with Renske Vrolijk
Sound-Micha de Kanter; Video-Diederik de Jong; recorded in the Ostadetheater, Amsterdam (NL) 2012.
Music by Renske Vrolijk, Vanessa Lann, Michiel Mensingh, Lucas Wiegerink.
De Volkskrant: 4 stars for Whirly Girls:
"Combative women as central theme in thrilling show...pioneers in art, aviation, emancipation, the weapons industry...explosive, driving music...fascinating images...a veritable barrage of information...a brilliantly constructed production"

ELECTRA's CD/DVD "ABLE TO BE"

ABLE TO BE: Retrospective CD/DVD released by Attacca Records

With music by Louis Andriessen, Corrie van Binsbergen, David Dramm, Donnacha Dennehy, Ron Ford, JacobTV.
Film & images by Mark Linnane, AKI, & Colm Tobin, Vinex Productions, J.C. Mol, Pjotr ‘s-Gravesande.
Available at Amazon & the usual places!

ELECTRA plays David Dramm's Baton Rouge Massacre - Live TV broadcast

Live broadcast, VPRO Television (Dutch National Television) ELECTRA performs 'Baton Rouge Massacre' (short version) by David Dramm, in the show 'Vrije Geluiden'.

ELECTRA: Monica Germino, violin/electric violin; Tatiana Koleva, percussion/marimba, Michaela Riener, voice/keyboard; Susanna Borsch, recorder/electronics

This film and more is available on ELECTRA's CD/DVD, ABLE TO BE (Attacca Records). To order, email: orders(at)electranewmusic.com or go to Amazon.com

-from the liner notes by Anthony Fiumara:
In Baton Rouge Massacre (2002/2007), the story has been transported to the state capital of Louisiana. In present-day Baton Rouge, the daughter of the governor finds herself on the run, hiding from her vicious mother and her lover. 'Several questions are left hanging,' writes Dramm. 'Was Electra born out of wedlock? Was her father himself without secrets? The state of Louisiana has had a long history of colorful governors; the character of Manny T. Rhodes was not one of them, but he could have been.' Musically, Baton Rouge Massacre wallows in the scent of an obscure pop jewel from the sixties by Burt Bacharach, Land of Make Believe, Dramm adds. Which is not so strange for a composer whose music was described in the Dutch Volkskrant as the groundbreaking terrain between Charles Ives, Jimi Hendrix, and Lou Reed.

ELECTRA plays 'The Briefcase', by Vinex Productions - Live TV Broadcast

Live broadcast, VPRO Television (Dutch National Television) ELECTRA performs 'De Aktetas' (The Briefcase) in the show Vrije Geluiden. film & music by Vinex Productions: Michiel van Dijk, music; Sjeng Schupp, animation

ELECTRA: Monica Germino, violin/electric violin; Tatiana Koleva, percussion/marimba, Michaela Riener, voice/keyboard; Susanna Borsch, recorder/electronics

This film and more is available on ELECTRA's CD/DVD, ABLE TO BE (Attacca Records). To order, email: orders(at)electranewmusic.com or go to Amazon.com

from the liner notes by Anthonly Fiumara: Vinex stands for Vierde Nota Ruimtelijke Ordening Extra, a notation of the ministry for housing, spatial scheduling, and environment management in the Netherlands. Large outer city areas were pointed out in this notation for massive new housing development (source: Wikipedia). Vinex Productions, however, founded in 2002, stands for Sjeng Schupp and Michiel van Dijk. Together they create music-animation films, in which Sjeng Schupp does the animation and Michiel van Dijk writes the music. Schupp and van Dijk develop the images and sounds simultaneously so that a sound can react to an image, and vice versa. The result of this way of working is a perfect fit of image and music, in which Escher-like repetitions, metamorphoses, and imaginary vanishing points go hand-in-hand with a good dose of humor. [dvd] De Aktetas (The Briefcase, 2005) sports a subtitle which could easily fit one of Sophocles tragedies: An Act Of God Which Got Out Of Hand. The film, however, is more of a shortened version of the creation, in which the name of the Dutch show host Sjors Fröhlich (George Fröhlich in the Vinex video) plays a bizarre role; on top of music which chugs along pleasantly throughout the Vinex universe. The mysterious lyrics seem, even for Vinex themselves, a bit Greek. In any case, The Briefcase proves that the ELECTRA women can just as easily serve a lighter muse.

Yannis Kyriakides: PARAMYTH

National VPRO television, program: Vrije Geluiden Recorded in the Bimhuis, Amsterdam Monica Germino - violin, Michel Marlang - clarinet, Teodora Stepancic - piano, Yannis Kyriakides - computer

 

The Washington Post: Andriessen 75 video

Anne Midgette talks about Dutch composer Louis Andriessen's 75th birthday, which was celebrated with a week-long festival spread across five D.C.-area organizations. It featured some of Andriessen's greatest works, as well as a number of premiere performances, including the violin concerto, La Giro. (Jessica Rosgaard & Jhaan Elker / The Washington Post)

Rob Zuidam: Agnus Dei (Bosch Requiem)

Robert Zuidam: "A taste of my Bosch Requiem: The lamb of God, the formidable countertenor Pascal Bertin, gently slaughtered by Monica Germino's electric violin. With the Nederlands Kamer Koor and ASKO|Schönberg Ensemble, conducted by Reinbert de Leeuw."

Pascal Bertin countertenor, Monica Germino violectra, the Nederlands Kamerkoor and ASKO|Schönberg Ensemble conducted by Reinbert de Leeuw, November 8 2013, at the cathedral of St. Jan, Den Bosch.

Louis Andriessen: La Passione

Bells for Haarlem, Passeggiata,
Letter from Cathy, La Passione
Boston Modern Orchestra Project;
Gil Rose, conductor;
Cristina Zavalloni, voice;
Monica Germino, violin
label: BMOP/sound
www.bmop.com

To order: http://www.amazon.com/Andriessen-La-Passione-Louis/dp/B001RGVKG4

 

Jacob TV: SUITES OF LUX for electric violin & soundtrack

Jacob TV's SUITES OF LUX (2007 version), for electric violin and soundtrack. Monica Germino, electric violin (Violectra)

Label: Basta Music

Jacob TV’s (a.k.a. Jacob ter Veldhuis) SUITES OF LUX was written for Nanine Linning’s choreography bearing the same name, and was premiered and performed by Scapino Ballet Rotterdam and electric violinist Monica Germino. The large-scale work with its evocative soundtrack (recently released on Basta Music) originally lasted about 40 minutes, and involved Germino performing from memory while moving amongst the dancers.

Choreography: NANINE LINNING
Music: JACOB ter VELDHUIS (performed live)
MONICA GERMINO, electric violin

THE PRESS:
TROUW (NL):
'As a magical central point, violinist Monica Germino leads the spectator through the choreography... Germino's presence is inescapable. Her electric violin sounds are truly bewitching.'
DE TELEGRAAF (NL):
'Jacob ter Veldhuis composed a solo for Monica Germino, who drew long, plaintive tones and piercing outbursts from her powerfully amplified electric violin, alongside 
a soundtrack of indefinable sounds...The violinist is the central figure on stage. She breathes life into the the dancers with her notes and summons the memories in them to wake. She leads, inspires, manipulates.'
DANCE EUROPE (UK):
"The violinist Monica Germino performed the music on stage with much passion, almost dancing her way through syncopated sections, and keeps drawing near to the dancers... At the close of the piece she ends up alone on stage, softly repeating the last notes of the music...."
ROTTERDAMS DAGBLAD (NL):
'Violinist Monica Germino performs Jacob ter Veldhuis' new score live and moves like an eleventh dancer through the group. The amplified electric violin music lures you into another world...' 'Dancers are lashed into action by violinist Monica Germino, who is always on stage. She [Germino] resembles a kind of snake charmer, but then not with a flute but rather with her electric violin...'

 

Play clip 1
Louis Andriessen: excerpts from Le Voile du Bonheur (1966-71)

Live concert: Monica Germino, violin Louis Andriessen, piano

Play clip 1
Play clip 2
WQXR, Q2 Live Radio Broadcast. Monica Germino & Frank van der Weij
Play clip 1
Louis Andriessen: La Passione 3. Una forma nera cornuta

Louis Andriessen's La Passione - 3rd Part, Una forma nera cornuta 

Monica Germino, violin; Cristina Zavalloni, voice. Bosten Modern Orchestra Project with Gil Rose conducting.

Label: BMOP/sound

Read more about La Passione

Play clip 1