Vermehrstimmigen als kontemplative Praxis. Wiederholung, Fragmentierung und Mehrstimmigkeit im Komponieren mit musikalischen Entlehnungen.
When composing with musical borrowings within repetitive structures, a dual perception often occurs, in which listening shifts its focus from the inherent representation of the borrowings to their immediate sonic presence. This shift in attention is frequently characterized as a form of aesthetic contemplation.
This project artistically explores how the concept of aesthetic contemplation, along with contemplative practices, can inform the compositional process and what techniques this might require. Two main methods are applied: artistic experimentation and critical reflection. The former involves compositional and improvisational practice; the latter includes evaluative listening, comparison with other compositions, and philosophical contextualization.
The research begins with works by Enno Poppe, Luc Ferrari, Emmanuel Nunes, and others, whose techniques of repetition and fragmentation have significantly influenced the experimental process – along with experiences from meditative practice. A central insight of the project is that the aforementioned moments of dual perception are inherently polyphonic in nature. Building on this, a compositional approach of "polyphonizing" is developed.
François Jullien's concept of a multifocal, defixed, and involved contemplation proved instrumental in formalizing this approach. Rolf Riehm's work Archipel Remix furthermore revealed strategies that could be made productive for testing such a "polyphonic" contemplative approach, in which repetitive structures are no longer just pre-compositionally constructed on a large formal scale but are processually unfolded in the form of multipolar variative networks of remembering and forgetting.
The practice of "polyphonizing" is thus able to replicate and reflect the polytemporal nature of contemplative experience. Ultimately, it raises the general question about commonalities between aesthetic and contemplative experience.
Aleksandra Škrilec, flute
Maho Ohara, clarinet
João Marinho, baritone saxophone
Brigitte Helbig, piano
Jakob Stillmark
Composer
Jakob Stillmark is a composer and artistic researcher, who often inquires philosophical thought through music. After first lessons with Ernst August Klötzke he studied composition with Isabel Mundry at the University of Music and Performing Arts Munich and has been working as a freelance composer since then. He participated in numerous international master classes, where he received lessons from Toshio Hosokawa and Marco Momi, among others. His works have been performed at numerous occasions such as the chamber music series of the Munich Philharmonics, Shanghai Academy of Music, SONify!-Festival, aDevantgarde Festival, Central Conservatory of Music Beijing, Deutsche Radio Philharmonie or Munich Chamber Orchestra. He worked with renowned ensembles such as Trio Abstrakt, Divertimento Ensemble, Kebyart Quartet, Duo Helbig-Wangler or Deutsche Radiophilharmonie. A residency at the Cité internationale des Arts in Paris was enabled for him by the Bavarian Ministry of Science and the Arts. Since 2020 he is a PhD student at the Zurich University of the Arts under the guidance of Prof. Isabel Mundry and Prof. Jörn Peter Hiekel. Stillmark is a scholarship holder of the Friedrich Ebert Foundation.