SKWENS
Composed by Peter Hannan.
Featuring hardware synths driven by sequencers, some internal, some external.
The challenge was that it should be possible to have all the videos playing simultaneously. The simple harmony to which all the videos conform makes this possible.
So this will not be like the Cage piece I heard in Bremen in 1982 called Music for a House where there were 100 ensembles of all kinds: rock bands, orchestras, choirs, jazz groups, soloists of many kinds all playing their own regular repertoire independently inside a huge space with a bit of traffic direction from the ever smiling Cage. Never before or since have I heard a similar cacophony. Scary and amazing.
I like hardware sequencers very much; they tend to have capabilities that are not found in any other way of triggering electronic instruments. So this collection of pieces explores some of the different ways that the sequencers work.
These are the devices:
Analog: Moog Matriarch, Make Noise 0-ctrl and 0-coast, Moog Mother 32
Digital: Waldorf Iridium, ASM Hydrasynth, Korg Minilogue XD, Erica Synths LXR-02 drum machine, Korg SQ64 sequencer
The way the pieces are laid out on the page suggests a possible way of listening. Each group of 4 videos seemed most compatible with one another. I also think of some videos as “solos” (#1, 7, 8, 9), while the rest are in different ways more “accompaniment” material.
More from Peter: Website, Youtube channel, Spotify playlist.
Please note that viewing multiple videos is not supported on mobiles or iOS devices.