Nadar Ensemble & Koninklijk Concervatorium Antwerpen - In a Large Open Space

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James Tenney

The OORtreders festival concludes on Sunday with a second participatory project dedicated to a performance of the work In a Large Open Space by American composer James Tenney (1934-2006). In the large open space of St Nicholas Church, the musicians are scattered around the room. The audience can move freely in the space and through the music.

The work’s compositional material is limited: it consists of 32 tones of a natural harmonic series from which each player chooses. Each chosen note is held for 30 to 60 seconds. Then the performer chooses another note from the sequence. This process is repeated continuously. With each performance, therefore, the work emerges anew, each time in a different way.

During the development process of this project, students of the Antwerp Conservatory of Music, from different disciplines and years of study, were coached by Thomas Moore and Pieter Matthynssens.