The European Bridges Ensemble was established for Internet and network performance. Its current members are Kai Niggemann (Münster, Germany), Ádám Siská (Budapest, Hungary), Johannes Kretz (Vienna, Austria), Andrea Szigetvári (Budapest, Hungary), Ivana Ognjanovic (Belgrade, Serbia), Georg Hajdu (Hamburg, Germany), and Stewart Collinson (Lincoln, England), performing with Georg Hajdu’s interactive network performance environment Quintet.net.
In 2009 July the ensemble worked at Hochschule für Musik und Theater Hamburg together with four young composers to create new network pieces. The result will be presented at MNW2009.

born in Göttingen, Germany in 1960, is among the first composers of his generation dedicated to the combination of music, science and computer technology. After studies in Cologne and at the Center for New Music and Audio Technologies (CNMAT), he received his Ph.D. from UC Berkeley. In 1996, following residencies at IRCAM and the ZKM, Karlsruhe, he co-founded the ensemble WireWorks with his wife Jennifer Hymer a group specializing in the performance of electro-acoustic music. In 1999, he produced his full-length opera Der Sprung. In May 2002, his Internet performance environment Quintet.net was employed in a Munich Biennale opera performance. In 2005, he co-founded the European Bridges Ensemble for networked multimedia performance. In addition to his compositions, which are characterized by a pluralistic attitude and have earned him several international prizes, the IBM-prize of the Ensemble Modern among them, Georg Hajdu published articles on several topics on the borderline of music and science. Currently, Georg Hajdu is professor of multimedia composition at the Hamburg School of Music and Theater and is preparing for a sabbatical semester at Northeastern University Boston.

CONFERENCE – BRIEF ABSTRACT:

One of the challenges that computer music composers face is the gulf between electronic music and instrumental performance. One solution bridging the two worlds is to involve classically-trained musicians capable of sight-reading and spontaneously reacting to conventional or graphical notation in a musical network, consisting of man and machine. Searching for an ideal tool, I have instigated the development of MaxScore, a Max/MSP notation object based on JMSL by Nick Didkovsky and combined it with my interactive network performance environment Quintet.net. My aim is to present two pieces composed in real time by the environment, to discuss the lessons learned from this experience and to provide some perspectives for future development.

I have the pleasure to welcome you to the second edition of the Music in the Global Village conference – a very unusual gathering focussing on the musical implications of Marshall Mc Luhan’s 1960’s statement about the global embrace. The emerging field of network music performance brings up various technical, artistic, ethical and philosophical issues which can’t be dealt with in the way of the typical paper session. On the contrary, this conference attempts to facilitate the intellectual discourse by breaking up the ritualized delivery of ideas and providing a framework in which nearly 30 of the finest representatives in the field will share their views, critically examine current practices and sketch out the next decades of network music performance.

We are very much looking forward to meet you in Budapest.

Georg Hajdu
Hochschule für Musik und Theater Hamburg