The Intellect of Chant conference seeks to present and understand oral transmission of various chant traditions from ancient times until the present day. Integrating music creation, music analysis, ethnomusicology, including new developments in innovative computational technologies for chant and music analysis, the conference will celebrate the multitude of chant and recitation cultures in both their historical existence and in our modern world. While a primary focus of the conference will be the transmission of chant and recitation practices, particularly those found in Jewish, early Christian and Muslim religious traditions, we will ground and contextualize our music analytical findings by concentrating on the human voice, its cultural positioning and historical development, integrating the fields of music composition, music technology, music performance, music theory, musicology, vocal pedagogy, ethnomusicology, and religious studies.
The conference will bring together composers, performers, scholars and practitioners of chant and recitation traditions as well as musicologists, ethnomusicologists, music theorists, scientists and music technologists from around the world to discover and re-discover recitation, chant and vocal traditions in the 21st century.
Program
June 16, Gunnar Sævigs Sal- Grieg Academy
19:00 Opening and Conference Reception
June 17, Gunnar Sævigs sal - Grieg Academy
9:00: Arrival with Coffee
Session 1: Recitation, Poetry and Voice as Material in Music Composition:
Arnulf Mattes, Grieg Academy, Chair
9:30: Dániel Péter Biró, Grieg Academy:
The Philosophy of Recitation
10:15: Marta Gentilucci, University of Cambridge:
Poetry, Displacement and Sound
11:00: Coffee Break
11:15: Ermis Theodorakis, Hochschule für Musik und Theater:
Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy:
Melody (2005) for Any Solo Voice – a Parametrical Approach to Vocal Composition
12:00: Lunch
Session 2: Plainchant, Tuning and Computational Models:
Esther Kontarsky, Berlin University for the Arts, Chair
12:30: Geert Maessen, Gregoriana Amsterdam:
From Recitation to Composition - On Non-Adjacent Inter Neumatic Relations in the León Antiphoner
13:15: Peter van Kranenburg, Utrecht University:
Tuning and Intonation as Optimization Problem
14:00: Peter van Kranenburg, Utrecht University and Geert Maessen, Gregoriana Amsterdam:
Distinguishing and Connecting Medieval Chant Traditions
14:45 Coffee Break
Session 3: Jewish Cantillation:
Dániel Péter Biró, Grieg Academy, Chair
15:00:Vanessa Paloma Elbaz, University of Cambridge:
Gesturing Voices: Sephardi Cantillation, Alphabetic Inscription and the Soul
15:45: Esther Kontarsky, Berlin University of the Arts, Neue Synagogue, Berlin:
Chanting the Syntax
19:00: Catholic Mass and Concert about Ascension Day
Dom Alois Broderson, Gregoriana Amsterdam (Amsterdam, Netherlands):
Les Métaboles (Colmar, France), Léo Warynski, conductor:
Selected Plainchants and Kyrie from Missa L’homme armé by Guillaume Du Fay.
Place: St. Paul’s Catholic Church, Nygårdsgaten 3
June 18, Gunnar Sævigs sal - Grieg Academy
9:00: Arrival with Coffee
Session 4: Social and Neurological Properties of the Voice:
Peter van Kranenburg, Utrecht University, Chair
09:30: Ariane Jeßulat, Berlin University of the Arts:
Vocal Polyphony as Experimental Sociality
10:15: Karsten Specht, Faculty of Psychology, UiB
Streams and Gradients: How the Brain Processes Auditory Information
11:00 Coffee Break
11:15: Workshop with Arnulf Mattes, Grieg Academy, Harberg-Theodorakis Duo, Juliane Harberg, mezzo-soprano, Ermis Theodorakis, piano:
Arnold Schoenberg and the Voice in “Das Buch der hängenden Gärten”
12:30: Lunch
14:00: Forum on Recitation and Chant Pedagogy
Vanessa Paloma Elbaz, University of Cambridge, Chair
Imam Abdi-ladif Abdilahi Ahmed, Bergen Mosque, Esther Kontarsky, Berlin University of the Arts, Neue Synagogue, Geert Maessen, Gregoriana Amsterdam
15:00: Workshop with Erik H. Halvorsen, Tabula Rasa Vocal Ensemble, Mari Grue Garcés, Thomas T. Dahl, Terje Isungset:
Delphis and Homeric Poetry
Place: Studio A Grieg Academy
19:00: Workshop with Dániel Péter Biró, Les Métaboles (Colmar, France) and the SWR Expermentalstudio, Thomas Hummel and Eleni Ralli, Léo Warynski, conductor:
Responding to Dufay: Historicized Composition in Intercultural Contexts
Program:
Guillaume Du Fay: Missa L’homme armé (recomposed with electronics)
Kyrie, Credo, Gloria, Sanctus
Dániel Péter Biró: Uva’et Hahi (At That Time) (Excerpt)
World Premiere.
Place: Storsalen University of Bergen, Nygårdsgaten 5
20:00: Concert with Harberg-Theodorakis Duo:
Juliane Harberg, mezzo-soprano, Ermis Theodorakis, piano
Place: Gunnar Sævigs sal Grieg Academy
Program:
Arnold Schönberg (1874-1951): Das Buch der hängenden Gärten Op. 15 (1908-1909) for voice and piano after poems by Stefan George
1. Unterm Schutz von dichten Blättergründen
2. Hain in diesen Paradiesen
3. Als Neuling trat ich
4. Da meine Lippen reglos sind und brennen
5. Saget mir
6. Jedem Werke bin ich fürder tot
7. Angst und Hoffen
8. Wenn ich heut nicht deinen Leibberühre
9. Streng ist uns das Glück und spröde
10. Das schöne Beet betracht ich mir im Harren
11. Als wir hinter dem beblümten
12. Wenn sich bei heilger Ruh
13. Du lehnest wider eine Silberweide
14. Sprich nicht immer von dem Laub
15. Wir bevölkerten die abenddüstern Lauben
Luciano Berio (1925-2003): Sequenza III (1965-1966)
for solo voice
Marta Gentilucci (*1973): a walk (2024)
for soprano and piano
Ermis Theodorakis (*1979): Melody (2005)
for any solo voice
This conference is part of the larger research project the Intellect of Chant done in conjunction with the multi-year artistic project Sounding Philosophy. The Intellect of Chant conference is supported by the Humanities Strategies at the University of Bergen and Sounding Philosophy is supported by the Norwegian Artistic Research Program, the Faculty of Fine Art, Music and Design, the Grieg Academy and the SWR Experimental Studio in Freiburg, Germany. We are grateful for the support that makes this initiative possible.