The composer as commentator, director, performer and researcher. Various disciplines come together in the work of the Filipino-Dutch composer meLê yamomo. Work that has a powerful current value, in which yamomo responds to personal subjects such as colonialism. meLê yamomo is the fourth winner of the biennial Open Ear composer competition. Previous winners were Gilius van Bergeijk, Anna Korsun and Eliane Radigue. For the third time, November Music and the Trillende Lucht Foundation are organizing an evening around the prize winner.
meLê yamomo’s work is characterized by a focus on time and place and the powerful materiality of sound. yamomo, born in the Philippines, lives in Amsterdam and Berlin and works there as a composer, researcher and theater maker. In 2018 his book Sounding Modernities: Theater and Music in Manila and the Asia Pacific 1869-1946 was published. Academic research and composition are subtly intertwined in Yamomo’s work. Yamomo’s work should be experienced live. In his sound works and performances he refers, among other things, to the meaningful beauty of gamelan music and the power of the spoken word. His performances could already be experienced during the Donaueschinger Musiktage and the CTM Festival Berlin.
During this festive concert on the occasion of the Open Ear prize, meLê yamomo presents his performance Eigenschwingungen – Forces of Overtones. This lecture-performance is a collaboration with cellist Eurico Ferreira Mathias. Together they take a closer look at the dominant European music history and look for other, unexpected musical frequencies. They play with our expectations and shed new light on the colonial past of the West and the European definition of musical harmony. In the laboratory of yamomo and Mathias, ingrained listening habits get a serious blow and a sanctuary is created for boundless musical encounters. A production of the Ballhaus Naunynstraße in Berlin.
Before and after the performance, Trillende Lucht and November Music organize a few more activities in the Verkadefabriek around the work and ideas of meLê yamomo, including a film, lecture and after-talk. More information follows.
Eigenschwingungen – Forces of Overtones was first performed in November 2021 as part of the Decolonial Frequenciesfestival, curated by meLê yamomo.
In collaboration with Stichting Trillende Lucht.
Tickets are now available on the November Music Festival website.