reconstruction i-v Lene Grenager 21.- 25. oktober 2024
Alpaca Ensemble devotes a whole week to performing Lene Grenager’s five reconstruction works, and brings back the lost soundscapes of industry and women’s history with the help of instruments, electronics, video and soundtracks.
reconstruction i-v is a series of works Lene Granger worked on for almost a decade. The works take a total of about 2 hours and 40 minutes to perform and thematize the downsizing of industry, machines as part of people’s close lives and the musical potential of industrial machines and industrial sounds. She uses embroidered scores, video and audio files in addition to sewing machines and conventional acoustic instruments.
In several works, Lene has worked with industrial sounds, mechanical rhythmics and superimposition of rhythmic layers without a corresponding basic pulse. She has made sound and video recordings of old industrial machines in various places in Norway, Sweden and England. Lene is interested in industrial history both in terms of the soundscapes themselves and of the major changes in lifestyle, living conditions and the fact that people lost their identity when their workplaces were closed from the beginning of the 1970s. In this process, a number of everyday soundscapes disappeared; people who had been in noisy industrial environments all their working lives had a silence around them overnight.
Another background for the series of works is how textile techniques have been some of the few possible forms of expression available to women from different walks of life and parts of the world throughout history. There are forms of expression that are not only used industrially, but are also inextricably linked to the home. The textile industry has been two-sided for women in that it could provide an opportunity for income both through work at home and in factories. At the same time, this work has always had low status and low pay.
Monday 21 Oct 19:00/ Cutting Edge, Akrinn Kalvskinnet
reconstruction in/landscape with machines
Tuesday 22 Oct 20:00 / At home in Skolegata 24
reconstruction iv/intimate measures
Piano: Else Bø Cello: Marianne Lie Sewing machine: Lene Grenager
Snacks and drinks included in the ticket price – sign up to hermann@alpacaensemble.com – limited places!
Wednesday 23 Oct 19:30 / Artistic Research Forum, Cinemateket
reconstruction iv/intimate measures
Piano: Else Bø Cello: Marianne Lie Sewing machine: Lene Grenager
Thursday 24 October Doors open 20:00 / Dokkhuset Stage
reconstruction iii/portrait of a city with sewing machines
reconstruction ii/the textile factory
Bassoon: Hanne Rekdal Contrabassoon: Ingrid Bennett Bass clarinet and Double bass clarinet: Elena Perales, Gjertrud Pedersen and Stig F. Aarskog Trombone: Emil Bø Double bass: Michael Francis Duch Piano: Else Bø Violin: Børge Brustad Cello: Marianne Baudouin Lie Trumpet: Eivind Lønning Percussion: Espen Aalberg and Henriette Kolset
Sewing machinists from NTNU ILU
Conductor: Lene Grenager
Friday 25 Oct 12:30 / Crowded area outside Lille sal/ Kammersalen, Olavshallen
reconstruction v/shadows of machines
Double bass: Michael Duch
Lene Grenager is a cellist and composer. She has written orchestral works, chamber music and solo works. As a performing musician, she mainly works with improvisation and with what she calls collective composition. She has been involved from the start in the two ensembles SPUNK and Lemur. The composition activity is broad and includes work with various forms of notation (including traditional notation, graphic notation, embroidered scores), incorporation of video, electronics and sound files. She has worked with site-specific compositions, installations and in collaboration with dancers and actors. As a cellist, she has released two solo albums and has also contributed to around 30 releases as a composer, musician and producer (e.g. on Unamna, which received the Spellemannpris in spring 2023). She has written the book Gardening – about seeds and cultivation in Lene Grenager’s music and several articles, for example, in VIS-journal (Duch, Grenager, Habbestad, Tafjord: Å lage et Lemuria, VIS-journal #0 2018). For her work, she received the Arne Nordheim composer’s prize in 2018.