Fantasy
Christoph Punzmann
2019
Artist Statement
My composition "Fantasy" is performative sound art. The music breaks the boundaries between antiquity and an innovative contemporary sonic language accompanied by performative content presented by the instrumentalist. A central conceptual idea is to underline the importance of the past for the present and the future. Further I want to offer a sonic language that was never heard before. Triggered by a new performative visuality through novel playing techniques. I started building a new instrument to cross the sonic limits of the arched zither. The instrument can be seen as an electronic, analog/digital extension, while the traditional possibilities of a more than 2000 year old instrument are retained. The instrument consists of a Raspberry Single Board Computer + audio interface Pisound, paired with a self-built analog microphone preamplifier and a System 500 Equalizer.
Through the usage of a traditional Japanese instrument in symbiosis with a newly constructed innovative sound device. Expressing my European interpretation of the time I spent in Japan, the experiences I made with the Japanese and especially what I learned through their culture and way of life. There's no full recording of the whole performance, but a demonstration of one of the possibilities of the audio processor and pictures that show the instrument prototypes, as well as an excerpt of a dance performance which I was accompanying with the first prototype.
Artist Bio
Punzmann is a composer, performer and multi-instrumentalist. After graduating in musicology and art history he moved to Vienna to study electroacoustic composition and experimental music at the University for Music and Performing Arts Vienna (MDW). Compositions range from stereo fixed media pieces to live performances using multichannel speaker systems, and installations. Material derives from field recordings, sounds originating from the human body, or analogue/digitally synthesized sounds. In Punzmann’s current artistic research he is exploring new ways of processing the human voice and the arched Zither (Koto), using the programming languages of Pure Data and MAX to create uncommon, innovative sound situations.