PANCRACE by Bécheau, Day, Desailly, Maurel, Vysocky

***Best of 2017 voted by the Wire magazine, Chicago Reader & Soundohm!***

The Pancrace Project (Arden Day, Prune Bécheau, Julien Desailly, Léo Maurel & Jan Vysocky) came out of an informal residency in Alsace (Dangolsheim) curated by the musician and inventor Léo Maurel.

Though no determined concept preceded the session a mutual desire to occupy Saint-Pancrace Church and investigate its 1848 organ in a profane manner seemed to bond all the players thus allowing them to do a « tentative d’épuisement » of the place over a week of improvisations and form emerging compositions. So nothing but the place became the only credo in taking possession of this charismatic environment. Like in most churches the organ stands like a Moloch or a sentinel bearing a singular relation to the place regarding its resonance and frequencies.

Hence the form of the session emerged from disrupting the traditional frontal approach to the instrument by both preparing the organ inside out and organically challenging its gregarious authority with instruments like a boîte à bourdons, a baroque violin, a pi-synth, hurgy toys, a piano paysage, feedback, Uilleann pipes, a motorised bow, Hulusi flutes and even bird call whistles… It became clear that a narrative was emerging that would soon lead to a structure. Amidst this hunter gathering of sounds one can hear layers of microtones, microrhythms, drones with elements of field recording all displayed like an ensemble.

Prune Bécheau (violon, orgue)
https://prunebecheau.bandcamp.com/

Julien Desailly (cornemuse irlandaise, flute Hulusi)
http://jdesailly.com/

Léo Maurel (orgue, Boîte à Bourdon, Hurgy Toys)
http://www.violonaroue.fr/

Arden Day (orgue, piano paysage)
http://ardenday.com/
http://unbehagen.at/

Jan Vysocky (Pi-synth, feedback, AM radio, recording)
http://wysozky.com/
http://unbehagen.at/

Cairos is a collective working in architecture, visual art, film, sound and music. Cairos edition is it's platform publishing works in the field of sound art, electroacoustic and improvisational music, featuring international artists and crossover collaborations into audiovisual, performing and installation arts.