little ideas by Nicholas Bussmann

Nicholas Bussmann is an artist and musician whose work is as multi-layered and branched. With his background in Berlin's Echtzeitmusik scene, collective improvisation continues to play a major role in his work. For Bussmann, writing songs means distilling the essence from this flow of improvisation; allowing a position in an environment of constant movement. little ideas is the first part of a trilogy of 3 x 3 songs entitled Ohnmacht (Powerlessness, but also loosing conscious). The personal and the political dimension cannot be separated in these works.

The pieces are both powerful and fragile. Bussmann's measured, simple vocals create an intimacy that is countered by the mechanical physicality of a player piano. This creates a fundamental tension that is common to all these songs. When Nicholas Bussmann programs the piano robot constructed by Winfried Ritsch, we don't hear a conventional piano. We hear a repetitive clacking and tapping that takes on a life of its own beneath the sparse melodies and patterns. Not only the strings and the body of the piano, but also the robot sounds and grooves, so that the whole material vibrates. This ambivalence and interaction between body and machine further extends to Bussmann's lyrics: the inflated Western “me, myself & I” and its status in the acid bath of digital cultures.



Since 2014, Nicholas Bussmann has been developing musical improvisational games together with the Cottbusser Chor, which have been performed at documenta14 and the Shanghai Biennale 10, among other venues. Solo exhibitions as an artist at the Museu Serralves Porto, HKW Berlin, and Taxispalais Innsbruck. He has contributed to over two dozen music albums. Telebossa, Ich Schwitze Nie, Nicholas Desamory, Kapital Band 1. Most recently, he released a record on Ni Vu Ni Connu with the recently deceased drummer Sven-Åke Johansson and Chinese musician Yan Jun.

Nicholas Bussmann is an artist and musician

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