Empire in Platzhirsch Festival 2016
Empire is an improvisation trio that came into existence when guitarist Thorsten Töpp invited trumpet player Liz Allbee and electronics player Korhan Erel to play two concerts with him in the Platzhirsch Festival in Duisburg in 2016. The trio returns with three concerts in Amsterdam, Moers and Duisburg.
The Amsterdam concert ‘Genres are so 2016’ on April 25 will take place at Splendor, where the trio will share the bill with Jerboah, an ensemble that plays “a mix of art-rock, post-pop, and worldbeat”.
This year’s Moers Festival artist-in-residence trumpet player John-Dennis Renken invites Empire for a concert at the Schlosstheater Studio in Moers on April 26. Empire will return the favor by inviting Renken to play with them at Lokal Harmonie in Duisburg on April 27. Both concerts will feature Natascha Töpp’s films.
Empire is:
Thorsten Töpp | electric guitar, electronics
Liz Allbee | amplified trumpet
Korhan Erel | computerbased live-electronics
John-Dennis Renken | trumpet, live-electronics
Natascha Töpp | video
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About Korhan Erel
Korhan Erel is a computer musician, improviser, sound designer based in Berlin. He plays instruments he designs on a computer by employing various controllers. He also uses analog and digital electronics. He is a founding member of Islak Köpek, Turkey’s pioneer free improvisation group, which is regarded as the band that started the free improvisation scene in Turkey. He composes and designs sounds for dance, theater, installations and film. He collaborates with dancers, video artists and spoken word artists. Korhan’s collaboration with Sydney-based video artist Fabian Astore “The Threshold” has won the Blake Prize in Australia in 2012.
Korhan’s computer performance system is called Omnibus. The instruments within Omnibus are a culmination of Korhan’s musical past and aesthetic choices. Omnibus instruments use concrete sounds (samples, field recordings), morphed and processed in realtime. They can be as simple as one single sample being played using a Nintendo Wii controller to a complex system that employs granular synthesis and spectral processing. The instruments are played interactively using Nintendo Wii controllers (Korhan’s choice of controller when he plays in ensembles with acoustic/electric instrument players), an iPad (used in solo/duo performances as well as ensemble concerts) and several midi controllers. No matter what technology he uses, Korhan always stays focused on the outcome and musicality rather than processes.
Korhan is the co-curator (with Nicola Hein) of UnStumm, a project that brings video artists and musicians from Germany and one other country for audiovisual improvised collaboration.
Korhan has had three residencies at STEIM (Center for research & development of instruments & tools for performers) in Amsterdam, where he studied use of sensors in music performance and instrument design. He was a guest composer at the Electronic Music Studios in Stockholm in January 2011.
Korhan has seven CD releases on Gruenrekorder (Germany), Creative Sources Records (Portugal), Evil Rabbit Records (Netherlands/Germany), A.K. Müzik (Turkey) and Kukuruku Recordings (Greece) as well as several netlabel releases.
He performs regularly in Europe and in the Middle East as a solo artist as well as with his projects in Germany and Holland.
