Pique Plastique Mini-Festival Announced For December

Tireless champions of Aotearoa's always vital experimental sound / music community, Audio Foundation and Pyramid Club are teaming up to bring Pōneke punters a three night festival of "Urgent Sound, Adventurous Music and Deep Listening", sporting the name Pique Plastique. Showcasing new and established sonic performance artists from throughout the nation, Pique Plastique's bill features avant-Nesian collective Blood Mothers, Samara Alofa, Tash van Schaardenburg of Bib Kids' new solo project Citacsy, Ro Rushton-Green (Sewage), Crone, Oghum, Isaac Smith, Rosie Langabeer, Ruby Solly and Daniel Beban. Promising to "spike activity in the brain network linked to emotional thinking, with simultaneous activity in different areas like the hippocampus and anterior cingulate cortex", Pique Plastique sounds like an aural proposition not to missed.

Operating on multiple fronts, Pyramid Club will also be presenting a special off-site event in the awe-inspiring surrounds of Karori's Futuna Chapel (designed by NZ architect John Scott) on Saturday 5th December. The concert will feature an ensemble of 18 musicians (all acoustic - strings, brass and woodwind) performing a new composition by Daniel Beban (Orchestra Of Spheres) titled ‘Daily Deaths’. Beban opened up about his work's urgent theme...

"'Daily Deaths’ directly translates Covid19 statistics from different countries into a musical score which the ensemble plays. Each musician plays a different country’s daily death rate in musical notes - the higher the death rate the higher in pitch the musical note… trumpets play Iran, double basses play China, flutes play Brazil, cellos play India and so on. As the piece unfolds the audience literally experiences the unfolding days, weeks and months of the Covid19 pandemic in sound. And because the pandemic is an ongoing situation, the piece is continually growing.

Because Covid19 is respiratory illness, the music is based around the breath of each musician. Each note is one full breath, with around 300 breaths representing the 300 odd days since the start of the pandemic. Because of the constant long notes, the piece is physically difficult to perform for the musicians. In this way the music mirrors the respiratory nature of the virus.

As well as the sombre theme just mentioned, the piece also tries to capture some of the ecstatic calm which many of us here in NZ experienced during the lockdown period in March/April. The dynamics of the piece are very quiet, and the pacing is very slow throughout."

Pique Plastique - Pyramid Club, Wellington

Thursday 10th December - Ro Rushton Green, Isaac Smith, Rosie Langabeer, Oghum, Samara Alofa, Ruby Solly
Friday 11th December - Citacsy D, Ro Rushton-Green, Daniel Beban, Blood Mothers
Saturday 12th December - Citacsy, Crone, Native Bush

Tickets available HERE via UTR

Pyramid Club - Offsite Project #7: Futuna Chapel
Saturday 5th December - Futuna Chapel, Karori (suggested koha: $20)
More info HERE

Listen to Samara Alofa's new single 'Dnt Care'...

Watch an informative video spotlighting Blood Mothers' artistic practice...

Press release:

Siblings in sound Audio Foundation and Pyramid Club present a mini-festival featuring some of Aotearoa’s most exciting new and established sonic performance artists. Featuring the powerhouse avant-Nesian collective BLOOD MOTHERS, Samara Alofa, Native Bush and drone/techno split personality CITACSY from Tāmaki Makaurau, Ōtepoti based multi-instrumentalist Ro Rushton-Green (Sewage), alongside Te Whanganui-a-Tara regulars Crone, Oghum, Isaac Smith, Rosie Langabeer, Ruby Solly and Daniel Beban, the series promises to spike activity in the brain network linked to emotional thinking, with simultaneous activity in different areas like the hippocampus and anterior cingulate cortex.

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As part of the Offsite Series, Pyramid Club presents an afternoon concert at Futuna Chapel, Karori. The concert features a new work for 18 musicians by Daniel Beban. ‘Daily Deaths’ translates the Covid19 pandemic into sound by reinterpreting the daily statistics of different countries through 2020.

Featuring an 18 piece ensemble of woodwinds, brass and strings, the concert will take place in the awe-inspiring acoustics of Futuna Chapel, an icon of New Zealand avant garde architecture.

Chapel open for viewing at 2pm, concert starts 2:30pm.

The 18-piece ensemble features Gerard Crewdson and Dan Yeabsley (tuba), Nell Thomas and Rachelle Eastwood (flute), Aiko Sato and Gareth Thompson (trombone), Jake Baxendale and Glen Downie (alto sax), Bridget Kelly and Blair Latham (bass clarinet), James Guilford-Smith and Stephen Roche (trumpet), Tristan Carter and Chris Prosser (violin), Charlie Davenport and Ruby Solley (cello), Patrick Bleakley and Isaac Smith (double bass).