101% mind uploading (2015)

for three performers inside piano, objects and percussion, written for Nikel ensemble

I have a very rich and complex history with piano, it is a very special instrument for me. Piano is a symbol of a vast music history, it represents a plentitude of piano schools, especially Russian piano schools (I used to be a concert pianist in Russia, was seriously getting ready to have a career of a piano player for about 15 years of my life). Piano for me is a symbol of black and white, literally and metaphorically: what was allowed and what was not, which sound was considered as full and beautiful and which was viewed as inappropriate, what was considered to be the right way to play Beethoven or Tchaikovsky and what was a violation. Piano is also a reminiscence of a physical pain, as I’ve had periods when I couldn’t play due to muscle spasms, of mental pain when one of those incompetent Russian teachers was shouting and humiliating me for years. Piano is also a symbol of rebirth; when I changed my teacher for another professor, he showed me how to heal my hands, how to listen to the resonance of sounds, how to find strength in music itself and how any piano, even the oldest, falling apart box with strings, keys and hammers, can sound and blossom if I want it to. He made me discover the power of intention – how to hear the sound before touching the key and how this inner hearing, this inner idea of sound, can be translated and passed to the instrument, how to evoke a unique sound by listening into the future and how to create a sounding reality by interacting with an object and listening to it.

This attitude formed me as a musician, it influenced my relationship with music of the others, music that I am making now and it definitely influenced my relationship with any other instruments and objects. Eventually it led me to the creation of this piece, which opened a whole new world of music making for me. With this piece, I also started to draw my scores by hand.

101% mind uploading is a constant search for The Sound: throughout the piece, with a special preparation on the strings and certain techniques of playing, performers need to evoke rhythmical beatings or harmonics but there isn’t just one possible outcome, there is an infinity of possibilities, so only with the determined intention, meticulousness and focused listening to the sounds and to each other they will be able to get the instrument to respond.

The surgical gowns are the tools to help them to tune in this specific mode of listening and being – acting with a surgical precision. Visually, the gowns are means to amplify the situation itself, happening around and inside the piano.

By creating this piece, out of necessity (initially, I was asked to write for a trio of percussion, saxophone and piano but, while composing, I realized that the essence of the piece lies inside the piano and there isn’t any space left for anything else), I shared my history with the instrument and part of my life as a musician and a human. This piece is not just about physical resonance of the piano but hopefully, it is about the resonance in the performers, who are invited to participate in this complex process of rebirth, happening sonically and conceptually.

As most of my pieces, 101% mind uploading is a piece that needs time. If you decide to play it, make sure you prepare all necessary objects in advance and that you have enough time to spend with pianos, on your own and together with other performers. Each of you will have to know the parts of the others as your own, that is why there is only one score and no separate parts. As each piano is different, preparation might change according to the piano models and you will have to adjust yourself to the new conditions. And this is true not only for this particular piece but for my music in general:

there is no one single solution or one perfect way to do something; between black and white there is a palette of infinite possibilities that comes on the way, but the idea of The Sound (and I provide below the video of the demonstration of sounds that I’m searching for) will always guide you through, if you take care of the touch, intention and listening, if you give yourself into the search and forget about the running clock.* To play my music, you have to fall in love with unpredictability, instability and unknown. You have to trust your instrument or object, feel it with your guts, develop a muscle memory while learning the piece.

* the time indicated in the score should be considered as a reference only; by no means, stopwatches should be used. The time in the piece is fluid, it can stretch and shrink. Sometimes it is important to wait for the sound (e.g. rhythmical beatings or harmonics) to appear, or touch the magnet slightly again to help the string respond and so on. Like a surgeon, a performer needs to act according to the current situation, be immersed in it.

Advice for performers

Below you can find the video demonstration of the techniques and sounds used in the piece. The video is pretty old by now (I used extracts from the videos I was making while composing) but you can still see and hear everything. In the video, I work with big concert grand pianos (Steinway D), that is why I use both magnets, a rectangular and a round one for the preparation. In the premiere performance by Nikel ensemble listed above, we had to play on Steinway B; because of the different position of the metal bars inside the piano, we changed the pitches of the prepared strings (d4 instead of e3 and b3 instead of d3 – where middle C is C4) and also we used only rectangular magnets for the preparation as for that size of the piano it was enough to evoke rhythmical beatings.

A frequent question concerns the pitches of opera gongs (in the video demonstration you can hear them at the very end) and a Sansula. It is important to have those exact pitches in those precise octaves for gongs, there is a relation between them and most importantly, I like the sound of those particular gongs at that height, I chose them. There are some performances on Youtube, where musicians use other gongs with and without my permission, I strongly prefer the original sounds. As for Sansula, it is essential to use Sansula and not a kalimba. Sansula has an open resonator that allows a wah-wah effect, which corresponds to wah-wah tubes, glissandi of opera gongs and glissandi on the strings with a guitar slide. Together, they constitute one family of sounds. Without one of those elements, the connection between the sounds will be lost.

Instead of the face massager you can use a vibrator or any other vibrating object. I would prefer if you attach it to the inner side of the bass drum, hidden from the audience, for the source of sound to stay implicit.

You can buy neodymium magnets online (for instance, in Russia I recommend this shop: https://mirmagnitov.ru/ , in Europe: https://www.supermagnete.de/eng/ ). The size of neodymium magnets is crucial. The size of the ferrite magnet can vary, it is important that it is convenient to hold it – not too big, not too small.

For other objects and links, please, check the technical rider below. For any additional questions, please, contact me by email.

On the photo above: Ensemble NEOPERCUSIÓN

On the photo above: ensemble No Hay Banda

A video with the score (performance by Nikel ensemble):