Event info

The Cartography of Time is a cycle of solo works by Icelandic composer Davíð Brynjar Franzson, an ongoing exploration of the experience of time. The works were developed in collaboration with Gnarwhallaby, Vicky Chow (Bang on a Can), Mariel Roberts, Matt Barbier and Weston Olencki (RAGE trombones), Rusell Greenberg (Yarn|Wire), Matthias Engler, and Ingólfur Vilhjálmsson (Ensemble Adapter). Dark Music Days is dedicating an entire concert to a selection of pieces from the cycle, inviting the audience into an immersive experience of Franzson’s minimal and slowly unfolding sound world.

The programme
the Cartography of Time (2015) for bowed cymbal and live electronics, ‘20
the Cartography of Time (2014) for contrabass clarinet and live electronics, ‘15
the Cartography of Time (2017) for bass drum and live electronics, ‘15

About the performers
Matthias Engler is a percussionist and experimental music producer based in Reykjavik and Berlin. Together with harpist Gunnhildur Einarsdóttir in 2004 they founded Ensemble Adapter, a contemporary chamber music group. He has worked for the group as percussionist, artistic director and manager ever since. Following his studies in Amsterdam he has appeared as guest player with new music ensembles such as Ensemble Modern, MusikFabrik and others. Performances at renowned festivals for contemporary music included collaborations with important composers of our time: Pierre Boulez, Helmut Lachenmann, Maurizio Kagel, Steve Reich a.o. Matthias regularly appears in experimental theatre productions and remains a member of the Brandt Brauer Frick Ensemble, an acoustic techno project from Berlin.
John McCowen is a composer and clarinetist focused on extending the possibilities of the contrabass clarinet, and other instruments. John’s multiphonic approach embraces drones, different tones, and beating harmonics as a means to extrude the compositional potential within a single, acoustic sound source. His work has been described by The New Yorker as “the sonic equivalent of microscopic life viewed on a slide”. Documents of this practice have been published by International Anthem, Edition Wandelweiser, Astral Spirits/Monofonus Press, Cairn Desk, Superpang, and others. John was an artist-in-residence in 2017/19 at Lijiang Studio in Yunnan, China as well as in 2020 at ISSUE Project Room in Brooklyn, NY.

About the composer
Davíð Brynjar Franzson is a freelance composer based in Los Angeles, USA. Projects include: An Uaban Archive as an English Garden, developed in collaboration with Halla Steinunn Stefansdóttir (Nordic Affect), Russell Greenberg (Yarn/Wire), Julia Mogensen, and Matt Barbier (wasteLAnd); the Negotiation of Context developed in collaboration with Yarn/Wire and described in various publications as "engagingly tactile" (New York Times), "compelling" (Wire), who selected the release as one of their top 10 modern composition releases of 2014, and as "sonic art that is clearly going places'' (Gramophone); the cello concerto on Matter and Materiality, commissioned by the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra and the Icelandic National Radio's commissioning fund; "strikingly static" (Guardian); and the Cartography of Time, an ongoing exploration of the experience of time, developed in collaboration with Gnarwhallaby, Vicky Chow (Bang on a Can), Mariel Roberts, Matt Barbier and Weston Olencki (RAGE trombones), Rusell Greenberg (Yarn|Wire), Matthias Engler, and Ingólfur Vilhjalmsson (Ensemble Adapter).

A new recording of the monodrama Longitude was released on Bedroom Community in autumn 2019. It made multiple year-end lists, and was described as "gorgeous and somewhat terrifying in equal measure" (5:4). His most recent release (in collaboration with Stephanie Aston and wasteLAnd), voice fragments, was released on Carrier Records in January 2021. It has received critical praise with one reviewer exclaiming it is as 'stunning' during the online premiere. Davíð co-runs Carrier Records, a label for new and experimental music, with Sam Pluta, Katie Young, and Jeff Snyder.