Published: an interview with HIPOGLOTE

This was really fun, i had a blast chatting with portuguese sound poetry achivers / activists / investigators tiago swabl and nuno nevers who have been part of the Hipoglote interview series for 87 issues, up to mine. Everytime I get asked to mark my contribution to sound poetry is feels special, as I do feel a sense of great respect for those who created and lead the practise, it's always something on the frontline, and to be a little part of it, and to be recognised as such in europe, means something special

Nuno and Tiago have created a great route in to discussing sonic and sound poetry, with some brilliant conversations in the past. we got on like a house on fire, really a privilege to be part of the project for me, we chatted about loads of stuff, and they seemed to enjoy my notion that sound poetry is what we do the moment we are born and in the last moments before we die

listen in here https://www.mixcloud.com/Hipoglote/87o-hipoglote_2018-06-18_interview_-steven-j-fowler/

A note on: the last soundings, performing with the great Phil Minton

An amazing privilege it was to perform an improvised vocal work with Phil Minton last October at Kings Place in London. The video of that work is now public, beautifully shot by Ed Prosser.

For over fifty years Phil Minton has been performing, singing, vocalising around the world. He absolutely has shaped, even defined, free vocalisation and improvised sound poetry since WWII. To get to work with him for the first time, with no prior preparation, no conversation about what we'd do before the performance even, was such an honour, and beautiful / terrifying in equal measure. So important for me to feel I'm crossing over with the greats of previous generations

A note on: performing with Phil Minton

An amazing privilege to perform an improvised sound poetry piece with the legendary Phil Minton on October Friday 7th 2016 at Kings Place, London.

For over fifty years Phil Minton has been performing, singing, vocalising around the world. He absolutely has shaped, even defined, free vocalisation and improvised sound poetry since WWII. To get to work with him for the first time, with no prior preparation, no conversation about what we'd do before the performance even, was such an honour, and beautiful / terrifying in equal measure. So important for me to feel I'm crossing over with the greats of previous generations. This was a real landmark for me. There's more pictures like this beautiful pair below by Ed Prosser on www.stevenjfowler.com/soundings

A great night overall too, closing out the Hubbub residency in a sense, with some fine work from James Wilkes, Emma Bennett, Phaedra ensemble and others making it a varied and intense evening of performance.

 

A note on: filming Soundings #6 with Sharon Gal

The Soundings project comes to an end for the time being this October with the 7th instalment and the end of the Hubbub residency and I've had an extraordinary time collaborating with 6 artists so far, the latest being Sharon Gal, a major figure on the London experimental music scene since the late 80s. Sharon's work has been a real influence on me, so it was brilliant to work so closely with her developing a series of performances, embedded in some unusual and industrial / suburban hidden spots of west london, for film. Again working with Ed Prosser, who has filmed most of soundings to great effect, we spent a brilliant day roaming from Kilburn to Kensal, along the grand union canal and into wormwood scrubs, playing with soundscapes, found sounds and instruments. We utilised the possibilities of film, performing in scenes of a sort, to create something original in the edit. Such a privilege to have this opportunity, and once again responding to materials given by Wellcome Library in response to prompts given by Hubbub curators.

A note on: Praxis at Parasol Unit - collaborating with Maja Jantar: July 15th

One of the most generous and definitive collaborative relationships that I have, working with Maja Jantar. She's so brilliant, and such a pleasure to work with, this collaboration, so full of play, of song, of physicality and intensity, really is the kind of work I want to do. Really great to do it with such a lovely audience at Parasol Unit and with the curatorial support of Simon Pomery and Lala Thorpe. A memorable experience.

A note on: Praxis 3 performing with Maja Jantar - July 15th Parasol Unit

PRAXIS 3 - Áine O'Dwyer, Maja Jantar & Steven J Fowler (duo), Cali Dux (Moot Press) Friday 15th of July, at Parasol unit foundation for contemporary art, 14 Wharf Road, London N1 7RW
Third instalment o ivativ poetry serie, part of RH Poetics Research Centr
7.30 pm ∙ £5 suggested donation ∙ Booking require Please email: lala@parasol-unit.org

PRAXIS is an innovative live poetry series that seeks to bring experimental, digital, sound and visual poetry to the Parasol unit foundation for contemporary art, inviting artists to perform original works and to collaborate in response to exhibitions at Parasol. This new series of workshops and events is curated by Simon Pomery and Lala Thorpe in association with the Royal Holloway Poetics Research Centre.

 

    Published: a Tapin2 Playlist. Why I record events/performances & 13 highlights from the last year

    Tapin2 is a brilliant journal, a hub for the European sound poetry scene I've been so pleased to be a part of over the last few years and edited scrupulously by Julien D'Abrigeon. Julien kindly asked me to put together a playlist from my youtube channel, covering the last year with a series of highlighted performances and why I keep such a resource the way I do. http://www.tapin2.org/playlist-5-sj-fowler

    There are three ways to consider the lack of documentation that’s apparent for much of Britain’s post-war avant garde poetry and performance art scene. The first, it is a deliberate gesture, that the works were meant to be ephemeral, only existing once. Second, that technology was prohibitive, ie camera’s weren’t easily available. Third, that people didn’t consider it. The first I respect but obviously don’t personally subscribe to. The second no longer exists. The third is a crime. So it was for me, discovering so many reports, whispers of works from the modern avant-garde, when I started to organise projects and events, knowing if I were able to watch them, to study them, that my own work would grow and become infused with those who came before. So I decided to setup a youtube channel and record every reading and performance I commissioned / witnessed / participated in. Four years later the channel hosts nearly 1400 artworks and performances. I hope people use it as a resource and it’s true value is in the future, as well as the now. It’s worth noting that much of what I commission with the Enemies project is about collaboration, and that this playlist is a highlight of videos captured in the last year, from November 2014 to November 2015, and that there’s much much more in the archive.fowlerpoetry sur Youtube

    The videos include performances from my events and my own work, from all over Europe.

    Upcoming: Four events - aWwW / EVP / Globe Road / Soundings

    Nov 13th: A World Without Words IV
    Nov 14th: Electronic Voice Phenomena
    Nov 15th: Globe Road Festival Walking Tour
    Nov 18th: Soundings III

    November Friday 13th - A World without Words IV at the Frontline Club: 7pm
    The fourth event in the series exploring neuroscience, aphasia, the brain and language, this time at the incredible Frontline Club. With a talk by Professor Barry Smith and the screening of a series of anthropological short films from Vincent Moon. Curated by Lotje Sodderland, Thomas Duggan and I. http://www.frontlineclub.com/screening-and-discussion-a-world-without-words/

    November Saturday 14th - EVP Sessions at Shoreditch Town Hall: 8pm
    Electronic Voice Phenomena hits London once again, I'll be presenting a new commission in full skeleton embodiment, exploring disembodied voice and death http://shoreditchtownhall.com/theatre-performance/whats-on/event/theEVPsessions

    November Sunday 15th - Globe Road walking tour for the Globe Road Festival: 11am
    A Sunday morning stroll up Globe Road in the company of Gareth Evans, Elaine Mitchener and the Bohman brothers, all of whom will present brand new performance commissions related to the road itself, finishing with a reading in York Hall with Stephen Watts, Richard Scott and Jonathan Mann www.theenemiesproject.com/globeroad

    November Wednesday 18th - Soundings III with Maja Jantar at St Johns on Bethnal Green: 7pm A collaboration with the incomparable Maja Jantar for a new sound poetry / avant-garde music performance as part of the Soundings project with Hubbub at Wellcome Collection responding to prompts from the Wellcome Library. St Johns on Bethnal Green, an early 19th-century church, is an amazing venue too. www.stevenjfowler.com/soundings

    Upcoming: Soundings - a project with Hubbub & Wellcome Library

    Soundings is a series of collaborative performances I will be presenting from August 2015 to October 2016, in conjunction with Hubbub and the Wellcome Library. There will be ten editions, each in a different location in and around London, each with a different collaborator.www.stevenjfowler.com/soundings

    Soundings

    Each edition of Soundings will begin with Wellcome library staff raiding the library's extensive collection to suggest items, including images, manuscripts and books, in response to a title inspired by the Hubbub's research strands and initiated by Hubbub curators. These prompts will form the basis for the public performances of sound poetry, sonic art or conceptual performance, devised each time by myself and my collaborator. Collaborators include Emma Bennett, Dylan Nyoukis, Maja Jantar, Patrick Coyle, Sharon Gal, Tamarin Norwood and James Wilkes, with more to be announced.

    Hubbub are the first residents of The Hub at Wellcome Collection, an international team of scientists, humanists, artists, clinicians, public health experts, broadcasters and public engagement professionals. We explore the dynamics of rest, noise, tumult, activity and work, as they operate in mental health, neuroscience, the arts and the everyday. I'm fortunate to be part of this extraordinary enterprise, as a poet and artist in residence, and you can read more about my work with Hubbub here: www.stevenjfowler.com/hubbubor www.hubbubgroup.org 

    Soundings #1: August 18th
    at Camley Street Natural Park
    with Emma Bennett
    Time: 1pm – 2pm (12 Camley Street, London N1C 4PW). Free entrance.
    www.hubbubgroup.org/soundings

    Soundings #2: September 4th 
    at Wellcome Collection Late
    with Dylan Nyoukis
    Time: 19.40 and 21.30 (183 Euston Road, London NW1 2BE). Free Entrance 
    www.wellcomecollection.org/events/friday-late-spectacular-hubbub

    Soundings #3: November 18th
    at St Johns on Bethnal Green
    with Maja Jantar
    Time: 8pm to 9pm (200 Cambridge Heath Road. London E2 9PA). Free Entrance.
    www.stjohnonbethnalgreen.org

    my performance in a Parisienne circus for Festina Lente

    I've read in Paris before, but I read, and I hope, relatively speaking, those days are temporarily coming to a close. Now is a time to read in public far less, and perform more. So this was an invitation I was grateful to receive from the amazing and intense Chilean poet Martin Bakero, who lives in Paris and curates the Festina Lente in the Circus Electrique, part of the Pantheon of Poets festival in the city. This was all sound poets and sonic artists, and as I've felt with the art writers of my generation in London who've influenced me so much, and are now friends (Pat Coyle, Holly Pester, Hannah Silva etc) this is a real community in Europe. After meeting Jorg Piringer and Heike Feidler last year, here I got to connect to Julien d'abrigeon and the wonderful Maja Jantar, whose performance was spellbinding and I learnt masses from just by watching. It's a privilege to be part of that community, if even peripherally, it is defined by exciting work, by real exploration and intensity and I feel very welcome by the people who seem to be defining it.

    My performance piece, mort & homme, was an attempt to utilise mantra like repetition through different vocal ranges, beginning with something like murky song into ulluation and finishing with doom. That was to be contrasted against electronic chinese music, and then a conceptual element Ive wanted to do for awhile, book sawing. I don't really care if the result is a success, but it was a satisfying experience, as I had to go out of my comfort zone, and that's all I want to do at the moment. The piece was new, an experiment and a departure with the only goal that it didn't seem that way. I'm not interested in thinking about the quality of the work, just the experience of making it. I had a wonderful time. Video below. I also managed to snag some videos of some of the other amazing performances that made up the day, one of a series now set up in Paris over the next few years.
    Maja Jantar & Martin Bakero https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_rdM9zGA2hY

    Huellkurven 2 - bring your guns we will exchange them

    I am genuinely excited to be in the magazine Huellkurven. There are very few repositories of sonic art poetry soundwork online which have such a brilliant and considered format, and such a vibrant editorial stamp. I have listened to every work on issue 1, and now to be one of 21 people in issue 2, it is very pleasing. You can also download the whole issue as an album too, and it's edited by a collective out of Vienna. The very finest avant garde sound poetry on display. My piece is a live recording in situe at a modern museum, in their ethnographic gallery, which through found radio and installation noises, as well as responsive, guttural sound poetry aims to ambiguously compliment / satirise / criticise the anesthetised western usage of african sound culture http://www.huellkurven.net/magazine.php

    Everybody's people

    I performed twice for the Voice art night. An epic experience for me hard to put it into concise sentences of any cogent value...newness, consistently attempting to find discomfort in the growth of new work and collaborators and practises has led to some of the most creatively profound experiences this year. It was a farewell to Ben - a friend who had given so much to me - a new world's poetry - a reluctant educator  - a moment he passed over to me something significant just before he leaves for China. and on top, to do this in tandem with dylan nyoukis - a true pioneer, a batwing sound artist, and for us to achieve real moments of synthesis fused was amazing, quite emotional. All I can say is that it felt overwhelming to be a part of a creative moment harrowing love happening live in a room full of very generous warm spirited people. It was also great fucking fun and shall not be quickly forgotten. Another Muay Thai poem, where 666... was attempting to be attritional and meditative this was intended as amusing energetic and explosive and still retain the sense of authenticity of practise amidst the silliness so vibrantly Central to old school sound poetry practise. Chris page again is a fine friend to help