Mobile Music Making at the Berlin Summer University of the Arts

"App Music: Mobile Music Making
With Matthias Krebs July 29th – August 2nd, 2013

For quite a while now, making music with apps on smartphones and tablets has been more than simply a novelty. Some excellent music apps offer innovative digital musical instruments to the users. Additionally, digital music production has started to change. These apps already allow remarkable musical results, as demonstrated by the first serious album productions (e.g. “The Fall” by Gorillaz) and professional stage performances (e.g. by Jordan Rudess or the DigiEnsemble Berlin).

The summer school seminar will be a composition and sound workshop, in which participants will try out perspectives and potentials of “mobile music.” A range of different sounds and musical compositions will be developed in groups and discussed in a plenary session. Results of the interactive creative activities will be presented in a public performance at the c-base.

Starting with an overview of the different music apps, platforms, devices and interfaces, musical practices will be explored in the creative laboratory.Project groups will develop several performances and productions. The (partial) results will be presented in the workshop by the end of the last day. Additionally, a joint rehearsal with the musicians of the DigiEnsemble Berlin is scheduled. The last two days will be used to prepare the public performance in the c-base.

Central questions are:
• Can you express emotion and meaning with mobile music apps?
What possibilities are offered by mobile sensor controlled devices (such as smartphones and tablets) for music production and for future use as
musical instruments?
• Which musical forms, fields of application and performing practices can be shaped by music apps?

Participants
The workshop addresses interested parties as well as musicians, sound artists and music technologists, who are attracted by making music with digital sensor controlled devices and who are seeking an interactive exchange with others regarding new musical forms. At the same time, the workshop addresses composers and creative individuals (from the field of marketing/media production), who are keen on creating film material and background music for media productions.

Participants may certainly play on their own devices in the workshop, however, additional devices, peripheral equipment and amplifiers will also be provided.

Matthias Krebs is a music educator, physicist and opera singer. For many years now, he has participated in several theater productions as a sound artist and composer. He founded the DigiEnsemble Berlin at the Berlin Career College in 2010. Today, it is the first professional music ensemble, which is regularly performing mobile music on physical stages. Further, Krebs delves into the field of mobile music making in his blog as well as in several music article publications and in his current dissertation.

date: July 29th-August 2nd 2013
place: UdK Berlin, Bundesallee 1-12
fee: 400 € (from June 10th 2013: 420 €) No. of participants: 12 to 15
language: English
application deadline: July 1st 2013
Online registration: www.udk-berlin.de/summer-courses"