Aurelie go to church

The next leg of Aurelie's (miniature and somewhat chronologically dispersed) tour of the North found them in Leeds, in the ominously beautiful surroundings of The Left Bank, Formerly Known As St Margaret of Antioch Church. An intriguing lineup of acts included The Twilight Gatherers, Seed of Barrabas and Slimpro 6 and the Bobettes. The latter concluded the evening with a colourful trip which melded thunderous choral motifs, a custom built Altar of Plumbing, and what eventually turned out to be frying fish. A truly sacramental, description-defying feast for bewildered senses.

The personnel from Aurelie's previous outing reconvened, augmented this time by Neil Woodall on violin. The sextet developed upon the structure of their Lancaster performance climaxing the set in an abrasive squall of sound spearheaded by Mr Hall and the Bin Lid.

(L-R: Glenn Boulter, Jim Tetlow, David Dhonau, Ola Szmidt, Neil Woodall, John Hall.)

Video documentation, filmed and edited by Jim Tetlow.

Aurelie meets APC

Anti-Pop Consortium, Lancaster Storey Institute 9/4/10 from Glenn Boulter on Vimeo.

Aurelie performed in support of lauded left field hip hop collecive Anti-Pop Consortium last Friday at Lancaster's Storey Institute. Casting various bits of electronic produce into the mix on this occasion were Dave Dhonau, Ola Szmidt, Jim Tetlow, John Hall and Glenn Boulter. Photos to follow...

Hats off to Alex and Fern Oxley for organising this one!
www.myspace.com/44breaks

More April Shows

More Aurelie shows for April:

Friday 9^th April

(w/ Anti-Pop Consortium)

Storey Creative Industries Centre

Meeting House Lane, Lancaster

Doors 7pm

£12

www.Storey.co.uk

Saturday 17^th April

(w/ Twilight Gatherers + Slimpro 6 & the Bobbetts)

Leeds Left Bank

Cardigan Road, Leeds

Doors 7:30pm

£4

www.leftbankleeds.org.uk

Tuesday 20^th April

(w/ The Big Eyes Family Players + The Cardboard Lung)

The Red House

Solly Street, Sheffield

Doors 7:30pm

£4

www.myspace.com/redhousesheffield

Saturday 24^th April

Phoenix Square

Midland Street, Leicester
9pm – late

Free admission

www.phoenix.org.uk

Digital Supper with Mark Vernon 05/03/10

Photos from an improvisation session led by sound artist Mark Vernon at Ulverston Lanternhouse earlier this month.



The event was the latest in the Digital Lunch series organised by digital arts organisation Folly:

"A programme of informal events connecting the Northwest's artists and creative practitioners to the FLI artists, their ideas and practice, is being developed as part of a new Upgrade programme in the region. Based on the premise of a Digital Lunch – a pilot event which was hosted during Andy Best's time in residence – these events will run throughout the residency programme. FLI artists will each host a Digital Lunch, gathering artists together to explore art, technology and culture over dinner. Digital Lunches are a ma-net Action Research Project supported by Arts Council England."



The evening featuring two improvisation sessions and an impressive array of food was attended by Aurelie's Glenn Boulter and a variety of South Cumbria based musicians and sound artists playing everything from a theremin to an egg slicer!

Photos by Folly's Tor Townley.

Mark Vernon website: www.meagreresource.com/index.html
Folly website: www.folly.co.uk

Upcoming shows in April

Two upcoming shows in April:

Storey Institute Lancaster, supporting Anti-Pop Consortium
Friday April 9th from 7:30pm
www.thestorey.co.uk
www.myspace.com/antipopny

Leeds Left Bank with Slimpro 6 and the Bobettes
Saturday 17th April from 7:30pm
www.leftbankleeds.org.uk/

Aurelie + Volcano the Bear

Aurelie performed a festive jig at Ulverston's Roxy Basement Bar in November of last year supporting a stunning set by fellow ex-of-Leicester experimentalists Volcano the Bear (Aaron Moore and Daniel Padden) against the unlikely backdrop of the annual Dickens fest...



The lineup on this occasion was Glenn Boulter on guitar, harmonium and the 'Ted Hughes Sheepboard', Jim Tetlow on keyboards and John Hall on laptop, Dickens samples and vinyl. John also took the opportunity to wheel out the mighty dustbin / gramophone feedback unit for it's first public appearance (see below).



Look out for a free MP3 of the closest thing Aurelie gets to a Christmas album in the near past/present/future featuring a digitised Scrooge, stillborn sheep and some angry sounding Buddhist trumpets...



Glenn, Jim and John in post-gig still life episode (above).

With thanks to Alex and Fern of 44 Promotions for organising another great show. Additional thanks to the driver from Barrow cars who was a Pavement fan and let us put two massive tables in his boot.

brainwashed.com/vtb/
www.no-fi.org.uk/
www.myspace.com/44breaks

Aurelie at ROH2 Firsts '09

Aurelie presented the latest incarnation of their open-scored Barrow AFC drone opera 'An Unorthodox 1-2' at the Royal Opera House Linbury Theatre in November of last year.
performances from some of the most diverse and genre-defying artists in the UK today.

Firsts is an annual programme of performances from some of the most diverse and genre-defying artists in the UK today.

Originally commissioned by Bifocals Community Arts in 2008 as part of a residency at Barrow AFC, a twenty minute version of the piece was performed over two nights on 24th and 25th November to a full house of 400 people.



Aurelie captured in a rare moment away from the impressive ROH Canteen...

The lineup (left to right) featured the return of Barrow based actor Damian Rose (voice and live manipulation) and artist John Hall (Laptop and samples) in addition to Aurelie stalwarts Glenn Boulter (guitar and samples), Euan Rodger (percussion and electronics), Dave Dhonau (cello and guitar) and Ola Szmidt (flute and vocals).



The whole thing was captured for posterity by Endgame's Jim Tetlow, so watch this space for upcoming footage and details of a planned DVD edition compiling several performances of the piece.



With thanks to Rebecca Hanson for selecting us for Firsts, all of the crew and the receptionist for her entertaining anti-operatic diatribes.

Aurelie and Cardboard Lung at the Merzbarn

Aurelie's Glenn Boulter and John Hall (the Cardboard Lung) made their way up the A590 last Saturday to discuss the upcoming FON Festival at the annual Kurt Schwitters Herbst-Schule. The art/architecture conference took place in and around Kurt Schwitter's 'Merzbarn' at the Cylinders Estate near Elterwater. The event included a seminar on artist led learning projects, performances and discussions on the future of the Merzbarn.

Glenn and John performed on Saturday evening at the Merzzzoom Cabaret, employing laptops, amplified mixing bowl, buddha machine and a mangled Patti Smith cassette. Other acts included the Lakeland Fiddlers and East Lancs. band Funnel whose set featured rousing renditions of Ursonate and Anna Blume.

Kurt Schwitters and David Medalla preside over the closing buffet at Cylinders Estate.

We'd like to thank Ian and Celia of Littoral for inviting us along to KS09 and look forward to collaborating in the future!

Post-Grimeborn Musings

Aurelie members convened in the capital this Monday for a performance of their football drone opera 'An Unorthodox 1-2'. Sharing the bill with composer Jenni Roditi, the piece was selected for the gala night of the Arcola Theatre's annual festival of alternative opera, Grimeborn.



Regular members Glenn Boulter, Dave Dhonau and Euan Rodger were joined by Barrow-based actor Damian Rose and artist/musician John Hall who was responsible for commissioning the piece as part of a residency at Barrow AFC in 2008. Endgame's Jim Tetlow was also on hand to document the performance.



The show played to a sold-out audience (including Swiss Aurelie fan Aurélie Emery and long-time anti-guitar campaigner Leon Cole) and featured some dextrous live looping from Damian accompanied by cello, crowd samples and electronics. The piece was warmly received, with the only dissenting voice coming from the Independent's hilariously ill-informed theatre critic Michael Coveney:

'Sounds of the terraces have twice been excitingly evoked by Andrew Lloyd Webber in Evita and The Beautiful Game, but Boulter and his gloomy half-hour serial score concentrates on the anomie of an abandoned pitch, wind rustling in the grass, a reiterated litany of unknown players, a solitary fan. We see all that on film while Damian Rose sits hunched over his paper in Barrow's blue-and-white strip and four musicians mix cello and percussion scratching with taped fragments.'

As Euan put it: "If we'd only had a glossy programme and someone ex-eastenders-now-secondary-character-in-the-Bill as the lead. Or perhaps we should try a bio-opera of Madonna in bronze age Britain?"

Luckily the North West Evening Mail were on hand to big us up:
(Click here to read)

Watch this space for news of further performances at the Royal Opera House 2 in November!

Aurelie woud like to thank to Alex Sutton and the Arcola for all their hard work in organising this event. Special thanks go to Nick O'Donnell Smith for his pre-show demonstration of the iPod trombone.

Aurelie at Grimeborn 09

Aurelie's 'football drone opera' An Unorthodox 1-2 has been selected for the opening night of a London opera festival. Grimeborn 09 takes place at the Arcola Theatre during August and September. More information to follow.

More from the Roxy

An evening of audio visual performances in the surroundings of Ulverston's immaculately preserved art deco cinema.



Andrew Deakin opened the proceedings screening John Cage's film 'One11' alongside a meditative electro-acoustic composition. Aurelie were up second with an outing for their piece 'Silence is Twice as Fast Backwards' in which a series of film subtitles are stripped of their images, providing the starting point for 5 group improvisations. Third was a song-based laptop and guitar set from Mondo Bongo (alias actor and musician Damian Rose) accompanying his own Barrow AFC-inspired visuals. The event culminated in a visceral performance by Good Noise Bad Noise that took Italian horror classic 'Suspiria' as the raw material for a series of intense audio-visual improvisations.



Dave Dhonau and Endgame's Jim Tetlow brave the crowd of pensioners for a quiet moment with Ulverston's finest ... followed by post gig ramblings in search of impressive lichen.

Aurelie: Documents from the Roxy Cinema, Cumbria 22_04_09

 Images: Argañaraz Lumen.

             

I'll gladly play the role of Mephistopheles. Requiem.

Ikiru. A visual extract from 'Silence is twice as fast backwards' - which

we played live in 04/2008 at the Phoenix Arts centre - Which is now

regrettably closing down at the hands of ill informed councillors in the

name of 21st Century culture regeneration.

Delta Golf & Foxtrot at the Brudenell

Our travel & imagery gratitude to Jim Ultima Thule.

Live Music and Video at the Roxy

An evening of experimental music and visuals from Good Noise Bad Noise, Aurelie, Andrew Deakin and Mondo Bongo.

*Rescheduled from January.