The Touchables
“The Noise Is Rest”
TO BE SPREAD LIKE VIRAL: To all fellow music-makers: Play the tone E for the environment:
To show that we really do care, play this tone, any octave, any length, but preferably as a long drone,
that could be faded in, to be played strongly, and of considerably length. This tone could start
spontaneously, it could start in the middle of a song, or symphony, or it could be played separately.
Thats up to you. But play it! Make the audience sing along! Show the world that we care!!!! Now!!!!!!!!
This duo-album is our first attempt to explore the musical possibilities in rather extreme registers,
are there interesting things happening when we play so low and high frequencies that we are on the
limits of feeling pitch or tonality? Does these extreme registers have a musical domaine of its own?
Does these “rules of listening” imply other sense-organs than just the ear? Does it make listening
more “subconscious”, more “etiological” ? Perhaps will more primitive, more instinct-based
mechanisms in our nervous system react to this, than to music played more in the “ordinary”
register?
Guro Skumsnes Moe (Octobass): It’s as if the sound of the octobass opens my mind. And I forget it so every
time I play it feels like a revelation of something I don’t know what is. It makes me uneasy and open.
The sound is not just a sound, it is perceived as a state. A presence of the depth.
Ole-Henrik Moe(Piccoletto-violin):
The piccoletto-violin is a violin that enables the very high register of frequencies to come out very
loud and clear. An ordinary violin can play the same register, but it will lack the supporting
resonances in the extreme register, making that register sounding pale and weak, compared to the
piccoletto-violin. So, to me, this sort of violin has the same function in the string-section as the
piccolo-flute, (or even, the piccoletto-flute), has in the flute-section: Every orchestra should have (at
least) one!
Ole-Henrik Moe:
Norwegian composer and violinist born in 1966. He studied composition and violin in Oslo and Paris and also took classes with Iannis Xenakis. He has composed chamber and orchestra music, performed at concerts and been featured in radio and television broadcasts in Norway and abroad. He has contributed both as composer and performer to a number of “crossover” projects with Norwegian rock band Motorpsycho and electronica pioneers Todd Terje and Andre Bratten among others. Ole-Henrik Moe is a renowned improviser and has participated in theatre productions and modern dance performances. His works have been performed at festivals such as Wien Modern, Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival and Ultima, by ensembles like Arditti, .
Guro Skumsnes Moe:
Norwegian bass player and composer born in 1983. Skumsnes Moe has over the years been one of Norways most productive composers and active musicians crossing the borders of contemporary music, rock, noise and improvisation. Her rock band MoE has toured just about every corner of the world and her acoustic noise ensemble Sult has more than any pushed acoustic textural music to the limits. Skumsnes Moe has scored for the Mexican director Amat Escalantes movie ‘The Untamed”, written music to several plays by the French puppet theater Plexus Polaire, and composed for Norwegian vocal group Oslo 14. The Touchables started as a chamber orchestra to explore the combinations of instruments that Moe and Skumsnes Moe felt deserved more recognition.