Music should not always produce a calming effect on us. Sometimes, it must shake and provoke in order to activate our senses and mind.
With this in mind, composer and sound artist Joan Bagés i Rubí and I created Morphosis Duo for a concert for the Associació Catalana de Compositors Actuals (Current Catalan Composers Association) in Barcelona in 2016. There, we presented SCRATCH!, a project with an open programme of works for baritone saxophone and electronics with the same line with Morphosis Ensemble, a flexible collective engaged in the dissemination of electroacoustic music, in addition to promote this repertoire with composers, sound artists and performers involved in the exploration of new languages and sonorities.
For us, electroacoustic music represents a step forward in the (r)evolution of music of the 20th-21st centuries. Furthermore, the real revolution in music today is not just the reinterpretation of works composed hundred of years ago, but giving equal opportunities to new music, its creators and performers.
After having presented SCRATCH at New York City Electroacoustic Music Festival 2017 (the USA) or at Bruits Blancs Festival 2021 (France), Morphosis Duo set out on the adventure of creating a new project: THIS IS NOT A FAD!, with a programme consisting entirely of works by different generations of female composers.
Watch the teaser:
Whilst a past in which the role of women in music (especially in the field of composition) has been so marginal cannot be changed, we have a responsibility to eradicate any type of discrimination (including gender) and lay the foundations for new generations of artists.
THIS IS NOT A FAD! also seeks to reflect upon the question of gender in music. Are there features that demonstrate that a work has been composed by a man or a woman? Except for voice, is the gender difference appreciated when a work is performed by a woman or a man? Do female audiences listen in the same way as male audiences?
This project was selected for the “live showcases” at the 10th edition of Classical:NEXT and we premiered it with a great success in Hannover (Germany) in May 2022.
Joan Martí-Frasquier
Barcelona, June 2022
