Something of a Berlin super group GROUPSHOW is a project by the three electronic music producers Jan Jelinek, Andrew Pekler and Hanno Leichtmann. With their resepective solo projects each going full steam – Jelinek under his Farben moniker releasing a James DIN A4 remix album, Pekler latest record “Prepaid Piano…” receiving rave reviews and Leichtmann (static, the vulva string quartett) curating such exceptional events as the Letratone festival at Radialsysteme or the Grand Jeté series at Ohm – Digital in Berlin is delighted to see the three musicians come together again for another special live performance with their improvised band Groupshow.
The three artists, steeped in the formal language of minimalism, engage in a boundary-free collective improvisation that has its roots in both Fluxus and Krautrock. GROUPSHOW performances do not recreate previously rehearsed or recorded music. Instead, they attempt to make an open-ended aesthetic process both audible and tangible. The pursuit of these aims has several practical consequences. Wherever possible, GROUPSHOW position themselves and their equipment in the middle of the performance space, avoiding the use of a stage, risers or any kind of spatial separation between performer and audience.
httpv://https://youtube.com/watch?v=3tbxbYHu5ZY
The lighting remains static and clinical throughout the performance while real-time video, filming from directly above the musicians and projected onto a wall or screen, shows the three members playing and manipulating their tangled pile of equipment. Whenever possible, GROUPSHOW begin playing before any audience members enter, thus deliberately avoiding the dramaturgical imperative of an opening from which the rest of the musical narrative is expected to unfold.
httpv://https://youtube.com/watch?v=g_5OksBmH4M
As the intensity of the music and degree of the audience’s attention are both subject to flux, GROUPSHOW set no time limit to their performances and members of the audience are free to come and go, engage and disengage with the music as they please.
Groupshow LIVE
Saturday, 1st November 2014 | 21:00 CET
Roter Salon in der Volksbühne | Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz | 10178 Berlin/Mitte
www.groupshow.de | volksbuehne-berlin.de
