Robert van Heumen
 

Robert van Heumen       composer-musician       laptop (LiSa & SuperCollider 3)

Robert van Heumen works with electronic means to create soundworlds. As a musician Van Heumen uses STEIM's live sampling software LiSa and real-time audio-synthesis software SuperCollider, controlled by various physical devices. His soundworlds are a mixture of digital crackles, heavy distortion, melancholic melodies, environmental sounds, voices and sounds from kitchen appliances, some of the time smashed beyond repair. Live sampled source sounds are gesturally manipulated and reworked within open ended narratives, exploring cycles of repetition beyond episodic improvisation.

Recent fixed-media works include the compositions Stranger and Fury, which are performed in multichannel and semi-improvised environments. Fury was presented at ICMC08, and Stranger premiered as a diffused work at Culturelab in Newcastle (UK) and was performed live at the Sound and Music Computing Conference in Porto in 2009. Both compositions are available on Creative Sources Recordings. In the fall of 2008 Van Heumen constructed the radioplay No Man's Land, commissioned by the CEM studio at WORM in Rotterdam, NL.

Van Heumen is performing regularly with the audio-visual trio SKIF++ (with Jeff Carey & Bas van Koolwijk), Shackle (working with electro-flutist Anne LaBerge on restriction), ABATTOIR (with cellist/vocalist Audrey Chen) and Whistle Pig Saloon (with guitarist John Ferguson deconstructing the guitar). He is a founding member of the N Collective and has shared the stage with dj sniff (Takuro Mizuta Lippit), Michel Waisvisz, Richard Barrett, Sakata Akira, Nicolas Collins, Oguz Buyukberber, Luc Houtkamp, Guy Harries, Tom Tlalim, Nicolas Field, Morten J. Olsen, Daniel Schorno, Roddy Schrock, Nate Wooley a.o.

Van Heumen is Managing Director of the STEIM foundation in Amsterdam, curator of the Local Stop concert series and member of STEIM's Artistic Committee. In a previous life mathematician, trumpet player and software programmer. He still reads L.E.J. Brouwer.

"... the whole set is sensuous fun as well as intellectually stretching."
Brian Morton (The Wire) on Whistle Pig Saloon

"... dynamic, ever changing, crackling, loud and soft, buzzing and hissing. Vibrant music this is, great music, moving away from the delicate structures of microsound into the land of noise based textures."
Frans de Waard (Vital Weekly) on Fury

"This is musique concrete that has torn away from its formal, academic origins. Deconstruction and reassembly in nasty extremis."
David Stubbs (The Wire) on SKIF++'s CD 'SK++ [01,02,03,04,00]'

"Office-R(6) literally sculpt rather than play the music using acoustic instruments and computers yeilding a music that is sublty seismic and eminently contemporary."
Musicreaction on OfficeR's CD 'Recording the Grain'

download resume | download HiRes promo photos



Selected Works

  • Radioplay 'No Man's Land' - commissioned by the CEM studio at WORM Rotterdam, premiered on Dutch radio on Dec 6 (2008)
  • Electronic composition 'Stranger' - premiered as multichannel version at Culturelab, Newcastle (UK) (2008)
  • CD 'SK++[01,02,03,04,00]' by SKIF++ on the fridgesound label (2008)
  • CD 'Fury' on Creative Sources Recordings (2008)
  • Solo semi-improvised piece 'They Would Get Angry Sometimes' performed at Brown University, Providence (USA, 2007) and <>Tag, The Hague (NL, 2007)
  • Ambient CD 'Silent' on the fridgesound label (2007) - based upon a specific synthesis process used by James Tenney
  • 4-channel composition 'Fury (after anger)' - commision for the Sonic Circuits festival in Washington DC (2006)
  • 4-channel composition '12 Bullets' - commision for STEIM's Noiseroom (2006) - also presented at the 5 days off festival in Melkweg Amsterdam 2006
  • Headphone composition for the audiovisual production 'Solitude' (2005) with Arnoud Noordegraaf (video) - premiere at the November Music Festival (Den Bosch NL, Gent BE 2005), further performances: Festival a/d Werf (Utrecht NL 2006), Effenaar (Eindhoven NL 2006), Junge Hunde Festival (Arhus DK 2006), Facelifters Lab (Maastricht NL 2006), Korzo Theater (Den Haag NL 2007)
  • CD 'Mundane Occurrences and Presentations' with the electro-acoustic sextet OfficeR - released in 2006 on Lampse
  • CD 'N - Live at STEIM' - with various groups of the N Collective - released in 2005 on the Alternative Version label (London)
  • Compositions for choreographies 'am i out?' (2000), 'Alien' (2001), 'Diva' (2002), 'Amour Fou' (2003), 'Drink me' (2004), 'STAU' (2004), 'Derivatives' (2005) by Anouk van Dijk

Selected Bands

  • SKIF++ (with Bas van Koolwijk on interactive video and Jeff Carey on laptop) - performances in Providence (Pixileration festival & AS220 2007), New York City (Issue Project Room & Galapagos/NIME 2007), Princeton (ffmup 2007), Birmingham UK (Modulate 2007), Amsterdam NL (SuperCollider symposium @ STEIM 2007, Sonic Acts XI festival 2006), Washington DC (Warehouse Theater 2007 & Sonic Circuits festival 2006), Haarlem NL (toon festival 2006)
  • Shackle (with Anne LaBerge on flute and electronics, focussing on restriction in material and structure, pieces are semi-randomly suggested by the computer, Shackle's aim is to explicity and subtly exploit shackling in both concept and material) - commissioned by the Fonds voor de Scheppende Toonkunst NL, performance in the Bimhuis Amsterdam in the Field of Ears program 2008, OT301 Amsterdam 2008, DNK Amsterdam 2008 & 2007, STEIM's Micro Jamboree 2006
  • ABATTOIR (with Audrey Chen on cello and vocals) - performances at STEIM's Local Stop (2008) and a European tour in the fall of 2008
  • Whistle Pig Saloon (with guitarist John Ferguson deconstructing the guitar) - performances at Borealis Norway 2009, DNK Amsterdam 2009, STEIM's Local Stop 2008
  • Man in the Middle (with Nicolas Field on drums and Tom Tlalim on electronics) - recently started collaboration in search of the rockband spirit
  • OfficeR (electro-acoustic sextet bringing structured improvisation in a very unique way - with Koen Nutters, Jeff Carey, Morten Olsen, Dirk Bruinsma, Oguz Buyukberber) - performances in Trondheim, Norway (2007), Washington DC (Sonic Circuits festival 2006), Berlin (Ausland 2005, Transmediale festival 2003), Geneva (Cave12 2006), Norway (Borealis & Numusic festivals 2005), The Netherlands (Gaudeamus Live Electronics festival 2006, Sonic Acts XI festival 2006, Bimhuis Amsterdam 2005)


Robert van Heumen

In an interview with Anne LaBerge for the Kraakgeluiden seminar 'Different codes' (February 2005):
 
'I started playing improv seriously with officeR, an electro-acoustic sextet, in 2001. At that time we started thinking about structures in improvised music, searching for ways to get away from the much-used improv paradigm of slowly building up drone-like atmospheres that even so slowly build down, or the massive hectic noise-like sessions where everybody tries to make himself heard. During the years, we build a specific 'language' that is very difficult to describe, but the better is it recognized when heard. It focuses more on sound than on melody or rhythm. Structures describe a type of sound and a type of communication, more than a pattern in time or pitch.
 
My setup consists of a laptop, a midi controller and a joystick, with which I control LiSa, a live sampling software that enables me to treat pre-recorded sounds as well as live-sampled sounds in various ways. With the joystick I can react quickly and intuitively on other musicians, building up a lively communication without locking myself up in the computer. I believe listening and reacting - together with collective experience building - is the key to interesting improvisation. And to me improvised music is interesting when I can see communication and concentration in people, no matter how the sound is generated.
 
Improvisation for me is very intuitive. Concious thought usually happens after the fact, in retrospect. Of course I evaluate then, and try to learn from it, but when I'm playing I don't rationalize.'