The concept of that live performance was “free improvisations for voice and magnetic tape”, so Savina provided her larynx as a source of raw material and Costis his equipment (the REVOX A-77 tape machine,a sound console and a harmonizer). That big wooden retro tape machine created an absurd sense of freshness and innovation, a disintoxication from the countless laptop experimentalists who carry themselves around producing the same boring and tiring digital output. Another interesting point about the tape machine is that you could see in real time the direct relation between Costis’ physical, hand activity and the sound result-almost like a DJ playing with his vinyl records. The hall of the Museum was suffocatingly loaded with people hungry for that kind of live events and happily the two artists gave them enough food…
From the first minutes of the session, the whole thing didn’t remind me at all the classic ping-pong improvisation I was expecting, as Costis was completely focused on Savina’s voice which was the prevailing element of the session. It was not the usual interactive improvisation, on the contrary I think it was a kind of instantaneous composition. As the session progressed, Savina demonstrated her endless store of vocal distortions and her instictive ability to pull something new from her throat, while at the same time Costis was treating that sound material using classic musique concrete techniques such as speed variations, superimpositions and sound textures overlapped, overlaid and intersecting. His resonant and reverberative effects created a warm and reverent atmosphere similar to performances in cathedrals. Savina gave me the impression that she is trying to unify her past and present repertoire and influences, blending her early conservatory training, her interpretations of melodious greek composers (Hadjidakis, Platonos, etc.), her love for legendary singers (Demetrio Stratos, Diamanta Galas,etc.), her rare improvisational attempts and her last ten year-obsession with traditional world music.
That stylistic openness combined with the skilled control of pace and pattern and the technical refinement of Costis created an expressive, dynamic sound result extending from vocal abstractions, guttural distortions, tuvan throat singing, african-asian colours, dadaistic automatic, spontaneous newspaper reading, sound poetry, glossolalia deliriums, surreal tape collage, layers of hum and roar, tape scratches, fragments of sounds from the audience, choir effects, greek traditional lullabies, Hadjidakis’ mellodies, mellow ambient to minimal, repetitive ethnic trance and massive ritual sound.All these in an amazing and outstanding 60 minute-package. Savina was like a medium transmitting the voices of other – world entities, while Costis was making his alchemical transformations creating gold sounds…
One of the year’s highlights! I am waiting for their next live session and why not, an album release. [Dimitris Sofianos]
