STRUCTURES NODE 1: Global Alchemy is a two-day event to explore raw sounds from unexpected corners of the world and to reflect on musical transformations induced by processes of globalization.
Experience street-level folk pop from Syria, unfiltered electric guitar music from the Western Sahara, and other hybrid, rarely recognized street musics from around the southern and eastern hemispheres. Cut through the boundaries of "us" and "them" with concerts by
Omar Souleyman and
Group Doueh, DJ-sets by
Sublime Frequencies, and with
films,
talks and
discussion.
Starting from the Sublime Frequencies label’s unique work,
Structures Node 1: Global Alchemy looks at the socially transformative power of music as the result of a constant, globe-spanning process of exchange, amalgamation, imitation, theft and appropriation. And at the musical and political frictions that arise from encounters of traditional music and globalized pop, of folk purism and the cacophony of modernity, of north and south, east and west. What’s the situation for musicians in countries facing a very unequal distribution of economic power and of the means to access? And what’s the status quo of musical diversity where an increasingly homogenized global market place collides with folk music as a highly diversified everyday life practise?
SUBLIME FREQUENCIESSublime Frequencies travel the globe, digging deep for overlooked and forgotten music, looking for artists and groups that move their souls, and making strong connections with musicians and music lovers wherever they go. Folk and pop musicians are sought out, documented and released on the Sublime Frequencies record label, capturing ultra-vivid sights and sounds from rural life and urban street. Radio broadcasts, field recordings and lost archives are also assembled into CD and vinyl releases, all presented in a genuinely thrilling and unabashed style. The label also releases DVD with film projects from their vast archive of visceral and immediate folk cinema shot on location in North Africa, the Middle East, South and Southeast Asia.
Sublime Frequencies was founded in 2003 by
Alan Bishop (
Sun City Girls), Hisham Mayet, and Richard Bishop (Sun City Girls), soon joined by
Mark Gergis and a number of occasional collaborators. In 5 years, the label has produced nearly 50 releases. The label specializes in releasing sound recordings, video, and film from all over the world with emphasis on North Africa, the Middle East, and Asia. SF also covers other areas including South America and sub-Saharan Africa. Sublime Frequencies presentation, aesthetic, and approach sidesteps traditional ethnomusicology, academic protocol and corporate funding, documenting the sound and images of ignored cultural phenomenon rich in expressive ideas. Sublime Frequencies are also focused on breaking down traditional barriers of how international music and related culture is perceived by the way it is presented. Sublime Frequencies are presenting some of the greatest expressive music in the world with only one agenda in mind: that it needs to be heard or seen, respected and recognized.
"The label is a collective of explorers dedicated to acquiring and exposing sights and sounds from modern and traditional urban and rural frontiers via film and video, field recordings, radio and short wave transmissions, international folk and pop music, sound anomalies, and other forms of human and natural expression not documented sufficiently through all channels of academic research, the modern recording industry, media, or corporate foundations. Sublime Frequencies is focused on an aesthetic of extra-geography and soulful experience inspired by music and culture, world travel, research, and the pioneering recording labels of the past." (Sublime Frequencies mission statement extract)
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