Showing posts with label martha moopette. Show all posts
Showing posts with label martha moopette. Show all posts

Tuesday, 10 December 2013

IF 5 - New Year's Eve



Close all your doors and windows! Take off your shoes! And the rest of your clothes! Lock up your daughters, and sons, then let them out again! And run, wildly, towards the Yellow Room of the Chapel in the Garden, in Bridport, this New Year's Eve.

And what, in your stupor of unrelenting delight, will you find there that cold, winter's evening?

Fine people, pillars of the community, chortling with the miscreants and the ne'er do wells. A feast of savoury snacks and delectable desserts, made by the hands of peoples. A wealth of live music, excessive entertainment, and beamy delights. 

The fifth of Bridport's popular feast of entertainment so cutting edge that it hurts like a paper-cut but doesn't wound too deeply, because it's just a paper cut, but it really hurts. But you just love to press down on it.

With performances from force-of-nature and King Elvis Herod, whirlwind wizard of ebony and ivory Robert Lee, malfunctioning and factory-reject badly-made pop-star Ergo Phizmiz, Human Christmas Tree Martha Moopette, and Bridport's most famous man President Flora Bertolli. The evening will also feature a performance by the supergroup known only as The Last Pub Band in the Universe, who will play, and perhaps hurt a bit (but they like the pain), all your favourite songs.

Tickets are just £3, the doors open at 8, and close, well, you know ... later.... bring a bottle or 4. Dressing up welcome but not obligatory. Nakedness always welcome.

Monday, 26 August 2013

A Young Lady and Her Cat Spend a Quiet Night In (Board Game Intermezzo)


What a ridiculous board game!
Better off to be ignored game!
Big fat man is in the middle.
It is all a silly riddle,
Such a lot of stupid piddle.
Roll your dice 
then,
move your piece.
I don't like it 
in 
the 
least.



Lots of dreams and lots of castles,
It is all a lot of hassle!
Massive baby disappears -
what does all of it amountter?
I have gone and lost my counter!
Use a penny, 
anything,
I'm sick 
of this 
bloody 
thing!




War is raging all around,
Bombs are crashing 
to the ground,
Very noisy!
Bang bang bang!
If you roll a six, 
then maybe,
you might find yourself 
a baby.
Then I hope
My
Dear Friend,
This game
will be
at an end.

Thursday, 23 May 2013

"UOEIA" premiere, May 30th 2013




“UOEIA”, an operina on the histories of yodelling by Ergo Phizmiz, based on books by Bart Plantenga. In woodland school, two young foxes are presented with the history of the world through yodelling: the enchantment of the planet, the birth of civilisation, through to the attempted destruction of yodelling by church and state, all culminating in the rescue at sea by yodelling by Harry Torrani, the English yodelling cowboy, of Mercedes Gleitze, first lady to swim the English channel.

“UOEIA” is performed by what, appropriately enough, should be termed “Swiss Family Phizmiz”, in a mixture of vocalisation, performance, shadow-puppetry, masks, paper-collage, and animation, with a kaleidoscopic music score that twists between original acoustic composition and sound-collage from across the history and richly varied cultures of yodelling.





Writer, Director, Composer: Ergo Phizmiz
Performers: Martha Moopette, Talulah Lotus, Autumn Poppy, Ergo Phizmiz
Video: Ergo Phizmiz, Simon Mathewson, Martha Moopette

“UOEIA” is a commission of DePlayer, and will premiere at Operadagen Rotterdam on May 30th 2013, as part of the yodel themed evening “That Global Glottis”.


With "That Global Glottis" DE PLAYER presents a program poised on the cutting edge of where experimental sound meets opera and the phenomenon known as yodeling. The technique of yodeling basically accents that jolt of air that occurs during the rapid movement between chest and head voice. While opera singers are taught to polish away that vocal leap with glissando techniques, yodelers do the opposite: they highlight the breaking of the voice.
"That Global Glottis" features a reading, a film series, and a Late Night Performance Event that spotlights this unique vocal technique as global phenomeon. The program was developed in close collaboration with author bart plantenga, renowned for his books YODEL-AY-EE-OOOO: The Secret History of Yodeling Around the World and his recently published Yodel in Hi-Fi, From Kitsch Folk to Contemporary Electronica. Both books emphasize the fact that yodeling is found everywhere from pop to opera, not just among the Swiss and in the Alps but also among the African Pygmies, the Nazi Jugend SS, Bollywood star Kishore Kumar and countless others.


Sunday, 26 February 2012

Elvis Herod & Ergo Phizmiz Dance to the Bells - New performance for 2012


A 12 hour durational performance from Elvis Herod & Ergo Phizmiz, for performance festivals, social interjections, private amusements, and community events.

Elvis & Ergo will arrive in your town attired beautifully with a ramshackle formality and sartorial elegance, and from 6am until 6pm will stand in the vicinity of your local church, interpreting the ringing of the church bells through the art of rhythmic movement, a form in which Elvis & Ergo are both acknowledged masters.

(One only has to discover these two gentlemen tearing up a dance floor in the Slug & Lettuce throwing Cubist disco shapes to realise this.)

Performances may also include special guests....

This long feast of wizard-moves and fancy footwork is available for booking now.

Contact ergophizmiz at gmail dot com with details of your local town and local church.

And just to get you in the mood, here's Ergo Phizmiz, Oblivian Substanshall, and Martha Moopette dancing to ABBA.

Saturday, 7 January 2012

Anything But The Third Policeman - Part One



In 2011 Ergo Phizmiz created an electronic opera on Flann O'Brien's The Third Policeman, which toured the UK and into Rotterdam. For licensing reasons we are unable to present audio or video of the opera. This is the first in a series of "Anything But The Third Policeman" short films, featuring footage from the tour, backstage footage, footage of artists from the tour performing their own music, and little things that happened along the way. Featuring Ergo Phizmiz, Martha Moopette, Monkton Wylde, Oblivian Substanshall, Vulnavia Vanity, and Elvis Herod.

Tuesday, 23 August 2011

The Third Policeman - First shows and Times review


Well folks! We're back. "The Third Policeman" has premiered, much (very tired and rather intense) fun was had by all.

Audience so far have loved it and detested it, as indicated in the image above. Which is, of course, just the way we like it....

Today's issue of The Times featured a rather splendid review of the show, below...



This link will take you to a photo gallery of images taken by Claire Shovelton (the above image is taken from Claire's gallery).

The lovely Tom Ravenscroft has also been drumming up support for the show, via his 6Music show where he featured a ten minute mix of songs and music from The Third Policeman, and in his New Statesman column, where he writes:

"You should probably expect to be at first a little startled - the music will be wildly unpredictable as I suspect will be his actions. I would be almost concerned if you had witnessed anything like it before. He is a burst of imagination, colour and noise, which has in the past left me sitting jaw collapsed on the floor, speechless as to how someone can so beautifully map out such madness."



Read the full article here.

And finally, today's blog would not be complete without this image of the Gang of Rogues a few minutes before going our separate ways.


Many thanks to Caroline & Izzy, Bill, Anna, Nell and all the other lovelies of Tete-a-Tete...

And let's not forget thanks to the Third Policeman team Erik Bumbledonk, Vulnavia Vanity, Oblivian Substanshall, Martha Moopette, Mike Wade, Bryan Innes Parker, Lucinda Guy, Talulah Lotus & Autumn Poppy. See you for more shows from October to December......

Wednesday, 10 August 2011

The Third Policeman Rehearsals Begin!

Oh yes. Today rehearsals for Ergo Phizmiz's electronic neur-opera vaudeville machine "The Third Policeman" began...

Erik Bumbledonk with beautiful flat cap / pony-tail combo

Bumbledonk looking pensive by a glove that has previously caused him pain

Ergo gesticulates and nobody looks

Bumbledonk recounts the plan of Divney

Ergo holds a bar for no reason

Ergo wears Mathers' fez and holds little tiny Mathers puppet

A pensive moment with Vulnavia Vanity and Erik Bumbledonk

Erik Bumbledonk sings and holds his penis whilst Vulnavia looks on

De Selby's nose

Ergo with the look of a madman

Vulnavia's latex fetish

And for an update on the splendid masks Martha Moopette & Mike Wade have been working on for the opera, you could do worse than head over to Moop's blog...

Tomorrow we construct the set, and await the imminent arrival of Oblivian Substanshall...

Wednesday, 9 March 2011

Howtosayto

HOWTOSAYTO Saturday 12th March 2011 at Bridport Arts Centre.

Curated by Ergo Phizmiz & Martha Moopette

Ergo Phizmiz "The Mourning Show" starring Erik Bumbledonk as Chris Evans

Live music from:
Vulnavia Vanity
Eleanor Davis

Oblivian Substanshall

Robert Lee & Friends
Erik Bumbledonk
Amie Willingale

Ergo Phizmiz

DJ Courtley Love
spins a bunch of badgoodbeauties

Films from
Martha Moopette
Phil Lane
Erik Bumbledonk
Maria Deegan
Carl Rosendahl
Alexander Jones

Monday, 14 February 2011

Howtosayto @ Bridport Arts Centre

Howtosayto? One would expect this query to have a simple, one-dimensional solution. Life is, however, rarely so straightforward, and set to wreak the freshly odoured havoc of uber simple anti-simplicity will be a flock of artists, writers, thieves, raconteurs, chefs, composers, charlatans and burlesque dancers taking over Bridport Arts Centre on 12th March, 2011.

Showcasing work by creatives existing outside the fairly contemptible rotten gammon stench of the art and music industry/world, Howtosayto will present an evening of delights for your aural-retinal palates to savour like strawberries with sugar on a Summer's morning.

Baked in an immense pan by internationally acclaimed Dadachefs Ergo Phizmiz & Martha Moopette, the evening is a luxurious casserole of ingredients from across the UK, set to sizzle with world spices and just a dash of arsenic.

The sartorial elegance of Vulnavia Vanity will present tasteful slices of ukulele uberpop. Master Professor of Surrealism Oblivian Substanshall will fill your wanting mouths with spoken-word odysseys from the depths of Edward Lear's oven. Future-anti-pop-supergroup Angela Valid present a wordless cookbook of shatters and rattles, like a heavenly kitchen hurtling through space. Eleanor Davis will put a viola and her mouth into a pan, let them gently simmer, and see what comes out. Ergo Phizmiz will perform his new piece "Fulcanelli's Shoes", which includes no cooking but plenty of time-travel and a picture of Simon Cowell looking like a murderer.

The evening will also showcase some of the cream of contemporary film-making, including music videos and installations by the multi-award winning Martha Moopette, "Process No 18" by Phil Lane, a Duckumentary by Alexander Jones, and the UK premiere screening of the film "Slitscan Carnival" by Carl Rosendahl, one of the founders of renowned animation studio Dreamworks.

Bringing out the extra spices will be burlesque dancer Amethyst Shivers, who is of course likely to heat up the proceedings, a human Cumin, if you like. The evening will be compered by a comedy legend so underground he's permanently hot from volcanic activity (hence his red hair, the colour of a Rogan Josh), the great Erik Bumbledonk, who was last seen as a suicidal, birdlike imitation of radio DJ Chris Evans, bare-bottomed and jumping out a window to his death.

At the miniscule cost of £3, which now constitutes approximately 3 and a half chocolate bars, or two bags of pasta, or half a bottle of wine, you can't really go wrong. So do come along, wear something dapper or trampsy, whatever is your wont, clean out your eyes and ears (but with something non-corrosive, of course), buy a drink, and learn Howtosayto.

ergophizmiz.net * marthamoopette.blogspot.com * bridportarts.com

Wednesday, 26 January 2011

Fulcanelli's Shoes - World premiere of the new piece by Ergo Phizmiz


World premiere of the new piece by Ergo Phizmiz
Taking place at Soundart Radio, Dartington, UK
February 5th, 2011

Reconsider your histories. We live in an age of holocaust deniers and the Da Vinci Code, the information age has become the age of fabricating the past. Reality has become something malleable, flexible to the needs and whims of whomever happens to be recalling what has already been.

"Fulcanelli's Shoes" is a response of sorts to this cultural phenomenon, by acclaimed artist, composer and writer Ergo Phizmiz. Weaving a tale with one foot paddling in truth, and the other firmly embedded in lies, the piece presents a rewritten cultural history of the 20th century, presenting the relationship between the artistic and alchemical worlds at the beginning of the century as the catalyst for the creative, scientific and political revolutions of the proceeding times.

Discover how Jean Cocteau could travel in time; the secrets of the Large Hadron Collider; hear a genuine alchemical transmutation of base metal into gold; find out how anagrams built the universe; learn how to fix anything that is broken .....

Part lecture, part opera, part documentary, this is a uniquely 21st century artwork, bringing together strands of forms into a unified but scattershot form. Collaborating with film-maker Martha Moopette and performer Vulnavia Vanity, Ergo Phizmiz has created a truly experimental piece of anti-art, with the feel of something akin to being kicked in the face with a Ferrero Rocher boot.






*

"Fulcanelli's Shoes" is presented as part of Soundart Radio's FirstSpark Festival, and double-bills with a special, in-studio performance of Ergo Phizmiz's opera about radio, magic, and the death of popular UK DJ Chris Evans "The Mourning Show".

Featuring an unforgettable and masterful central performance from Erik Bumbledonk as Chris Evans, "The Mourning Show" has been described as a punk-opera.

Telling the story of the gradual destruction of Evans on his Radio 2 morning show by three malevolent callers, this performance is an experience you won't easily forget.

As a flummoxed audience member put it at the London premiere in August 2010, "It's not only the big things that can become overwhelming".....

Vital Weekly described it as "an excellent opera, which brought plunderphonics to a new level".

The performance will also contain delicious winter warmer soup, included in the ticket price.

*

"Fulcanelli's Shoes" is supported by Arts Council England, Soundart Radio, & Care in the Community Recordings

"The Mourning Show" was commissioned by DePlayer (www.deplayer.nl)

*

If, due to geography, time, space, or what-not, you are unable to get along to the performance, you can tune in to the show live on www.soundartradio.org.uk

Friday, 21 January 2011

Ergo Phizmiz at Bridport Arts Centre

Ergo Phizmiz is involved with two forthcoming events at Bridport Arts Centre, Dorset, UK.

CARLOS NORONHA-FEIO
featuring a sound-installation by Ergo Phizmiz
"3, 2, 1, 0 - A A And Away - 1, 2...."

Rugs, Video and Installations

The Allsop Gallery

29th January - 12th March

Carlos Noronha Feio is an artists who leaves and weaves the mothership of his own national identity to traverse cities, histories and space.

His work is engaged with the points at which geography and migration meet, where different cultures collide, interfere and impose their own imperatives on each other.

The exhibition features his latest work funded by the Gulbenkian Foundation.

Read an article about the exhibition here.


Chinstrap presents.....

An evening curated by Ergo Phizmiz & Martha Moopette....

Featuring live music, early & new cinema, trash-opera, burlesque, Dada ....

HOWTOSAYTO

Saturday 12th March

8pm

Admissions: 8pm

An evening of contemporary music & early cinema, live soundtracks & radio-art, sound-installations and performance.

Banged together by composer Ergo Phizmiz (The musical man of the moment - The Times) and prize-winning film-maker Martha Moopette you are cordially invited to explore Bridport Arts Centre in the company of inventive, accessibly music and film from local and international artists.

"Howtosayto" promises a night of curiosities and skewiff ideas, live collaborations, mini-operas, and possibly some classics of bad-good pop music from the past, present and future.

Thursday, 11 November 2010

Watch "The Mourning Show" online

The Mourning Show from Bill Bankes-Jones on Vimeo.

Ergo Phizmiz's opera about radio, magic, death and UK radio DJ Chris Evans, commissioned by DePlayer, received it's UK premiere last August at Tete-a-Tete: The Opera Festival. Now you too can join in the nihilistic fun and watch a DJ be destroyed.

On his regular early morning show, popular DJ Chris Evans is telephoned by three ladies.

They proceed to destroy his mind.

Convinced he is a bird, he exits via the fourth storey window.

From “maverick composer” Ergo Phizmiz, The Mourning Show is a demonic-memetic-suitcase-living-room-opera.

“An excellent opera, which brought plunderphonics to a new level” – Vital Weekly


Music, Words & Direction: Ergo Phizmiz
Design & Video: Ergo Phizmiz, Vulnavia Vanity, Martha Moopette & The Travelling Mongoose
Puppeteers: Vulnavia Vanity & Courtley Love
Featuring:
Erik Bumbledonk as Chris Evans
Ergo Phizmiz as the Plague Doctor
and
Martha Moopette, Lucinda Guy and Margita Zalite as the Callers

Monday, 4 October 2010

Fairy Chewbacca




A music video for the new Ergo Phizmiz single "Fairy Chewbacca", featuring Courtley Love, filmed & edited by Martha Moopette.

"Fairy Chewbacca" is a new version of a song from the recently released Ergo Phizmiz album "Things to Do and Make", on Care in the Community Recordings, which can be bought from all good music retailers, and if they haven't got it, spank them!

Saturday, 18 September 2010

Ergo Phizmiz Live at Bridport Hat Festival - Videos

Below are some songs from Ergo Phizmiz's live show at Bridport Hat Festival, September 18th 2010..... keep an eye for some delightful hats passing by, some wonderful moustaches, and some angry looking fellows....

"Hats"



"Yellow Hat"



"In The Waking"



"Food and War"



"Fashionable Waltz"



"An Elephant On His Head"



"Mandrill"



"Fingerwings"

Thursday, 19 August 2010

The Mourning Show - The Talulah Tapes

A very pleasant surprise discovery. Ergo's 6 year old daughter filmed the vast majority of one of the rehearsals of "The Mourning Show" at Tete-a-Tete: The Opera Festival (with the exception of the shadow-puppetry based Prologue). Filmed without sound, we've edited it to the recorded version of the opera, and here it is ....







Saturday, 14 August 2010

"The Mourning Show" at Tete-a-Tete: The Opera Festival - Video Extracts

A selection of extracts from the UK premiere of Ergo Phizmiz's opera about radio, magic, death & Chris Evans, "The Mourning Show".















And a little backstage treat, with Vulnavia Vanity lip-syncing to The Quiz, whilst Erik Bumbledonk & Ergo Phizmiz rehearse their moves...




Monday, 5 July 2010

I Am The Music Man

One Sunday morning Martha Moopette said to Ergo Phizmiz "You really should cover I Am The Music Man". The deed was done, and by 3am the whole shebang, video and all (courtesy of Miss Moopette) were ready to molest the internet. Here are the results, with line-moustaches especially for the occassion ....



Saturday, 10 April 2010

The Mourning Show - May 2010

De Player presents
"The Mourning Show"
An Opera about Death, Magic & Radio

Written & Composed by Ergo Phizmiz

Starring Erik Bumbledonk as Chris Evans

With the voices of Lucinda Guy, Martha Moopette & Margita Zalite

Project Consultant The Travelling Mongoose

Masks by Vulnavia Vanity

*

The first performances of The Mourning Show
will take place at:

May 6th 2010 - Extrapool, Nijmegen, The Netherlands

May 8th 2010 - DePlayer, Rotterdam, The Netherlands

May 9th 2010 - Les Ateliers Claus, Brussels, Belgium

*

Download the hi-res poster

Download an mp3 preview of a Pot-Pourri of music from "The Mourning Show"

*

We will be delighted to see you there .....