The Carnival in the Mirror Marches Into The Sea - Repeat broadcast on Deutschlandradiokultur

Deutschlandradiokultur are repeat broadcasting Ergo Phizmiz's 2011 30 minute radio-collage work "The Carnival in the Mirror Marches Into The Sea", next to a 20 minute edited version of the 2012 piece "Conversations With Birds". Listen here, at 0.05am (German time) on the morning between 27/28 February.

"The carnival is warming. Costumes rustle, commentators mutter in their microphones, glasses are filled and emptied. As an unheard sound procession on the audience begins overtake. 

Surreal acoustic natures transform into and through each other, pianos squirt their guts, dead carousels come to life, and the audience is increasingly in ecstasy."

The History of the Click Track

Broadcasting March 8th on WDR3, Germany, and online "The History of the Click Track", a 50 minute music documentary by Ergo Phizmiz.

"Because music in society is now so omnipresent as 'background music', and you can thank Erik Satie for that, and because the vast majority of music today created by corporations is recorded using click-tracks, it is possible to look at the click-track as an invisible yet omnipresent force in all our lives."

Ergo Phizmiz Shoots Peas on WFMU - Archive

You can listen to the archive (and see the playlist) of Ergo Phizmiz Shoots Peas on WFMU, on Do Or DIY with People Like Us, HERE.

"Conversations With Birds"

This Friday sees the premiere broadcast of "Conversations With Birds", a 45 minute horspiel on birds, language, memory, dreams and art-history in a mixture of English, German, Polish and Bird Language by Ergo Phizmiz.

Created with a stellar group of collaborators and cast members from across the gamut of artistic mediums including Juliane Meckert, Margita Zalite, Patrick Sims, Denis Kundic (aka Vernon Lenoir), Michal Libera, Martha Moopette, Dwoogie, Caroline Stupnicka, Flora Bertolli, and Oblivian Substanshall.

The piece was commissioned by Katarina Agathos for Bayerischer Rundfunk, and can be listened to by tuning in at 9pm German time this Friday 19th October.

Do tune in....

Ergo Phizmiz sings Gilbert & Sullivan

In December 2011 Ergo Phizmiz recorded four Gilbert & Sullivan operettas, acappella, from memory, for Vicki Bennett's mammoth 744 hour radio-broadcast "Radio Boredcast".


These recordings, along with the rest of the Boredcast, is now archived by the ever marvellous WFMU.


"Around the age of 11 or 12 I became obsessed with the comic operettas of Gilbert & Sullivan. This fascination lasted around 3 years. There were posters of W.S. Gilbert (the "S" stands for Schwenck, rather spectacularly) and Arthur Sullivan on my bedroom wall.


For years the thought of returning to their works "from memory" has been at the back of my mind. My very boring contribution to Radio Boredcast is "acappella" versions of the G & S operettas "HMS Pinafore", "Iolanthe", "The Pirates of Penzance" and "The Mikado".


Some of them I know better than others. In the cases where I didn't know the melodies, I made them up or roughly talked through them. I also decided to not use different voices for characters (these recordings are my second takes - the first takes sounded like The Goon Show and to be honest I had far too much fun doing them for it be genuinely boring), and to omit stage directions, so we are left with a very boring barrage of Victorian words, tuned and untuned, from my tired, monotone voice."


Ergo Phizmiz sings "The Mikado" 


Ergo Phizmiz sings "The Pirates of Penzance"


Ergo Phizmiz sings "Iolanthe"


Ergo Phizmiz sings "HMS Pinafore"


Ergo Phizmiz is a composer, writer, and multimedia artist. He makes pop, theatre, installations, opera, radio-art, radioplays, sound-collages and performances. He lives in Bridport, UK, and has a headache. He never wants to perform Gilbert & Sullivan again.

Ergo Phizmiz sings Gilbert & Sullivan, on Radio Boredcast

Ergo Phizmiz has joined the boredom of the Vicki Bennett curated, mammoth 744 hour broadcast Radio Boredcast, commissioned by AV Festival 2012.

Thu 1 March – Sat 31 March

Radio Boredcast is a 744-hour continuous online radio project, curated by artist Vicki Bennett (People Like Us) with AV Festival. In response to our ambiguous relationship with time - do we have too much or not enough? - Radio Boredcast celebrates the detail, complexity and depth of experience lost through our obsession with speed.

With over 100 participants Radio Boredcast includes new and unpublished works, freeform radio shows, field recordings, interviews, monologues and much, much more. Thematic playlists will run throughout from “Acconci” to “Zzz…”

 

You can listen continuously for a month, or for hours, minutes or seconds. Online 24 hours each day, at www.avfestival.co.uk or www.thepixelpalace.org. To launch Radio Boredcast live from 1 March you can click the red radio icon in the header above, or via the individual link for each day below.

 

In the meantime, the schedule for the whole month is listed below, with details of each show and information about the artists. You can also subscribe now to the Radio Boredcast podcasts. Thanks to all the contributors.

 

Co-commissioned by AV Festival and Pixel Palace, hosted by BASIC.fm.

Ergo's contribution involves acappella performances of the entirety of "The Pirates of Penzance", "HMS Pinafore", "Iolanthe" and "The Mikado", comic operettas by W.S. Gilbert & A.S. Sullivan.....oh dearie me.....

Around the age of 11 or 12 I became obsessed with the comic operettas of Gilbert & Sullivan. This fascination lasted around 3 years. There were posters of W.S. Gilbert (the "S" stands for Schwenck, rather spectacularly) and Arthur Sullivan on my bedroom wall.

For years the thought of returning to their works "from memory" has been at the back of my mind. My very boring contribution to Radio Boredcast is "acappella" versions of the G & S operettas "HMS Pinafore", "Iolanthe", "The Pirates of Penzance" and "The Mikado".

Some of them I know better than others. In the cases where I didn't know the melodies, I made them up or roughly talked through them. I also decided to not use different voices for characters (these recordings are my second takes - the first takes sounded like The Goon Show and to be honest I had far too much fun doing them for it be genuinely boring), and to omit stage directions, so we are left with a very boring barrage of Victorian words, tuned and untuned, from my tired, monotone voice.

Ergo Phizmiz is a composer, writer, and multimedia artist. He makes pop, theatre, installations, opera, radio-art, radioplays, sound-collages and performances. He lives in Bridport, UK, and has a headache. He never wants to perform Gilbert & Sullivan again. http://ergophizmiz.net

Conversations With Birds

Ergo Phizmiz is now in production on a new radioplay "Conversations With Birds"....

.....written in a mixture of English, German, Polish, and Bird languages, in collaboration with translators Denis Kundic, Caroline Stupnicka, Robin Gill, and Pretty Polly ......

..... it is commissioned by Katarina Agathos at Bayerischer Rundfunk, where it will broadcast this year.....

....the cast includes Ergo Phizmiz, Elvis Herod, Oblivian Substanshall, Martha Moopette, Vulnavia Vanity, Michal Libera, Robin Gill, and more to be confirmed ....

........ tweet tweet ........

The Mourning Show - Rehearsal Photos

From the rehearsals of the new opera about the death of Chris Evans, which previewed last night in Nijmegen....

The Faust Cycle - Download from Headphonica

The Faust Cycle
or, The House of Dr Faustus
-Released 1st January 2010 on Headphonica -



Written, Composed, Performed & Produced by
Ergo Phizmiz

Project consultants
James Nye, Martha Moopette, The Travelling Mongoose

One afternoon Ergo Phizmiz finds himself lumbered into delivering a parcel to the house of legendary alchemist and necromancer Dr Johann Faustus who, since the events of some time ago for which he is renowned, has entered into a rather quieter life in a vast, labyrinthine house, with hundreds of lodgers running the gamut from artists, birds, bird-people, walking fictions, ventriloquists, a Cassowary, running chairs, walking gramophones, and myriad automata.



This enormous dream fable, told through speech, songs, collage and sound-design, is the result of over three years delving down various rabbit-holes, and features collaborations in a range of contexts with artists of many disciplines, including Jack Phoenix, Margita Zalite, Pete Um, Angela Valid, Bela Emerson, Martha Moopette, Amie Willingale, and Zenith Pitts.

In glorious radiophonic technicolour, it is a musical-comedy of disorientation and magick, somewhere between nightmare and the half-remembered childhood whimsy of an insomniac music-hall artiste.


Download the entire 15 hours, complete with magnificent artwork from Moritz Grunke and friends, free, from the marvellous Headphonica.


The project is supported by Arts Council England, Soundart Radio, Vaguely Marsupial Productions, VentnorBlog, Quay Arts

Down By The Stream #2 Playlist & Download

If you tuned into Soundart Radio this afternoon at 2pm UK time, you will have heard some new toying about with radio by Ergo Phizmiz & The Travelling Mongoose, in the shape of the second episode of their irregular "Down By The Stream" shows.

In this show, interspersed with found-sounds, foley, field-recordings, spoken-word, and various other ways of playing about with their favourite medium, we heard (roughly and in no particular order):

Frankie Valli "Grease"
Grange Hill Cast "Just Say No"
Siegfried Wendel "Oldtime Music"
BBC "50 Years of the BBC"
Papadopoulous, Kowald & Floridis "Pyrichia"
Aaron Islamb "Boss Yourself"
The Music of Portsmouth
Indian Summer 12"
Cozy Powell 7"
Buxtehude Fugue
Benjamin Britten "Dances From Gloriana"
Stravinsky "The Firebird (Suite)"
Lord Kitchener "Dr Kitch"
Mr Bach Goes to Town
Disney "Pinocchio"
HMV Vehicle Sound Effects
David Tomlinson "The Life I Lead"
All Star Jazz Festival
Darius Milhaud "Cantate de la Paix"
Kathleen Ferrier 10"
Indo-Jazz Suite
Saint-Saens "Carnival of the Animals"
How To Give Yourself a Stereo Checkout
Disney French 101 Dalmatians 7"

Interview with Chinky Bolin

Mix by Ergo Phizmiz & The Travelling Mongoose

Field-Recordings by The Travelling Mongoose

Produced by Ergo Phizmiz


You can download this show in high-quality mp3 below:

Ergo Phizmiz & The Travelling Mongoose "Down By The Stream #2"

And while you're at it, why not grab the first episode too:

Ergo Phizmiz & The Travelling Mongoose "Down By The Stream #1"


"Down By The Stream", the latest project of Ergo's long running collaboration with the Mongoose, takes place on an irregular basis, as part of Ergo Phizmiz's experimental weekly show on Soundart Radio, Dartington, UK.

Pointballing - On "The Verb", BBC Radio 3

BBC Radio 3's 'cabaret of spoken-word' The Verb will be presenting the first of a new Ergo Phizmiz project called "Pointballing", tomorrow night, Friday 27th March.

Pointballing is the first of what will be a number of short pieces of playful, nonsensical radio-art, with spoken-word, original music and sound-effects, written, performed and produced by Ergo Phizmiz.

Tune in ... 90-93 FM, on digital, or online at www.bbc.co.uk/radio3

The programme, which also features Graham Swift and Tomas Venclova, goes out 27/03/09, and will be available through the BBC's "Listen Again" service for one week after broadcast at www.bbc.co.uk/radio3/theverb

Diddly-Dee-Diddly-Da, as Reginald Gardner once intoned .....

Many interesting and lovely things happening this year.....

Coming soon there'll be the new album "Things to Do and Make" on Care in the Community Recordings, preceded by a single "Food and War" featuring B-side cover by R. Stevie Moore. A tour is planned to accompany the album release. The new LP showcases Ergo's songwriting through two solid sides of eccentric pop goodness, and will also be accompanied by an online version of the complete sessions for the album, with more than two hours of extra material not included on the album.

Collaborations are on the cards with Klimperei, David Fenech, R. Stevie Moore, Jack Phoenix, Margite Zalite, The Travelling Mongoose, Thomas Hicks, and Buchinger's Boot Marionettes. These collaborations will run across radio, albums, workshops, television, soundtracks, and theatre.

Towards the end of the year we'll see the podcast of Ergo's radiouberwork "The Faust Cycle" - a ten part radio adventure that has taken up the best part of the last two years. This podcast will also be followed by an installation and an album release of music from the series on Soleilmoon. Alongside Ergo taking part in various ways in this radiophonic extravaganza are Jack Phoenix, Margite Zalite, Felix Kubin, Irene Moon, Pete Um, Matt Johnson, Zenith Pitts, Martha Moopette, Mystoffeles Valentine, and Angela Valid. Coinciding in 2009 with this will be the launch of Ergo Phizmiz's (almost) complete radio works from 1999-2009 in high-quality mp3 at the ever marvellous Ubuweb.

Also keep an eye out for the release on Cataclyst Records of "Chronicles of the Suspicious Gentlemen" in the later part of the year, and a new commission for BBC Radio 3 about the painter Paul Klee and his relationship with music. Ergo is also currently working on a number of projects in broadcast media for children.

On the live front, also keep an eye out for live shows in collaboration with People Like Us. The best place to keep up to date with live shows is at www.myspace.com/ergophizmiz .

So, busy times afoot, and full steam ahead ..... happy new year ....