Alberto Bernal + Óscar Escudero + Belenish Moreno-Gil
Interdisciplinary and new media in the face of the challenges of new musical creation.
Over the last decade, musical creation has consolidated a series of processes that had long been developing in parallel in other artistic disciplines. As a consequence of the performative shift in the arts, the cheapening of creative technologies and a deeply rooted audiovisual culture, “musical” no longer refers exclusively to sound. Performers are therefore confronted with works that require them to take a professional approach to fields that go beyond the dimension of their own instruments, extending to software programming, the manipulation of virtual reality devices or the manufacture of instruments in a kind of post-instrumental lutherie. However, these new perspectives remain marginal within the Spanish educational system.
It is therefore urgent to offer new references and ways of approaching these transformations, enriching the curricula of performers and creators in our country. Only in this way will the sector be able to respond to the needs of a potential public eager for pan-disciplinary projects that respond horizontally to the great challenges of our society.
Alberto Bernal, composer and sound artist.
Óscar Escudero, multimedia composer and performer.
Belenish Moreno-Gil, multidisciplinary artist, performer and musicologist.
Alberto Bernal
Composer and sound artist of classical origin and varied influences, his works are framed near the turning point between concert environments and other disciplines such as installation, performance and video art. His work is, above all, a search and deconstruction of the boundary between the aesthetic and the socio-political, as well as between the different traditional perceptual fields (sound, image, word, everyday perception).
Óscar Escudero
Óscar is a Berlin-based multimedia composer and performer who works at the intersection between sound, video and virtual reality. His productions are characterised by exploring the gaps between the traditional analogue concepts of “body”, “time” and “stage”, their current state as total virtualities and the creation of artistic devices operating in a “SPAM reality”.
His works have been commissioned and performed by, among others, ensemble mosaik (DE), NeueVocalsolisten Stuttgart (DE), Sarah Maria Sun (DE), Ensemble Adapter (DE), International Ensemble Modern Academy (DE), PHACE (AT) and CrossingLines (ES). These groups and other artists have taken his work to stages and festivals across Europe, such as the Munich Biennale, Wittener Musiktage für Neue Kammermusik, Kontakte Biennale (AdK Berlin), Donaueschinger Musiktage “Next Generation”, Schloss Solitude (Stuttgart), Fundación Juan March and Reina Sofía Museum (Madrid), and E-Werk (Freiburg).
His education includes composition studies at the Conservatorio Superior de Música de Aragón, oboe and master studies at the Royal Academy of Music Aarhus and Anton Bruckner Privatuniversität Linz. He has received scholarships from the Ernst von Siemens Stiftung (Progetto Positano), the Residencia de Estudiantes (2016-17) and the Fundación Antonio Gala (2014-15). I have also been a member of the faculty of the Master in Musical Research at the International University of La Rioja (2014-16). He is currently working with the playwright and stage director Belenish Moreno-Gil in the creation of musical theatre works and in the pedagogical programme KUNSTWELTEN of the Berlin Academy of the Arts.
Belenish Moreno-Gil
Multidisciplinary artist, performer and musicologist. From a very young age, she was drawn to the world of music and the performing arts. She undertook piano, singing and musical language studies in Jerez de la Frontera, her hometown. She graduated in Musicology from the University of Granada and later supplemented her studies with a Masters in Music Education and the Interuniversity Masters in Musical Heritage. While she was studying, she was actively involved in the founding of the Young Musicology Association of Granada (Joven Asociación de Musicología de Granada), as well as in the coordination of the 9th Young Musicologists Conference (IX Jornadas Jóvenes Musicólogos) at the national level. Her research has focused on traditional music, particularly the zambomba in Jerez and Arcos de la Frontera. Other lines of research include gender studies and posthumanist studies.
In addition to her musicological training, she studied singing at the Royal Victoria Eugenia Conservatory and the Universität für Musik und Darstellende Wien, taking classes in dance and performing arts. Since 2017, she has been part of Voission XXI (voice and percussion duo with Néstor Pamblanco focused on contemporary music). Their works have been performed at the Kontakte Festival (Berlin) and Operadagen Rotterdam, as well as in Spain, Austria and France. In recent years, this multifaceted training has allowed her to participate in various projects as a musical performer and playwright. She is currently working with composer Óscar Escudero on the creation of contemporary musical theatre and stage pieces as well as working in the KUNSTWELTEN pedagogical programme of the Berlin Academy of Arts.
