Manifesto
18. January 2017
The Duos Project is me having duo sessions with a series of artists, not just musicians but also sound artists, dancers, visual artists, directors, you name it. Around 2014-15 my work was taking some new directions. I was starting to work more cross-disciplinary than before, and I wanted to get as much experience as possible with electronics. This was a confusing process. To make what I wanted to make, I needed to change my habits, maybe also change my views on the world. And learn new techniques. So to sort my thoughts, I actually made a Manifesto.
Manifesto, taste the word! It has the taste of early 20th century, futurism and dada. But writing it actually helped me. Looking at the list again now, I realized that I have started doing many of the things in it. So the Manifesto probably was the start of the Duos Project. I’m posting it here, for everyone to read.
MANIFESTO
1. Put yourself into new surroundings, use your own strategies in different surroundings. Or use new strategies in old surroundings.
2. Be brave and play with interesting and hungry people from all artforms. Travel to meet them. Book gigs with new people. Play for the door if necessary.
3. The order of events is Act –Document- Reflect
4. Make something new that has punch to it, that means something, that awakens senses and emotion.
5. Do not depend on other people to provide the power that you want, make sure that you can provide that power on your own.
6. You don’t need to learn more, make do with what you got, jump in and make it work.
7. Don’t think that things have to be finished, think of it as research. Jam a lot, test out a lot.
8. Extend your palette, by testing out new methods. For instance: Improvisation-based does not mean the music is limited to «improv music».
9. Don’t not do things just because they are not thought through on beforehand or because you don’t know on beforehand how they will sound.
10. A lot of time will go into setting up the infrastructure for such “moments of freedom” This is ok.