Chris Pitsiokos (US), Georg Wissa (A)
Chris Pitsiokos (saxophone), Georg Wissa (voc., perc.)
Georg Wissa: living in Graz, works with voice and things that sound. He perceives improvisation as an attempt to be present in the moment with all of one's senses, without knowing exactly where the sounds will lead one.
Chris Pitsiokos: “I make sounds with an alto saxophone and many other instruments, sometimes by myself, and sometimes with others. Currently I lead a somewhat nomadic existence, but my two home bases are New York City and Berlin. I could say that I work fluidly between composition and improvisation but that would lend these spurious concepts undue importance. I work using the tools available to me—my instruments, pen and paper, computers, verbal communication, body language, community, social dynamics, considerations of human psychology, considerations of acoustics and aesthetics of spaces, food, alcohol, drugs, hugs, history, etc.—to make something happen either alone or with others. I’m not being ironic: I deeply believe that the nature of the relationships between the people collaborating, the space it occurs in, etc., has as great an impact or more of an impact on the resulting art than notes written down on a score. I try to take all parameters into account, and confront my work holistically, carefully considering as many aspects of what goes into the creation as possible. Maybe this is post-composition/post-improvisation. But, once again, even using these terms gives them undue importance—these terms were imposters in the first place, and talking about them as distinct entities, or even antipodes that we can move between distracts from the point of making music. Both terms focus on only one facet of a multi-faceted process.”
Foto: Nils Brinkmeier, Kim Solemno
