Mophradat is collaborating with MaerzMusik in Berlin on a special new residency program open to musicians, composers, producers, sound, and interdisciplinary artists to work collaboratively with the Berlin-based Ensemble Adapter on new work to be presented at MaerzMusik festival in 2024.
The residency, which takes place in Berlin and remotely, offers the musician and Ensemble Adapter flexibility as they work together, encouraging innovative creation processes beyond the borders of notation and conventional presentation formats, as well as engagement with experimental and dialogical approaches to artistic work.
The invited resident will receive a monthly stipend for four-and-a-half months for the period in which they are in residence and conceiving a new work with Ensemble Adapter. Together with the DAAD, the festival will host the resident in Berlin for two working sessions with the ensemble from November 15 to December 15 in 2023 and February 1 to March 25 in 2024. The musician will be provided with a living and working space in Berlin during their on-site stays, access to various studios and sites, and be introduced to peers in the city. The residency will also cover the costs of return economy travel for both trips, visa, and travel insurance, and the festival will provide the composer with a fee for the commission and concert.
Based in Berlin, Ensemble Adapter is an experimental music group led by its founders Matthias Engler (percussion) and Gunnhildur Einarsdóttir (harp). Treating music as a contemporary art form, Ensemble Adapter creates, curates, produces, workshops, and performs – both onstage and online, and focuses on collaborative work with partners of various artistic backgrounds worldwide. You can read more about Ensemble Adapter here.
Founded in 2002 by Berliner Festspiele, MaerzMusik is a festival is interested in challenging the traditional dichotomy often found between “composer” and “implementer” to create a more deconstructed space of co-authoring processes of conceiving an artistic work. The festival’s programming encourages interdisciplinary approaches and cross-pollination of artistic practices that engage with and beyond the body, technology and form. It also focuses on developing new creative strategies that engage with participatory processes with the audience, questioning habitual listening and inviting new ways of experiencing music. You can read more about MaerzMusik here.
Moroccan musician Leila Bencharnia was invited for the residency with MaerzMusik in Berlin to collaborate with Ensemble Adapter on a new piece to be presented at the festival. Leila was invited for the three-months residency following the open call for Art Time Residencies: Music last May, which received 57 applications.
Leila Bencharnia (b. 1993, Morocco) is a sound artist, acousmatic interpreter, and musician born in El Kelaa and currently based in Milan. Through her sonic work, she recognizes forms of radical listening as a modality of knowledge transmission and seeks to have an active role in decolonizing listening as a way to encourage social and political dialogue.
The residency is organized in collaboration with MaerzMusik, with the support of their partner DAAD. Leila’s residency is partially supported by the Flemish Authorities.