What’s the best way to spend time with a musician when they visit a city to perform? And when the musician in question has a great deal to say, what sort of concert do you organise to do justice to that?
Inspired by the supernatural horror of H. P. Lovecraft, black metal and a sense of worry as to what constitutes an object, or a world.
NVA asked Arika to curate and programme the sound aspects of their 2007 Half-Life production in Kilmartin Glen. Arika worked with Toshiya Tsunoda, Lee Patterson, Rhodri Davies and Angharad Davies.
INSTAL’s third outing saw performances by AMM, Cosmos (Sachiko M & Ami Yoshida), Voreboms, Vibracathedral Orchestra with Matthew Bower and John Godbert, Paragon Ensemble, Merzbow and Ryoji Ikeda.
The second edition of the INSTAL festival broadened it’s scope to include performances from Francisco Lopez, Phil Niblock, Stefan Mathieu, Alva Noto, Ryoji Ikeda and John Wall.
Looking at and listening to different ideas about sound and music, INSTAL 09’s collection of artists included Tetsuo Kogawa, vocalist Joan La Barbara, Phil Minton (and his Century FC feral choir), Austrian Actionist Hermann Nitsch, Steve McCaffery and many more.
The first INSTAL festival (programmed by Barry Esson of Arika and Tiernan Kelly) featured a line-up including Robert Lippock, Philip Jeck, Fennesz, Paragon Ensemble, Icebreaker International, Defaalt and Rhomboi.
Slapstick comedy, monologue, and a kind of live sculpture transformed through video, props, musical instruments and make-up.
In 2008 we toured our Kill Your Timid Notion festival of experimental sound and image to London, Bristol and Glasgow, bringing audiences a taste of the previous 5 festival editions.
The final iteration of Arika’s INSTAL festivals, the 2010 edition was an experimental festival of experimental music – 3 days of events at the Tramway that explored un-average ideas about sound and music.