On 1 June 2024, joined by special guests, artist Junshu Gu and dancer Hari Krishnan, the Vocal Constructivists offer innovative musical explorations of the sense organ we overlook: our nose. Their performance will take place in the architecturally stunning St Paul’s, Bow Common. Young and old are invited to submit single words related to scent, nose shape, or function, which will be included in the concert, alongside operatic extracts, advertising slogans, music hall songs, and contemporary compositions, featuring premieres of new commissions.

Saturday 1^st June, 2024, St Paul’s Bow Common, London E3 4AR, 7pm (doors open at 6:30). Free Admission.

We perform works by US Artist Fellow Jin Hi Kim, Scratch Orchestra founder Michael Parsons, the inimitable Linn D., voice expert and poet Barbara Alden, visual artist/musician Alison Cross, the mercurial Kurt Schwertzik, Fluxus artist and poet Nye Ffarrabas, movement transcriber Simone Forti, the balletic Constant Lambert, Deep Listening proponent Pauline Oliveros, her Swiss collaborator Margrit Schenker and electronic pioneers Otto Luening and Vladimir Ussachevsky. We are honoured to be joined by dancer and educator Hari Krishnan and the creative observer of Living Tones, Jin Hi Kim herself.

The Vocal Constructivists are extremely sad to learn that the artist Tom Phillips CBE RA, ‘the most literal man’, died on 28 November 2022. Climbing through the window to get acquainted with Irma, Grenville, the Nurse, Toge and all his friends, has been a pivotal experience on the VC journey. We continue to ‘stir the violet notes’, as the words that Phillips revealed and concealed resound and shape our ongoing collages of sounds and syllables. It was ‘an unbelievable dream’ to prepare and perform Irma in his presence, both in person and online. 

The Vocal Constructivists returned to Pentameters Theatre on 20 December 2022 to perform 1952 at 70, in celebration of the 70^th birthday of landmark experimental pieces. VCs offered fresh interpretations of Earle Brown’s December 1952 and John Cage’s 4’33”, alongside works by Morton Feldman, György Ligeti, Otto Luening, Władysław Szpilman, Vladimir Ussachevsky, and a premiere by founder member artist Alison Cross (b. 1952).

Scratch and the Sequence

Following a busy two years online, the Vocal Constructivists resumed live performance in summer 2022 with a sell-out show at Pentameters Theatre, London. The programme revisited groundbreaking works of past decades and premiered several new pieces. Scratch and the Sequence questioned the contents of Linn D’s Nothing in Nothing, explored being Half Rite, listened to Barbara Alden’s Inner Word, chased Ben Zucker’s Wolffs, crumpled Nye Ffarrabas’s paper concerto with eggs, buzzed after Simone Forti, vibrated Daniel J. Wolf’s spectral madrigals, woke up Jin-Hi Kim’s Living Tones II, and it was back to the board with Cornelius Cardew’s Schooltime Compositions and Alvin Lucier’s Opera with Objects.

To celebrate their tenth anniversary, the Vocal Constructivists are hosting a series of events that invite you to listen, learn, share, and perform with us. The festival, through the square window playfully sequences through these activities over two days. With no entrance fees, no mud, and enough space for all who want to pitch their virtual tents (for brief or longer stays), this festival offers opportunities for creativity, participation, reflection, Q&A, and lively engagement with music-making. There are three structured “events” each day: the first involves a choice of seminars, the second features guest speakers, and the third presents Vocal Constructivists in performance. There are additional opportunities for discussion. This festival is offered in memory of Scratch Orchestra pioneer and broadcaster Carole Finer († March 2020).

Further details and schedule here

On 20 March, 2020, our beloved friend and collaborator Carole Finer passed away. In addition to being a founding member of the Scratch Orchestra, Carole was an extraordinary musician, composer, musicologist, and radio broadcaster. Her radio show Sound Out on Resonance FM explored a wide range of musical genres, from experimental to bluegrass to musical samples that she collected in her travels around the world. We will always be grateful to her for sharing her mentorship, musicianship, and unbridled creativity with us.

• In response to the current restrictions on in-person choral activities, the Vocal Constructivists are launching several new initiatives: a youth participation scheme, multiple fragmentary interpretations of Tom Phillips’ Irma, and a remote performance of a graphic score that will grow incrementally and change infinitely.
• 7 August 2020 marks the launch of a new 7-month project, Building a New Legacy. Join us online for the premiere screening of a new interpretation of our performance of Irma, Tom Phillips’ 1969 opera, discussion of a new computer-assisted realization of open notation, and reflections on the youth project as part of building new audiences for experimental music.
• Join us for the two-day festival that marks the culmination of this project, 6–7 March, 2021.
• The Vocal Constructivists were scheduled to perform Treatise and lead an interactive workshop on the music of Pauline Oliveros at the Donostia-San Sebastián Musical Fortnight in August. While we had to cancel our trip due to Covid-19, we were honored to be included in one of Europe’s most renowned classical music festivals, and we hope to participate in Musical Fortnight in the future.

THE VOCAL CONSTRUCTIVISTS perform text and graphic scores, alongside works that extend ‘traditional’ notation, bringing a sense of play to their interpretations of experimental music. Coming from diverse backgrounds, with ages ranging from 19 to 79, the Vocal Constructivists draw on an eclectic variety of artistic influences—classical, global, avant-garde, and theatrical. In addition to performing original interpretations of experimental classics such as Cornelius Cardew’s Treatise, they have commissioned and premiered 22 works, establishing themselves as an important force in new music-making. Read our full bio here.

“a group of exceptionally gifted singers who are at one with each other” – Choir and Organ