Nov. 26, 2008 - Issue #684: I Served the King of England

Ensemble Mujirushi

Avant garde is new expression

Piotr Grella-Mozejko is one of the most intelligent people one could ever interview, particularly on the subject of music. Especially animated when it comes to the subject of avant garde art and music, Grella-Mozejko could also expound for hours on subjects as varied as hardcore punk and literature. His group, Ensemble Mujirushi, will be performing pieces of music by well-known avant garde composers at the Stanley A Milner Library theatre on November 29, as well as pieces composed by members of the group, including one by Grella-Mozejko himself. Recently he was kind enough to answer a few questions on the nature of his group, avant garde music and the way the avant garde pushes the boundaries of art.

 

Vue Weekly: Tell me about the name of your group.

 

Piotr Grella-Mozejko: The name means ”no name.” We were brooding over what to call our group and the dancer Gerry Morita is married to a Japanese master chef and she said, “You know Piotr, in Japan there is this big chain of grocery stores which is called Mujirushi which means ‘no name’ or ‘no brand’” and we thought, “That’s it!”

 

VW: How does the music performed by Ensemble Mujirushi differ from that in more traditional styles?

 

PGM: We play pieces which are written down but using an entirely different system of notation. Everyone is familiar with traditional notation, notes with stems on staffs and so on—there are certain genres in music which take it a bit further. The composer will write a score, but that score will look more or less like an abstract graphic, or something even less tangible. Some scores are simply drawn using abstract symbols, some scores use a minimal number of symbols, the idea being to look at the score and get inspired by the combination of those abstract signs on the page. Many people think that you can do anything you want with such music, but the truth is no—we approach each and every graphic score as if it were written using traditional notation.

 

If in the score you have a big thick square we’ll think, “That big square is probably meant to be a loud, dissonant chord.” If we see a long thin line we approach it like, “This probably means a long soft sound.” Also, those signs are put on the page in various places—where on the page is that sign? Is it on top of the page, or on the bottom? When it’s on the bottom then you know you play in lower register, when it’s in the upper part you play high.

 

This sounds like abracadabra but actually it’s not, because most people when they see those scores they immediately grasp the idea and they understand that it’s yet another way of writing music, just giving the performer a little more room to manoeuvre.

 

VW: The avant garde is not often considered art by the vast majority of people. Why do you think that is?

 

PGM: It’s the power of tradition, people are used to listening to Bach, Beethoven, Debussy, all those guys. There are a lot of people out there who will tell me, “I don’t want to listen to this music, people don’t like it, you should write like the masters did,” and I always respond, “Do you want your fucking teeth treated by a dentist the way they were treated a hundred years ago? So don’t ask me to treat my audiences to something that is already dead!”

 

This experimental art is just a certain beginning. We tend to forget that in Germany and Austria in the mid-19th century, people still considered Beethoven to be crazy. He was considered the most avant garde of his time and it took time for them to absorb his aesthetic and to understand finally what a genius he was. Initially, a lot of people thought Picasso was crazy, but now he’s a classic of visual art avant garde. Why? People got used to it. Same here. We are creating certain values that people are not familiar with and who knows, maybe in 20, 30, 40 years they will come to understand that this aesthetic is as valid as any other.

 

VW: Is it the goal of the avant garde to shock people out of their complacency?

 

PGM: Let’s get it straight—the avant garde never, never wanted to shock. It always wanted to put the system into imbalance, but never wanted to shock for shock’s sake. The avant garde, even the most extreme Dada camps were really not intended to shock for shock’s sake, they were intended to show certain new vistas into what arts can be. The shock thing comes from those who were shocked, the avant garde artist that invents her or his new means of expression is often faced with an audience which is totally unprepared for that new means of expression and it’s the audience that creates that shockwave. the artist is aware of her or his achievement well beforehand, so we cannot talk about shock.

Art is like a vast endless cosmic ocean. It has no beginning nor does it have an end. We can dip our hands, our brains, in that ocean, inhale that ocean and then come up with something new, but those who have certain listening or perceptual habits, they may react to it, they may express their shock to it, but I don’t think the goal of the avant garde has ever been to shock, it’s the audience that becomes shocked. We want to demonstrate to our potential audiences that there are other ways of artistic self expression. We don’t want to shock. V 

Sat, Nov 29 (8 pm)
Ensemble Mujirushi
Stanley A Milner Library Theatre, $10 & $15

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