• Edições Cn, 2021

• Vinyl 12”

• SUGAI KEN - field recordings, liner notes

• Lieven Martens - collage, additional sounds and field recordings
  Jeroen Stevens - additional percussion

• Roman Hiele - double bass, mastering

• Kohei Oyamada - liner notes translation

• Jeroen Wille - artwork

Aかぎろひ

Bかぎろひ – Concl.

Recently out of the blue, Sugai San sent me a collection of personal field recordings he made of folklore groups and public performances in Tokyo, Toyama, Kanagawa, Kyoto, Tottori, … The close listener already knows that Sugai San’s aesthetics speak of a great knowledge of these performing arts.

An open invitation: “the traditional local performing arts in the 21st century intrinsically conceive “fragility” as they are vulnerable to extinction. The Japanese local performing arts that appear in this recording is no exception, endangered by the declining birth rate and aging population which are typical to the country. (SUGAI KEN)”

I bring the original recordings into conversation with new elements (corresponding field recordings and or additional percussion and strings, performed by Antwerp musicians Jeroen Stevens and Roman Hiele) like a ‘monomane’ - tr. imitating – sound game. But when i throw these old and new figurines together on the podium, the objects immediately disappear in the cracks of the stage wood. Thus only the understament of the suggestion remains. And relentlessly the significance of every movement now becomes a question.

Furthermore, what’s in focus? The manipulation? Or the content? Or are we zooming in on the aspect of archiving ~ preserving? Dubious. - Lieven Martens

Click Below to Listen