Violins to Fences: A Life of Experimentation in Music by Jon Rose :: July 27, 2012; 6:00 pm :: Village Roadshow Theatrette – State Library of Victoria, 328 Swanston Street, Melbourne.

At one end of the continuum is the violin — iconic, an instrument of perfection, a bastion of western culture; at the other end is the fence –- metaphor for duality, the instrument of our species’ desire for control, ownership, and exploitation. For most of the last forty years, Jon Rose has explored the musical possibilities of the string and the wire in all sizes and situations. In this lecture he connects the radical with the traditional, and the unique experience with the commonplace, in a practice of music that has led him into previously unexplored sonic worlds and sometimes into confrontation.

Presented by Jon Rose for the Centre for Creative Arts Public Lecture, as part of the 2012 Executive Dean’s Lecture Series:

About the speaker:

Jon Rose performs on the global stage at the sharp end of experimental, new and improvised music. Central to that practice has been ‘The Relative Violin’ project, a unique output, rich in content, realising almost everything on, with, and about the violin – and string music in general. Most celebrated is the worldwide Fence project in existence since 1983; least known are the relative violins – over 20 home experimental string instruments, created specifically for and in Australia.

Jon Rose has appeared on more than 60 albums and collaborated with many of the mavericks of new music including Kronos String Quartet, John Zorn, Derek Bailey, Butch Morris, Alvin Curran, Fred Frith, George Lewis, Otomo Yoshihide, Christian Marclay, John Cage, etc. at festivals of New Music, Jazz, and Sound Art world wide such as Ars Elektronica, Festival D’Automne, Maerzmusik, Dokumenta, North Sea Jazz Fest, Leipzig Jazz Fest, European Media, New Music America, the Vienna Festival, the Berlin Jazz Festival, etc.

Recently Jon Rose was commissioned by the Kronos String Quartet to write and build “Music from 4 Fences” for the Sydney Opera House; realised his bicycle powered “Pursuit” project at Carriage Works (Sydney) and The Mona Foma Festival (Hobart); performed a completely new and improvised solo part for the Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra; created two major radiophonic works for the BBC on the first Aboriginal string orchestra and the history of the piano in 19th century Australia; toured in Europe with his current improvisation groups ‘Futch’ and ‘Strike’; produced his interactive Ball project at The Melbourne Festival, Gallery of New South Wales, Sounds Outback, and Mona Foma; performed his interactive multi-media composition “Internal Combustion” for violin and orchestra at The Philharmonic, Berlin.