Fluidian (Emil Gherasim, b. 1973) is a transylvanian composer, guitarist and sound artist of works including acoustic and electronic art music, film scores, music for stage performances, live improvised sound textures, soundpaintings and ambiental soundscapes for visuals. 

Started largely as a self-taught musician, lately guitarist and co-author of Psycho Symphony progressive band and then studied new classical music composition with Ede Terenyi at Gh.Dima Music Academy, Cluj Napoca. His music can be considered to be very personal and deep meditative with a huge visual emotions, combining sound textures with a specific manner of improvisation.

Known for collaboration with Ede Terenyi consisting in electronic re-orchestration of some of his works and creating music inspired by Design Music works of Terenyi. Co-founder and composer/guitarist of Macro World musical project which is a world music and ambient-jazz influenced musical journey created in collaboration with percussionist Csabcsi Cserey. He also create and perform improvised soundscapes with live electronics for visual projects under his stage name Fluidian.

Official website HERE.

Facebook HERE.

SoundCloud HERE.

Opened towards electroacoustic experiments, opus.art tackles the contemporary musical phenomenon from a multimedia perspective, with consistent new music influences, while utilizing both acoustic and electronic sources, hybridized through the latest technologies. The ensemble was founded in 2013 by Cătălin Creţu and Dan Alexandru (both graduates of the National University of Music inBucharest). Dan Alexandru is a percussionist, sound engineer and producer fromBraşov, member of GAME percussion ensemble and various Romanian orchestras and ensembles. Cătălin Crețu specialized in multimedia composition at Hochschule für Musik und Theater inHamburg. He coordinates the Electroacoustic andMultimediaMusicCenterof the National University of Music inBucharest. 

Starting from algorithms realized through various coding mediums, the music made by opus.art explores polistylistic expressive areas, alternating modern composition techniques, utilizing complex, sometimes extravagant timbres, overlapping asymmetrical rhythms, spectral harmonies, various polyphonies, all combined in a large improvisational framework in which opus.art often invites one or several other musicians to express themselves. The large scale use of new technologies, live processing and audio-visual interactions induce a spectacular aspect in all their concerts. 

opus.art is the melting pot in which contemporary electroacoustic alchemists tame the algorithms and humanize the technology.

Facebook page HERE.

Somnoroase Păsărele, a project that appeared in 2007, represents the musical research of two artists: Gili Mocanu and Elena Albu. Previous experiences have existed since 1992, with GM recording sounds on magnetic tape. The roots of the project rised from contemporary music (Iancu Dumitrescu, David Prescott). Somnoroase Păsărele is derived from the artistic project Bitum that was born in 2005. There have been collaborations with musicians and artists such as Robert Walker (USA), Bogdan Scoromide (RO) and Mugur Grosu (RO). The general tendency was to explore the type of sounds and themes specific to contemporary music, but in a form made more accesible to the younger audiences. Although they avoid the term “experimental”, the result belongs in this area. If in the beginning they played with preparing clasical instruments, mixing natural or analogic sounds and all kinds of  recordings, after 1997 their work started to focus exclusively on the relationship with the computer, studying composition, tone and non-tone, atipical structures, even bypassing the unconventional for obtaining the determinants. What was important in each composition was the search for a meaning, for a round and self-contained construction. Aware of the fact that experimental times are gone, they wanted to go further, so they made up the phrase “conventional experimental”. 

Somnoroase Păsărele produced an album “ABECD” at Baba Vanga Label, that in 2013 was presented with a live performance inPrague,Czech Republic. Then followed different invitations to experimental music festival (Simultan/Timișoara; Dvorak Marathon/Bucharset and Berlin- Konzerthaus).

SoundCloud HERE.

Facebook page HERE.

Somnoroase Păsărele is a unique project, a musical fusion that is a welcome addition to the Romanian contemporary music field.

Sound designer, field recorder and broken tools aficionado, Sillyconductor (Cătălin Matei) wrote music for mute films, fashion shows in Berlin (Fashion Week), Vienna or London, programmed the sound for performances and installations in numerous biennials and festivals in Norway, Spain, Germany, Italy, US etc.

Among the most memorable stuff, he used 100 maneki-neko golden cats  to fathom Ligeti’s mechanical adventures with metronomes, he created the Shuffler – a micro-track ultrafast software that used thousands of images and sounds at colossal speeds, he used automobile sounds to resample orchestral sources, he even conducted birds choirs with the help of a Kinect video-camera, as well as an earthquake and some other things.

SoundCloud HERE.

George D. Stănciulescu (b.1982) is  a Romanian electronic music producer, composer/sound-designer and digital music theorist. George is a graduated psychologist (2006), MA in cultural management (2009) and  a PhD in philosophy of digital music and new media (2012, Alexandru I. Cuza University of Iaşi) . He also specialized in Paris(two fellowships in 2010 and 2011 at IDEAT and Sorbonne University), under the guidance of  French  professor and composer of Romanian origin Costin Miereanu. The book version of his doctoral thesis, entitled “Postmodern and digimodern music. Philosophical perspectives”, was published the beginning of 2014 by Editura Muzicală, with an introduction by Romanian composer and professor Octavian Nemescu. Through original concepts such as “pseudo-naturalization”,  “techno-poietic renaturalization”,  “hypersound icon”, “uchronic/diachronic performatism” among others, the research is the first one in Romania to deeply explore the metaphysical and phenomenological nature of virtual sound creation and computer based music in  postmodern culture.  

He is also an electronic and experimental music composer and producer since 2005, when he founded the neo-classical ambient/ avant-garde ensemble Ad Ombra, which consequently released a CD trilogy through polish label Rage in Eden Records. The three albums ( Rites of Genesis/2008, Magna Charta Illusorum/2009 and Almost Eternity/2011) received international critical acclaim and worldwide distribution. Some tracks were also included in various underground samplers and compilations in Italy, Germany, UK, Mexico and USA. In 2009, George started to focus  on the more electro-dance oriented sonic dimensions  by creating the eclectic electronica music project LeVant, which had its debut CD,  Beyond the Masque of Eden,  released  by Athens based label Dead Scarlet Records in 2010. The second album, “Knock, Knock, Ginger” was self released as a digital download in March 2014, revealing an eclectic paradigm that comprises indie electro, trip-hop, contemporary music and art-pop altogether.

Born on March 21^st 1980 in Bucharest, Miron Ghiu won the second prize at the International Philosophy Competition, in 1998, with an essay about virtual spaces. He studied philosophy at the University of Bucharest and started to work as a new media and music journalist. In 2004 he published books on The Beatles, Ozzy Osbourne & Marilyn Manson and worked for about 3 years as a PR Manager for EMI Romania and BMG. For some years now Miron Ghiu is a freelance journalist for various media outlets and a sound designer and DJ. He’s mad about music, passionate about technology and tends to use all kinds of media in his works. He’s a transhumanist and he loves robots as much as humans, waiting for the technological singularity to come. Politically speaking, Miron Ghiu is an anarchist.

In 2006 he was sound designer for a multimedia CD-ROM based on Antoine de Saint-Exupery’s “Little Prince”.  In 2008 he started to DJ for various events and clubs.  Since 2010 he’s a member of Nava Spatiala, an experimental ambient/drone/noise duo which debuted in 2012 @ Asiluum.com . In 2011 Nava Spatiala performed at the Simultan festival. In 2010 he did the sound design for an art exhibition held at the Brukhental Contemporary Art Museum. In 2011 he held an open studio using all kinds of media, from gramophone recordings to hacked game consoles, for Platforma Space, subsidiary exhibition space of the National Contemporary Art Museum in Bucharest. In 2012 he was sound designer for “Reality Videograms”, a video installation by Cinty Ionescu at Aiurart Gallery in Bucharest. He was also sound designer for a mixed-media performance produced independently in Bucharest and performed in various spaces around the country – “Detox” by Roland Barthes.  He participated in the Young Artists Biennal with a video documenting visible communication cables in Bucharest -  “Cabluri/Cables”.  He did the sound design for “Urme de distrugere pe Marte”, a performative installation in a theatrical context @ Teatrul Odeon.

LINKS: Soundcloud 1, Soundcloud 2, Soundcloud 3, Nava Spatiala