Oleg Gudachev. Archipelago
The invisible islands out of which the Saint Petersburg-based composer, theorist, and improviser Oleg Gudachev has composed his Archipelago are soundscapes recorded at different ends of the earth. Archipelago’s two main “islands” are an eight-channel audio-recording of the largest hydroelectric power station on earth—the Three Gorges Dam in China—and a six-channel recording of the sound of New York City which features a solo for a slowed down police siren.
Archipelago is Gudachev’s first venture into the genre of sound installation. Previously, he has typically composed dramaturgical works that unfold in time and have clearly distinguishable beginnings, middles, and ends. This makes Archipelago unusual in as far as it can be listened to from any moment, and as many times as one likes.
For Gudachev, Tuning is a natural continuation of many years of experimentation with spatial music—a genre founded on the interaction of sound and concrete spaces. Gudachev features here as both a composer and a multi-instrumentalist, working at the juncture of acoustic and electronic music to produce a work that is almost symphonic in its complexity and volumes.
Oleg Gudachev (Leningrad, 1988) is a composer and improvisational multi-instrumentalist. He graduated with a degree in Composition from the Rimsky-Korsakov Saint Petersburg State Conservatory (2014) and is a post-graduate student at the Vaganova Ballet Academy. He is a co-founder and the artistic director of the {instead} ensemble musical collective. In 2020, he was resident artist at HELLERAU — European Centre for the Arts and the winner of the Aksenov Family Foundation’s Russian Music 2.0 prize. He has written the music for productions at many Russian theatres, including the Alexandrinskiy Theatre in Saint Petersburg and Moscow’s Tovstonogov Bolshoi Drama Theatre.
Audio engineer: Andrey Titov-Vrublevsky