One of Europe’s foremost institutions of electronic music experimentation, the Elektronmusikstudion EMS in Stockholm celebrates its 50th anniversary in 2014. Created in 1964 as a studio for research and development within the Swedish National Swedish Radio, today the EMS is run independently by the Director Mats Lindström. Lindström will give an introductory talk on the history and current experimentation taking place at this important centre for musical innovation, as well as direct the multichannel diffusion of several seminal works produced at the studio.

EMS aims to support the artistic development of electroacoustic music and its integration within other artistic areas; as such it has been involved in a wide range of musical scenes, including contemporary electronic dance music, noise, drone, sound installations, and text/sound compositions. Every year the EMS hosts different guest composers in residency as well as musicians and music practitioners from all over the world that travel to the studio to attend seminars, courses, and lectures. Over the years luminaries such as Karlheinz Stockhausen, Philip Glass, and Morton Subotnick – best known for his "Silver Apples of the Moon", the first electronic work commissioned by a record company – have graced the studios halls, as have more recent visits from the likes of Mark Fell, Brian Williams a.k.a Lustmord, or Stephen O’Malley from Sunn O))) and KTL.

Lindstrom’s talk will elaborate on the studio’s extensive research, its productions and compositions, as well as the web of protagonists that have called the studio home over time.  Lindström will also offer a background to several works he himself will specially diffuse, including a work by EMS founder Knut Wiggen (1927), as well as pieces by pioneering experimenters within Swedish electronic music Rune Lindblad (1923 – 1991) and Åke Hodell (1919 – 2000) will be diffused.

The same afternoon, Lindström will also direct a two-hour multichannel electroacoustic sound projection entitled "Images of the Dream and Death", composed by Swedish-Hungarian electroacoustic pioneer Akós Rózmann (1939 – 2005). Produced by Rózmann at the EMS between 1974 and 2001, the work was released in 2013 on Editions Mego sublabel Ideologic Organ, curated by Stephen O’Malley.

Detailed Programme Schedule

16:00 Talk 1 – Prehistory / history

16:30 Diffusion 1  

• Knut Wiggen (NO, *1927) – "Etyd", 1972, 3:48 min
• Rune Lindblad (1923–2001, SE) – "Die stille Liebe", 1972, 9:38 min
• Rolf Enström (* 1951, SE) – "Tjidtjag och Tjidtjaggaise", 1985–86, 21:05 min

17:05 Talk 2 – Present / EMS today

17:20 Break

17:40 Diffusion 2

• Knut Wiggen (*1927, NO) – "Sommarmorgon" (Summer morning), 1972, 3:40 min
• Roberta Settels (*1929, US) – "Landscape with 3 Tape recorders", 1973, 8:34 min
• Åke Hodell (1918-2000, SE) – "220 Volt Buddha" (Bildspiel), 1971/1980 , 21:23 min

18:15 Talk 3 – Conclusion EMS today / future / questions