Ultima and MUNCH present Catherine Christer Hennix & Kamigaku Ensemble

Catherine Christer Hennix’s Kamigaku Ensemble - Performance


Music plus maths equals magic – A hypnotic sound swirl taking you to unknown places.

The concert is a chance to experience her brand new work for shō (a Japanese free-reed mouth organ) and trumpets. It’s an immersive, hypnotic combination of long, precisely-tuned notes on the trumpet and the shō. Through a layered drone, built up from precisely-tuned acoustic and electronic sounds, she tries to alter her audience’s perception and bring them close to a state of being she calls ‘divine equilibrium’.

Catherine Christer Hennix (b. 1948) is a Swedish artist, composer, poet and mathematician. She has spent her whole life investigating the relationship between mathematics and music. Since the 1970s her large body of sound works includes sine-wave compositions, solo works for tambura and for keyboard, as well as ensemble works. She often performs with her group the Chora(s)san Time-Court Mirage. The principles behind this new piece date back to her 70s Stockholm group the Deontic Miracle, which played music inspired by Japanese court music and modal jazz.

Catherine Christer Hennix – shō

Amedeo Schwaller – shō

Ellen Arkbro – trumpet

Hilary Jeffrey – trumpet

Susana Santos Silva – trumpet

The Kamigaku Ensemble is a co-commission from Blank Forms, MUNCH and Vassa Tassar, with support from the Swedish Arts Council. The event at MUNCH is presented in collaboration with Ultima Oslo Contemporary Music Festival.

Photo: Ari Marcopoulos

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Published Saturday, 1 April 2023