« We’ll hear more work conceived in a similar way over the coming months, and maybe years, but it will rarely touch such thoughtfoul and emotional heights as this. »

Brian Morton
The Wire, August 2020 (Issue 438)

In 2022 the Crown Quartet created A Natural Contract for Resonances IV in Ispra (Italy) at the JRC Joint Research Centre of the European Commission. It crosses borders through the simultaneity of music and language, in a musical exchange between four different European countries. These four countries have long been barely accessible due to the Covid-19 pandemic; the idea behind this live yet remote sound art concert, as the four artists will be connected via streaming directly from their studios, is therefore to evoke notions of memory, a call to the most essential elements of humanity and society. In addition to the quartet’s rich instrumentation, the work features a textual layer integrated within the compositional structure, allowing space for spontaneous and improvised exchange. The multilingualism of the text fragments reflects the diversity of the musical languages and approaches of the four musicians. Hungarian, italian, various german accents, english and croatian meet the abstract vocal sound art of Zabelka and Szemző. A Natural Contract speaks of transcending borders through music and language, overcoming the barriers that closed at a startling speed due to Covid-19. In this sense, the work is also a memory, a discourse, a reflection on the most fundamental elements of humanity and society.

Crown Quartet
A National Contract
sound art in four countries

produced by Resonances IV – NaturArchy: Towards a Natural Contract
in collaboration with Usmaradio, Giardini Pensili

Crown Quartet
Croatia: Zahra Mani – double bass, bass & electric guitars, field recordings, live electronics
Italy: Roberto Paci Dalò – clarinet, bass clarinet, voice, live electronics
Hungary: Tibor Szemző – voice, bass flute, flute
Austria: Mia Zabelka – electric violin, vocals, live electronics

station manager and sound engineer
Alessandro Renzi

23.6.2022 17:00-18:00 CEST
Livestream on Usmaradio.org
and simultaneously on
Orange 94.0, Neu Radio, Fango Radio, Radio Raheem, Kanal 103

European Commission, JRC Science Art Society

The beginning of the Crown Quartet was the News from Radio Yerevan – Sound Art In Four Countries, concert organised by the Steirische Gesellschaft für Kulturpolitik back in 2020 in the middle of the global Covid’s lockdown when everybody were confined at home. Sound and radio waves hold powerful potential on many levels. Artistic, communicative, subversive. They are carriers and expressions of multiple layers of meaning. As part of a live radio quartet performance, four artists, in the midst of the Covid crisis, connect via internet stream from their studios in Austria, Hungary, Italy, and Croatia, engaging in an acoustic exchange composed of music, speech, and sound. The piece revolves around questioning acoustic materials, their manipulation, meaning, use, and aesthetics. The title refers to Radio Yerevan, a public, subversive, and humorous satire born behind the Iron Curtain. For years, a series of questions and answers (“Radio Yerevan was asked… Radio Yerevan answered…”) became a vehicle for humor, cynicism, and absurdity, reflecting the truths, lies, and hypocrisies of a communication culture that now reveals itself as a precursor to today’s fake news.