Incense of Music Festival // Incense of Music Nr. 40
Valentina Bellanova, flute and recorder
Olaf Rupp, guitar
Clara Gervais, double bass
Elena Kakaliagou, french horn and voice
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Valentina Bellanova: I was born in Florence, where I later studied musicology and recorder. I then furthered my instrumental studies in Germany at the University of Music, Drama and Media in Hanover, where I obtained my Soloist’s Diploma. I have been very involved with classical Turkish and Arab music for several years now, also studying their respective aesthetics and theories. I play both the Turkish and the Arabic Ney and regularly perform these instruments in various music and theatre projects (for example as soloist in the National Theatre Thuringia, in the NDR Radio Station in Hanover, in the Kulturforum in Frankfurt (Oder), in the Komische Oper Berlin, in HAU Theater Berlin etc.)
Olaf Rupp plays Improvised Music on the acoustic and electric guitar. The organic flow of his music is guided neither by chance nor by dominant, willful decisions. To him the same level of focus and attentive energy should be present in loud and fast music as well as in softer, more subdued kind of playing. In all his music he explores how motion-clusters can be perceived as one agglomerated sound in motion. This means that every note is a dot in a higher matrix and its color is more important than the position of that note in any hierarchic classification system. So a sequence of notes creates a moving sound, not a melody.
Clara Gervais was born in Marseille and studied there before further studies in Paris, Prague, San Sebastinan and Basel. She was especially influenced by her teachers Emilie Cillol and Wolfgang Güttler. She plays music from Baroque to Modern as well as having strong interests in Jazz, Folk and Improvisation. She has performed under directors such as Pierre Boulez, Peter Eötvös, Beat Furrer, Gottfried von der Goltz, Jürg Henneberger and Andrea Marcon. She is a member of La Cetra Barockorchester Basel, the Trio La Banda Ki and many other groups and orchestras. As well as playing the bass she is interested in composing music and writing poetry.
Elena Margarita Kakaliagou is a greek-austrian french horn player and performer, currently based in Berlin. Starting out with piano lessons, she moved on to the French horn at the age of 18. After completing her studies in Athens/GR with Vangelis Skouras, she moved on to KUG-Graz/AT to continue her education under the teaching of Hector McDonald. Instructed by Erja Joukamo-Ampuja, Elena obtained her Master’s degree from Sibelius Academy/FI in 2010 in French horn and chamber music. During her career, Elena has received scholarships from Klangforum, Impuls Academy and Ensemble Modern with teachers like Mike Svoboda and Bill Formann.
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