Gendos Chamzyryn: Voice, dungur, percussion, dopshuluur, chadagan, cello, khomous,ocarina.



Tim Hodgkinson: Lap steel guitar, clarinet, bass clarinet,klarnet, alto saxophone, sound manipulation, voice, dungur, percussion,ocarina.



Ken Hyder: Percussion, drum kit, dungur, voice, ektara, bassektara, sound manipulation.





K-SPACE is the spiritual, musical and artistic fruition of along and vivid encounter between the experimental ethos of western contemporarymusic and the traditional cultures of southern Siberia. K-Space is a project that pushes the boundaryof what such a collaboration can mean.





GENDOS CHAMZYRYN



Already a member of the legendary Tuvan avant-garde rockgroup Biosyntes when he met Hyder and Hodgkinson in 1992, Chamzyryn combines adeep commitment to the traditional culture of Tuva with an extraordinary giftfor experimentation grounded in the belief that music must 'open up towards thecosmos'. A master of the Kargiraa style of 'throat-singing' , he is also recognisedas a stone-carver and an initiated 'shaman-artist' in his own country.Chamzyryn has worked extensively inmusic therapy in Poland and the Czech republic and released numerous solorecordings.



TIM HODGKINSON



Increasingly lauded as a contemporary composer, with worksfeatured at international contemporary music festivals, and a set of pieces forensemble out on the Mode label, Hodgkinson has also a powerful commitment tointense and highly energised performance practice. In over thirty years' work hehas placed himself in a series of definitive projects, whether as cofounder ofthe seminal Henry Cow group, as saxophonist with influential avant metal bandGod, or as bass clarinet soloist in the spectral compositions of IancuDumitrescu. His lap steel guitar playing remains completely uncategorisablebringing subdued and not so subdued echoes of rock musics and otherethnicities.



KEN HYDER



Since the 1970's when with Talisker, he forged a new musicby overlapping Scottish and jazz traditions, Hyder has pushed forwards the logic of his drumming explorations withSouth African, Brazilian and Celtic folk musicians, with Japanese and TibetanBuddhist monks, and more recently with Siberian shamans. An originator of manycollaborative and trans-cultural projects, he has also taught specialistworkshops in the UK, France, Italy, Germany, Holland and Finland and in Russianconservatoires (Moscow, Ekaterinburg, Novosibirsk and Kyzyl).





K-SPACE



K-Space have toured Europe and southern Siberia repeatedlysince 1996.

They have released four albums, including the technicallyrevolutionary Infinity, which involved the development of new software tore-compose the pieces each time the disk is played.



The first K-Space CD Bear Bones was reviewed by Ian Simmonsfor Nthposition



"K-Space's Bear Bones is one of those rare beasts, aproductive and

respectful collaboration between western musicians and thosefrom

another culture. It sees UK improvisers Tim Hodgkinson(ex-Henry Cow)

and Ken Hyder teaming up with Tuvan shaman Gendos Chamzyryn,whom they met on an extended expedition to explore the sonic aspects ofshamanismin the mid-90s. Recorded in Siberia and elsewhere between 1996 and2001,it shows that Hodgkinson and Hyder's groundwork paid off.



"On Bear Bones they neither co-opt Chamzyryn as exoticgarnish to their

existing music, nor do they go native and attempt to playtotally in Tuvan style.



"It also carries with it some sense of the experiencesHyder and

Hodgkinson had of the extremely strange fringe technology ofKozyrev's

Mirrors at a research institute in Siberia. An abstrusedevice which I

will not pretend to understand, Kozyrev's Mirrors canreputedly warp

space and time and induce telepathic experiences akin toshamanic

journeys. What is amazing is how well Bear Bones works.



"By turns scary, humorous, rhythmic and abstract, it isa truly stunning

piece of work, unique, powerful and infused with a deepsense of shamanic otherness."



The Wire described their second album Going Up as "Farremoved from the weightlessness of World Music impressionism and the sham ofNew Age flotsam... it approaches the condition of 'total music'....for those of us who wantlistening to remain a real adventure and an ongoing process of discovery."



And Faust's Jean-Hervé Peron says of Infinity: "Great great piece of work on the musical/spiritual level as well as thisvery ingenious technological twist: you buy one cd and you get x-times thelength of always good music ! A genius strike ! And magic... it is always new...I was UP UP AND AWAY !!"



RELATED DISCOGRAPHY



* Shams: Tim Hodgkinson/Ken Hyder, Impetus (1987)

* The Goose: Hodgkinson/Hyder/Ponomareva, Megaphone (US), Woof (1992)

* The First Take: Biosintes w. Gendos Chamzyryn, FMP (1996)

* Burghan Interference: Shams - Tim Hodgkinson/Ken Hyder, Slam (2000)

* Shizo i.d.: Gen-Dos - Chamzyryn, Revival of the Computer (Tuva) (2001)

* Bear Bones: K-Space - Hodgkinson / Hyder / Chamzyryn, Slam (2002)

* Kamlaniye: Gendos Chamzyryn, Long Arms (Russia) CDLA 04070 (2004)

* Shaman Tree: Gendos Chamzyryn, Luna Music (Poland) (2005)

* Going Up: K-Space - Hodgkinson / Hyder / Chamzyryn, Ad Hoc(2005)

* Vocal Evocations: Chyskyyrai: with Hodgkinson / Hyder & others,SOASIS (2008)

* Infinity: K-Space – Hodgkinson/Hyder/Chamzyryn, AdHoc (2008)

* Black Sky: K-Space – Hodgkinson/Hyder/Chamzyryn,Setola Di Maiale (2013)

Live gig reviews:-



"More than a concert - a total ritual gesture ofextraordinary intensity."



La Vanguaria, Spain



"Gendos Chamzyryn's throat-singing creates its owncounterpoint

following the most meticulous Kaargiraa vocal technique ofcombining

simultaneous bass and high frequencies. K-Space music is ahead-spinning

mix of organised and irrational sounds, a fluid alchemy ofelectronic

and acoustic instruments, with all the elements pulsating ina kind of

magic syncretism."



Il Manifesto, Italy





BACKGROUND by Ken Hyder and Tim Hodgkinson –





Shortly after we met at a Music For Socialism event in SouthLondon in 1978 we started playing together, recording and touring andconstantly trying to find ways of making music which would be fresh andimpactful every time we performed.



We also wanted to infuse the music with the “s”quality…spirituality…vibe…or whatever expression you might give to that elusivenon-musical magic which touches people.



Then came a completely unexpected and unique invitation in1990. We were to do a month’s tour of Russia, spending most of the time inSiberia – and the British Council were financing it.



We were particularly interested in shamanism from the pointof view of performance and what it could suggest in the way of differentapproaches to music making.



The following year, we played with singer Sainkho Namtchylakat a festival in Lithuania and she suggested we come to Tuva to learn Tuvan musical techniques and conduct workshopsin improvisation. During that trip to Tuva in 1992 we met a number of peoplewho would become very important for our future music.



We met Mongush Kenin-Lopsan - anthropologist and director ofthe Kyzyl Museum - who later kick-started the public re-emergence of shamans,and set up the Dungur association of shamans in Kyzyl. On a trip to the southof the country we met the lama Kungaa-Tash-Ool-Buu. Although we didn’t know it at the time, Kungaa hadbeen a shaman in secret for 30 years. We also got to know the musicians ofBiosintes – a kind of Tuvan Sun Ra band which included Gendos Chamzyryn.



Sainkho Namtchylak gives a few glimpses of Gendos' historyin the sleeve notes to his 2004 album Kamlaniye: "I had met Gennady forthe first time in 1983. At that time I had been a student at MoscowConservatory. It happened in July. I had come back to Tuva for the summerholidays. Gennady had already been the well-known director of the Tuvan musicalgroup called 'Cheleesh' .



“Several years later I saw him for the second time. Thishappened in 1991, when I was organising my first festival of improvised musicin Kyzyl, to which, incidentally, I invited the well-known German double bassplayer Peter Kowald.



“Gennady and a few other musicians came up to me after theconcert and said to me that this festival has opened entirely new horizons ofmusic to them.



“This is how the Tuvan trio of improvised music 'BIOSINTES'was born, consisting of three musicians: Gennady Chamzyryn, Vresh Miloyan andMergen Mongush, who began their career in the field of avant-gardejazz".



In 1996 we first played as a trio with Gendos in Kyzyl, andthe idea of K-Space was born.



The band takes its name from Nikolai Kozyrev, the RussianAstro-Physicist. Kozyrev believed that time was a conduit for energy and hedesigned an apparatus called Kozyrev’s Mirrors that could take you intoKozyrev’s Space.



We encountered thismachine after playing a gig in Akademgorodok, a science-city built nearNovosibirsk in the 1950s.



There, at the RussianAcademy of Medical Sciences (Siberian Division) we met Akademician VlailKaznacheev, who said: "Shamanism is not a religion. It's a specialphenomenon of the intellect and spirit of the human being."

His line of argument was this. In the beginning, humankind communicated with adifferent field of the brain but there were cosmological changes in the earth'smagnetism. This made it difficult for people to continue communicating in thispsychic way - except for shamans.



After the talk with Kaznacheev we were led to anotherbuilding and invited to enter the Kozyrev's Mirrors and experienceK-Space. The effect of floating in spaceand being aware of entities was similar to shaman’s descriptions of going intotrance and entering the black sky.



When we described all this to Gendos he agreed that'K-Space' was the right name for our trio, explaining that, in Russian, 'K' isa word meaning 'towards', so that the name would mean 'towards the cosmos'.



In 2011, during a 21st anniversary tour of Russiacelebrating our first trip to Siberia, we were again invited to theAkademgorodok laboratories to experiment in the time machines – but this timewith Gendos. It is very rare for musicians to receive such an invitation.



We have regularly kept going back to Siberia on field tripsto Lake Baikal, the Altai mountains, and of course, Tuva because there is somuch to learn there. And the shamans, musicians, singers and visual artistslike the sculptors have been so generous with their time and energy and theirknowledge of another way of looking at – everything.



At the same time, we have worked with them too, in concertsin villages and towns. We have performed with shamans as well as musicians andsingers either solo, or in choirs. And we have held workshops throughoutSiberia setting out some of the techniques we absorbed from the west.



Among the musicians we have performed with are gipsy singerValentina Ponomareva, Sainkho Namtchylak, Vladimir Rezitsky and the musiciansin Tuva’s two best-known bands Huun-Huur-Tu and Albert Kouvezin’s Yat Kha.



In the West, K-Space has played all over Europe. We havealso conducted workshops in Europe. Atan eco-festival in north Italy we devised a site-specific event around a sunkenspring involving 16 Italian musicians.



We have had an academic involvement with the School ofOriental and African Studies in London where we presented papers. And wecontributed a sound installation to a museum exhibition on shamanism inStuttgart.



We were also advisers to the BBC on a tv documentary serieson shamanism.





The SOAS papers can be found here –



http://www.soas.ac.uk/musicanddance/projects/project6/essays/file45912.pdf



http://www.soas.ac.uk/musicanddance/projects/project6/essays/file45913.pdf



Music and pictures –



www.myspace.com/kspacesiberia



www.kenhyder.co.uk



www.timhodgkinson.co.uk/