Flame Keepers is a perpetual music installation based on Jakub Ciupinski's concept and design. Commissioned, created, and launched by Metropolis Ensemble in response to COVID-19, Flame Keepers runs uninterrupted in real time, twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week.
Invited artists are commissioned weekly to supply new original material every seven hours. As a result, the piece will evolve as an open-ended collective composition designed to run forever.
We intend the Flame Keepers experience to be a virtual bonfire shared by a group of strangers worldwide, a concert that never ends, made in, and especially for, times of hardship and social isolation.
Violeta García (1990) is a cellist, composer and curator from Buenos Aires, Argentina.
She studied at the “Conservatory Astor Piazolla”. She graduated in Composition at “Conservatory Manuel de
Falla” with Ricardo Capellano and she has a Degree on Musical Arts specializing in violoncello at “Universidad
Nacional of Arts (U.N.A)”. She is currently based in Bern, Switzerland doing a Master in Composition at the
University of the Arts Bern (HKB Hochschule der Künste Bern).
She is a performer in many art forms, including free improvisation, contemporary and trans-media experimental
repertoire in violoncello and electronic music.
In 2015 she founded a digital label and music series called TVL-REC, which is devoted to publishing new music,
experimental groups and collectives from Latin America and other countries and making music series and
festivals of noise and extreme music in Latin America and Europe.
She collaborated with different artists from all over the world as: Uri Caine, Tristan Honsinger, Tony Malaby
Quartet, Hank Roberts, Jacques Morelembaum, Stanimir Todorov, Jorge Perez Tedesco, Brandon Lopez, Chris
Pitsiokos, Weasel Walter, Joelle Leandre, Leila Bordrieul, Dasom Baek, Tamio Shiraishi, Carlos Quebrada,
Camilo Angeles, Camila Nebbia, Emilie Girad Charest, among others.
She worked in various companies and ensembles: Compañía Nacional de Danza Contemporary from Buenos
Aires, Reverso theater company from Uruguay, Dominga Tango & the ensemble Nicotina es Primavera.
She played at Fusion Festival (GE), Spielact festival (CH), Welcome to the Village Festival (NL), Valkhof Festival
(NL), Norðanpaunk Festival (ISL), Antwerp Queer Arts Festival (BEL), KEXP (US), CCK (ARG), Gran Teatro
Nacional (PE), Universidad de los Andes (COL), WORM (NL), among others.
Internacional residencies: Art Omi (NYC), Konvent Zero (ESP), Art Basel in Faena Art Center (ARG), Fondo
Nacional de las Artes (ARG), Fundación Williams, Ibermusicas, Artists in Residency at Jazz Festival in Lima,
Perú, among others.
She tours annually playing a repertoire of current contemporary music, Solo set, free improvisation and with
several projects (Blanco Teta, Tortuga Alada, duo whit Chris Pitsiokos, duo with Camilo Angeles…)
On this page, seven musical ideas, or streams, loop simultaneously in real-time.
As the streams repeat, the musical experience will never be or sound the same because the individual loops run asynchronously and their durations are divergent.
As a result, the seven streams shift and realign into subtle new configurations continuously.
The perpetual metamorphosis of this composition is catalyzed by a commissioned prompt: every seven hours, a select artist serving as the Flame Keeper is given the chance to replace any existing stream with a single new one.
The moment a new stream is introduced, the system enters a seven-hour lockdown, during which the composition cannot be altered by human hands. After the given seven hour lockdown is over, the Flame Keeper may swap another stream and the cycle begins anew.
At the beginning of the week, the new Flame Keeper inherits the state of the installation from the previous one. Due to the seven hour lockdown mechanism, it is impossible to swap all seven streams in less than forty-nine hours.
During this three day transition, the new Flame Keeper builds within the composition created by the previous artist, gradually making it their own.
If the Keeper misses any of the upload windows, the system engages a fail-safe algorithm that replaces any one of the streams with one randomly selected from the historical archive of musical streams of all former Flame Keepers. The results might be harmonious, cacophonous, anodyne, or expressive, yet always surprising.
If left completely abandoned, the composition will evolve with unpredictable results, continuously.
Use this feature to travel back in time to experience any artist's work.
Jakub Ciupinski is a Polish composer living in New York City. Although his music is often associated with electronics and interactive performances, he has written numerous pieces for traditional acoustic forces, varying in scope from solo miniatures to symphonic works. Jakub has collaborated with Metropolis Ensemble since 2009.
Grammy-nominated conductor Andrew Cyr (“a prominent influence in the world of newly emerging music”, The Washington Post) founded Metropolis Ensemble in 2006 to support ascending contemporary composers and performers through the creation of new work.
Avneesh Sarwate is a programmer, musician, and multimedia artist working in the fields of audiovisual performance, installations, and interface design.
Ryan Rose is a software engineer and saxophonist living in Cambridge, MA. His work explores musical expression through robots, physical installations, connected web experiences, and more.
Daniel McKemie is an electronic musician, percussionist, and composer based in New York City. Currently, he is focusing on technology that seeks to utilize the internet and browser technology to realize a more accessible platform for multimedia art.
