Deforce, Arne

As a musician and researcher, he is fascinated by how, at the intersection between music, art, science and technology, new concepts and relationships in music can be developed between the instrument, musical gesture and electronics. As such, his collaboration on Life-form (2012), a one-hour cycle by Richard Barrett for cello and electronics, or on the piece Foris (2012) by Raphaël Cendo, reflects the fact that a soundworld of untapped potential between the physicality of playing, technology and extended notations can further be developed in a collaborative project between composer and performer. Recently (at the Ruhrtriennale 2017) he has premiered (together with the Catalan composer Hèctor Parra, a great admirer of new cosmological models of quantum physics, and sound designer Thomas Goepfer), a new grand one-hour cycle for cello and electronics, entitled Limite les rêves au-delà and inspired by the theory of “superstrings,” gravity waves and black holes as described by the French physicist Jean-Pierre Luminet. His repertoire is mainly focused on solo and chamber music. He has collaborated with composers such as Richard Barrett, Luc Brewaeys, Kee-Yong Chong, Raphaël Cendo, Hèctor Parra, Alvin Curran, and Phill Niblock, who have written original works especially for him, as well as with musicians such as Daan Vandewalle, Mika Vaino, Richard Barrett, Peter Jacquemyn, and Yutaka Oya, the ensembles Champ d’Action, Ictus, Musikfabrik, the Concertgebouw Brugge, Centre Henri Pousseur Liège, IRCAM Paris, and GRAME in Lyon. Arne Deforce is featured regularly at leading international new music festivals including the Ars Musica, Holland Festival, ManiFesta–Agora Paris, Archipel Geneva, Musica Strasbourg, MITO SettembreMusica in Milan, Fondation Royaumont, Musica Sacra Maastricht, Hudders eld Contemporary Music Festival, and Amsterdam Cello Biennale. 

His extensive discography, including interpretations of music by Giacinto Scelsi, Morton Feldman, Iannis Xenakis, Richard Barrett, Pascal Dusapin (for Aeon-Outhere); Jonathan Harvey (Megadisc); Phill Niblock (Touch); Mika Vaino (Mego), has received international acclaim such as five Diapasons d’Or, Coup de Cœur de l’Académie Charles Cros, and in 2012, the Prix Caecilia. 

In 2012 Arne Deforce obtained his Doctor of Arts degree from the University of Leiden (in collaboration with the Orpheus Institute Ghent), based on a dissertation on the performance practice of late twentieth-century music, entitled LABORINTH Π – inking as experiment: 472 Meditations on the need for creative thought and experimentation in performing complex music from 1962 to the present.