Yann Tiersen Shares New Track 'Nivlenn'

Yann Tiersen & QUINQUIS have embarked on a unique summer tour that has so far seen the two Breton artists travel from their home in Ushant to Ireland and up to the Faroe Islands for a tour of Celtic lands. The tour is entirely done via their sailboat Ninnog, named after a medieval mother superior who traveled from Wales to Brittany becoming a protector of women and a champion of sustainability and forestry.

They will continue their journey down to Scotland this month with a new series of dates that includes community centers, ecovillages, and a record shop as well as more traditional venues. Full details are listed below.

The tour is intended as a direct political statement on the ecological impact of large-scale touring, inviting us to examine established methods of touring and performance. With several shows already booked over the summer, the artists have invited communities to suggest places for them to perform along the route – churches, communes, pubs, squats, beaches and gardens – with the aim of offering an alternative way to experience performance, for both the audience and the artists.

YANN TIERSEN will release Kerber Complete, a box set that collates four very different versions of his 2021 album Kerber, on September 15th, 2023 on CD and digitally via Mute.

Kerber Complete will collate Kerber, Yann Tiersen’s 2021 album built on modular synthesis and sampling, 11 5 18 2 5 18, the modular recomposition of Kerber, a brand new solo piano recording of Kerber and an album of remixes and reworkings from the likes of Terence Fixmer, Beatrice Dillon and Laurel Halo, as well as remixes by Tiersen of NEU!, Keeley Forsyth, Michael Price and Simon Fisher Turner & Edmund de Waal.

While 2021’s Kerber saw Tiersen incorporating modular synthesis and sampling into the recording process, his follow up album, 11 5 18 2 5 18, was born from further experimentation in the studio as the artist prepared for a performance at Berlin’s modular and synthesizer festival, Superbooth.

Using samples as his source, Tiersen resampled, reprogrammed and recomposed existing audio to create entirely new tracks unrecognizable and decontextualized from their original versions. Kerber Complete brings the story full circle as he compliments the two albums with remixes from across Kerber and an album of newly recorded piano versions of the tracks, piano being the original source of the samples for Kerber.

TOUR DATES:

8/2/2023 – Findhorn, Universal Hall, Findhorn Foundation (Yann Tiersen & QUINQUIS)
8/8/2023 – Edinburgh, Liquid Room (Yann Tiersen)
8/22/2023 – Liverpool, 24 Kitchen St (Yann Tiersen)
8/25/2023 – Wales, Ara Deg (Yann Tiersen)
8/26/2023 – Wales, Ara Deg (QUINQUIS) 

Yann Tiersen has been involved in music for most of his life, pushing boundaries with varied instrumentation - vintage synthesizers, modular synthesis, piano, violin, Ondes Martenot  - while exploring our connection with nature, place and his love of Celtic languages, including his native Breton.

Émilie Tiersen released SEIM, her debut album as QUINQUIS on Mute in spring 2022 after a series of releases as Tiny Feet. The album, described by Uncut as “… ethereal, sometimes casually ominous songs… amid flickering synth flourishes” was followed a few months later by a new collection of compositions, the AER EP. QUINQUIS’ work is rooted in both historical and modern stories, connecting worlds with electronics and Émilie’s tender yet quietly soaring vocals, all sung in Breton.

Photo credit: Richard Dumas

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