As part of Art Pop 2009, Agence TOPO presents101 Song Scores, a performative and poetic infiltration initiative by the artists Sheena Hoszko & Michelle Lacombe.

101 Song Scores is a project which addresses the subjective ways of relating to song lyrics and their meaning. The artists compiled a database of song “scores” (text-based performance directions) culled from the lyrics of western popular music of the last 50 years. In collaboration with Agence Topo, these informations are available online to propose a long series of shared moments of action. With an emphasis on waiting, the 101 Song Scoresweb page highlights the integral relationship between an action and its duration. Have fun, perform!

With 101 Song Scores, the artists have infiltrated Agence TOPO’s web site as well as Pop Montreal venues and the following media spaces and communication tools:

Pop Montreal Twitter – www.twitter.com/POPMONTREAL
Pop Montreal Website – www.popmontreal.com
The blog Inside the Frozen Mammoth – www.thefrozenmammoth.com
Art Pop Website – www.popmontreal.com/art
Art Pop Print Program

Directed by Julien Ceccaldi & Kit Malo, Art Pop 2009 presents emerging and established artists to engage and entice POP Montréal festival-goers. Art POP’s Vernissage/Opening party will take place on the 30th of September, from 5pm onwards at Espace Reunion 6600 Rue Hutchison.

Sheena Hoszko & Michelle Lacombe are Montreal-based artists whose conceptual practices overlap in relation to the body, language, and emotion. 101 Song Scores is their first collaborative project.

Here along the artists further explain their project.

About 101 Song Scores
A word from the artists Sheena Hoszko & Michelle Lacombe

For Art Pop 2009, we propose an artwork entitled 101 Song Scores that uses “event scores” to bridge the gap between music and contemporary art. Event scores originated in the work of John Cage and quickly became a form adopted by many conceptual and action artists, thus hold an important place in both the history of music and the visual arts. Event scores are simple performance instructions that are often published, existing predominantly as text-based directions that can be completed in the mind of the reader. It is within this historical and thematic tradition that we collaborate with Agence TOPO, Art Pot 2009 and the Pop Montreal festival.

Using “popular” music as our source material and cultural framework, these text scores have been created by extracting an action from the lyric of a selected song (ex.“Walking on Broken Glass” by Annie Lennox) and the duration of the action is determined by the length of the song (ex. 3:41). We have been working within the canon of western popular music from the last 50 years to create these small texts that reference lyrics in a direct and oblique manner, as well as culling from the catalogue of bands programmed in the 2009 Pop Montreal festival.

We proposed 101 Song Scores to be disseminated via existing Pop Montreal communication tools with the objective to superimpose, compliment, and highlight the current musical content. We intended for the presentation of the scores to have an aesthetic continuity which appropriates the design fonts and colors already used by the Pop Montreal festival.