Marcus Schmickler
Marcus Schmickler is a German composer, musician and producer, born in 1968 and based in Cologne. He works across electronic and computer music, composition for ensembles and electro-acoustic improvisation, and has also made song-based records under the name Pluramon. He studied electronic music and composition at the Cologne music academy and is closely associated with the labels A-Musik and Editions Mego. Marcus Schmickler studied with Hans Ulrich Humpert and Johannes Fritsch and wrote his diploma thesis on Gottfried Michael Koenig.
Politiken der Frequenz
Edition of 300 copies. Comes in neon-coloured jewel-case (5 different variants). Following a hypothesis according to which "Music and Economics share a fundamental object: number," Marcus Schmickler and Julian Rohrhuber's project Politiken der Frequenz circles around the acoustic rendering of number concepts. Inspired by Alain Badiou's Le Nombre et les Nombres, and accompanied by mixed choir, the piece attempts to question the apparent immediacy of numbers that allows calculation to govern today…
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Timekeepers II
a-Musik, the Cologne-based bastion of sonic exploration, unveils a new chapter in their quest for boundary-pushing sounds. Timekeepers II, a split LP featuring recordings of two duos by Marcus Schmickler with Jaki Liebezeit and Hayden Chisholm. Side A bears the imprint of Liebezeit's rhythmic flow fusing with Schmickler's digital Shepard Tone interpretation. A studio recording taken before a performance at Moers Festival in 2014. On side B, Schmickler's electronics converge with Chisholm's bagpi…
Sky Dice / Mapping the Studio
Marcus Schmickler's music is designed for multi-channel sound projections and references German electronic music tradition, spectral music, experimentalism as well as 1990s club music. His artistic practice explores avant-garde trajectories in electronic music composition, formal systems, sonification and psychoacoustics. EMEGO 296 features two new major works from this audacious sound explorer.
Sky Dice / Mapping the Studio premiered at Donaueschinger Tage fur Neue Musik 10.20.2018 having being…
Neue Bilder
Thomas Lehn and Marcus Schmickler have been known for building their sonic worlds for 17 years since their first album Bart. After 6 years of studio silence, here comes Neue Bilder. Their 5th allbum is a constant flux of musical juxtapositions, collisions and balance of their tour de force with analogue synth and computer. The album features two tracks created from two concentrated performances in Münster and Wels, both being magnificently reworked stereo versions of their quadrophonic live conc…
Richters Patterns
Double-CD collecting five of Marcus Schmickler's key-works composed and recorded between 2006 and 2016. "Richters Patterns" (2016), "Kemp Echoes" (2013), "E-UROPAS" (2006), "Fokker Bifurcations" (2014), and "Ata Oto" (2016). Full color digipak with eight-page booklet; edition of 400. "Richters Patterns" (2016) is a collaboration among Marcus Schmickler, artist Gerhard Richter, director Corinna Belz, and the Ensemble Musikfabrik. In 2011, Richter took an image of his work Abstract Painting and di…
Particle / Matter-Wave / Energy
Kompakt welcomes veteran contemporary experimental producer Marcus Schmickler with the release of his spectacular noise / techno fused medallion entitled Particle / Matter-Wave / Energy.Marcus Schmickler’s fifty plus release discography is one of the most fascinating in his field. From his studies under Cologne based Stockhausen collaborator Johannes Fritsch to his releases through legendary imprints a-Musik, editionsMego and Mille Plateaux, over the years Schmickler has been behind innumerable …
Timekeepers
ten years after their "variety" cd a-musik present the brilliant second release by John Tilbury (piano) and Marcus Schmickler (computer). Recorded in january 2012 at Loft, Köln, mixed in december 2014 at piethopraxis.
Rule Of Inference
next to his prolific work as an electronic composer, improviser and producer, "rule of inference" once more features schmickler's as yet less known yet marvelous work as a composer and arranger for classical instrumental settings. similar to his widely regarded album "param" (2001), the album is a collection of various settings, all of them recorded over the course of the last years. "rule of inference" unveils a conception that marks various departures along the history of music: the alb…
Bari Workshop
restocked: BW hosted a group of medieval miniature manuscript painters who were amongst the experts in the recording of the history of science and who circulated knowledge around the world and across cultures. Greek texts on Euclidean geometry were translated into Arabic, and medieval Arabic manuscripts on optics and geometry migrated to Western Europe, where, translated into Latin, they contributed to the development of perspective in Renaissance Italy.Hand in hand with scholarly interests were…
![Thomas Lehn, Marcus Schmickler – Live Double Seance [Antaa Kalojen Uida]](https://cdn.soundohm.com/data/products/2026-09/thomas-lehn-live-double-seance-lp-jpg.jpg.250.jpg)
Live Double Seance [Antaa Kalojen Uida]
The analogue-digital electronic duo of Marcus Schmickler and Thomas Lehn has been working since its first meeting in December 1998 during the German premiere of the Music in Movement Electronic Orchestra (aka MIMEO) in Cologne. Since they have been extensively touring in Europe, the USA and Japan and performed at Experimental Intermedia/NYC, Mills/Oakland, Bard College, Lampo/Chicago, Princeton University, Festival Wittener Tage fuer Neue Kammermusik, AMPLIFY/Tokyo, CCA/Glasgow, Darmstadt…
Usa
Archival release documenting the 2009 USA tour of Peter Rehberg and Marcus Schmickler under the R/S moniker. Real time extreme music improvisations recorded at Lampo in Chicago and No Fun Fest in New York City. 'USA' is the second full length release by the leading electronic music duo, follow up to their 2007 'One (Snow Mud Rain)' on Erstwhile Records. Peter Rehberg (a.k.a. Pita) was a founder of the influential Editions Mego label based in Vienna in 1995 (formerly Mego). He performs thr…
Palace of marvels (queered pitch)
Marcus Schmickler's new release following his acclaimed Altars Of Science (EMEGO 082CD) is a must-have for those interested in the rising field of contemporary computer music. It reconfirms Schmickler's interest in the liaison of sound, phenomenology and cognitive sciences. Schmickler, therefore, utilizes a new interpretation of 1960's discovery, the Shepardtone, discovered by Roger Shepard, which creates the auditory illusion of a tone that continually rises or descends in pitch yet ultimately …
Navigation in hypertext
Lehn and Schmickler's 1st recording, Bart is considered one of the best synth improv albums ever made. Since Bart, dating back to 2000, the duo has toured frequently through Europe, Japan and the USA. This double-release, features some of the best performances the duo recorded over the course of 15 live concerts. A brilliant amalgam of the two musicians' strengths, Navigation in hypertext utilizes both improvisation and studio postproduction techniques to create a lasting work, combining the fee…
One (Snow Mud Rain)
Peter Rehberg (Pita) and Marcus Schmickler have been two of the leaders in the electronic revolution of the last fifteen years, both on their own and in collaboration with others. One (Snow Mud Rain) is the first duo CD from these two long-time friends and associates.Rehberg co-founded the massively influential Mego label in 1994, and soon after began recording under the name Pita. His first solo release, Seven Tons For Free, came out in 1996 and was a kick in the teeth to all those who heard it…
AMPLIFY 2002 | Balance
2003 release ** Featuring: Thomas Lehn, Toshimaru Nakamura, Tetuzi Akiyama, Günter Müller, Christof Kurzmann, Taku Sugimoto, Keith Rowe, Marcus Schmickler, Otomo Yoshihide, Burkhard Stangl, Sachiko M, Cosmos. "A document of the 2002 Amplify festival in Tokyo curated by Erstwhile's Jon Abbey. Disc 1 and 7 are smaller club shows that took place outside the Festival proper, disc 2 is a studio session that took place around the time of the festival and discs 3-6 feature eight of the twelve sets that…
Amazing daze
Marcus Schmickler is internationally well known in heterogeneous contexts of contemporary music. He is closely associated with the a-Musik label and over the last years he has worked in different fields of electronic, instrumental, improvised, experimental and new music. His latest releases feature choir and chamber music pieces, a new computer music composition as well as a new release under the banner of Pluramon with Julee Cruise. His continuous collaborations feature settings with analogue s…
Variety
"the piano's harmonic figures meet with computer sounds unexpectedly within a slowly changing acoustic environment. piano pixies sing and dance serenely in a virtual space while the noises from the instrument insitage dialogues with the computer. the music is tranquil, never aggressive and is at almost every moment polyphonic in the good old sense of the word. pretty often, the two musicians play on two different planes so that in spite of the slowness of the whole thing, the resulting complex r…
Demos (for choir, chamber quintet and electronic music)
""demos" is schmickler's most ambitious work to date. it has been performed at the renowned cca in glasgow, where it was performed in the course of a three day festival organized especially for schmickler. "demos" deals with nietzsche's thoughts expressed in his "zarathustra" on the extent with which language could be dealt with as music. marcus schmickler transcends the classic mythic emblems of ancient greek choirs such as recitative and declamation by employing contemporary means. "demos" is …
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Wabi sabi
wabi sabi is a staggering sounding, beautifully packaged and simply significant contemporary electronic album by marcus schmickler out of the thriving german underground music scene. schmickler has one release under his own name on the odd size label in france, and was a contributing member of pol and kontakta on the same label. most recently he released the exceptional pluramon pick up canyon album on the mille plateaux label (which featured the guest drumming of jaki liebezeit). this cd consis…
Sator rotas
marcus schmickler aka wabi sabi (a3) aka pluramon expands his electronic experimentations, creating a surreal, open music that enraptures the listener with raging soundwaves and maximum density. expect the unexpected from the new school of improvised music: hybrid wooshings, subsequenced crackles, microharmonical adventures. strange, tense, cool and rich of superb pranks.
s/t
ErstLive is a new series of releases from Erstwhile Records, documenting notable live sets associated with the label. The discs are designed to simulate a concert experience, each in the same template design using two colors chosen by the musicians involved, with a photo of the concert on the back cover. Each will be in an edition of 800 CDs and not reprinted. The initial releases will be chosen from the AMPLIFY 2004 festival which took place in Cologne and Berlin in May 2004. ErstLive …
Rabbit Run
Keith Rowe: tabletop guitar, electronics Thomas Lehn: analogue synthesizer Marcus Schmickler: digital synthesizer, computer