Bandstory

Curriculum Vitae
the saxophone quartet melo X was founded in at the vienna hochschule für musik und darstellende kunst by arne marsel (soprano saxophone), nicole marsel (alto), gabriele riegler (tenor) and herbert mraz (baritone). these musicians have not only tried to deal with a variety of musical styles but have also expressed interest in integrating electronic as an autonomous instrument within the acoustic setting of a saxophones quartet. this last aspect is particularly important for this ensemble in its quest for new ways of expression combining music with non-musical elements like language, movement, image, light, etc. as practically no material conceived for such musical presentations and for the specific setting of this ensemble existed, a program had to be created by the group it self. from the beginning on, two pillars have been established: firstly, commissions to composers, sometimes the result of a “work in progress” between the composer and the ensemble, secondly, arrangements of ethnic-influenced works and original compositions.
 
     
the first public performance of melo X took place in may 1991 during the “Österreichischen Saxophonkongress”.
until 1996, melo X performed both in austria and abroad (as during the jazzfest wien, jazzfest salzburg, mediennacht braunschweig) mostly a program which included the two pillars mentionned earlier.
in the ensemble presented a concert made of world premieres from christian schedlmayr, michael goleminov, nicolas simeon, fritz kell, christoph cech, armin pokorn and klaus john at the ottakringer brewery.
a manifestation of the two pillars can also be found on the album “in futura minima” which came out in . 		   
     
baritonist herbert mraz quit the group and christian eder-colvin took his place in the quartet.
thanks to the successful collaboration between melo X and several contemporary composers, the interdisciplinary project “AUS 1002 ART” came to life in 1998. this project dealt with elements of the austrian folk music tradition and showed above all how the contemporary art has dealt with these elements. the result was an interdisciplinary project with the music at the centre as an object of study with choreography, video and light conception.
the world premiere of “AUS 1002 ART” took place in march 1999 during the festival hörgänge at the schubertsaal of vienna konzerthaus.		  
     
From on, melo X has been working with the project “do”.
the “do”-cd came out during fall 2001 and included guests like wolfgang puschnig and sainkho namchylak. stylistically, the album above all presents a type of folklore which, through the integration of contemporary styles like modern dance-music (jungle, drum’n’bass, techno, dub and trip-hop), improvised music, elements of jazz and contemporary classic, is here presented in a new context.
the concert program “do” was conceived as a multimedia project.
   
     
In December there again was a change of the baritonsaxophon player. Florian Fennes took the place of Christian Eder, who at that time emigrated to Australia.
   
     
Since “do” is also performed live. For this live adaptation the members of melo X ( 4 saxophone, drums & electronics) were enlarged with two vocals and a Chapman Stick.