The Making of a Wooden Resonator

Join artist and musician Giorgio Magnanensi for a seminar on the creation of his resonators and how you, too, could make your own!

Giorgio has been building resonators from discarded piles of wood, reclaimed from mill operations on the West Coast, for a few years now.

“While sharing these instruments in my social and artistic practice, I was constantly amazed by how their presence, the quality of their resonance and the effects on audience reception seemed to foster a deeper engagement within the creative spaces in which the resonators were presented,” he says. “I have been reflecting upon all this as a sound artist and community facilitator, and sharing engaging sonic landscapes and sound-thinking tools in a variety of outdoor and indoor settings. 

“Recently I have been focusing even more intensely on all this with a clearer understanding of both the philosophical and political aspects implied by this practice and instruments. Within this perspective and a radical re-contextualization of materiality as vibrant matter, we can discover the resonators’ capacity to act as quasi-agents (or forces) with trajectories, propensities and tendencies of their own. Here their full sonic, tactile and visceral presence in the natural context they are resonating within, manifests new forms of activating creative energy. 

“For all these reasons I wish to share the intrinsic agency of the wood resonators in both a workshop and a sound event that will offer the opportunity to experience the unique modality of their omnidirectional sound diffusing energy and sonic materiality, and to understand how they strongly impact us with their surrounding presence, their symbolic and iconic character and their vibrant materiality.”

In this workshop, Giorgio will go tell his story and go into the technical properties, creation methods and alternative applications he sees for the technology, giving you the tools to go away and make your own wooden resonator!

While this workshop is free for anyone to attend, please recognize that it does cost money to put on these types of events, so if you’d prefer to choose to pay $5 for your ticket during the registration process, know that it will be put to good use in creating future programming like this.

As per Provincial Health Office regulations, a valid proof-of-vaccination QR code will need to be shown and scanned at the door for entrance into this event.

The seminar will take place in the Main Gallery of the Campbell River Art Gallery.

About Your Facilitator:

Born and raised in Italy, Giorgio Magnanensi currently lives in Roberts Creek on the Sunshine Coast of British Columbia, Canada. His diverse artistic practice includes composition, conducting, improvisation, circuit-bending and video art. From the early 80’s to date he has been working as a composer, conductor, educator curator and performer in Europe, Japan and Canada. He is artistic director of Vancouver New Music, Laboratorio Arts Society and lecturer at the School of Music of The Vancouver Community College.