Building Performance Practices is a year-long workshop, taking place in Athens, Greece.
It is divided into two periods (Autumn and Spring) each of them lasting one week and comprising rehearsals, composition lessons, experimentation sessions, lectures and a final concert consisting of the 8 new works composed during the workshop by the selected composers.
Volume 1 (2024)
In the first volume of BPP (2024) àktapha and Zesses Seglias worked with 9 composers towards the creation of the following works (in alphabetical order):
Panagiotis Botzios: Cthonos
Román Gonzáles Escalera: Y se desvaneció como un sueño
Payman Mansouri: Aegean Sea
Finn Matingly: Triptych
Veronika Reutz Drobnic: Afterglow
Francesco Sgambati: El Spleen de Paris
Zygmund de Somogyi: False Vacuum Songs
Giorgos Vavoulas: Exocoetus
Volume 2 (2025-26)
In BPP vol. 2 (2025) àktapha and Ioannis Angelakis worked with 8 composers towards the creation of the following works (in alphabetical order):
Tianyu Zou: Hand Angels
Yalda Jahangiri: The wind will carry us
Alireza Gholamian: Nahān az nahoft
Francesco Fiorenzani: Atlante Ribelle
Luo Mengyong: Lachesism
Kenrick Ka Ki Ho: Mukti
Matteo Rigotti: naòs
Quotes by past participants:
"àktapha ensemble truly cares about what is written in the score and why. They work on multiple levels of understanding and detail, therefore creating a productive and helpful rehearsal and concert atmosphere."
-Veronika Reutz Drobnic
"It has been one of the most inspiring and profound collaborations I have had in my compositional career. Working with Àktapha has been always easy because they have always been eager to help us reach the piece to the best point of excellence, not only with their performance but also contributing with very interesting suggestions and ideas. Apart from that, the atmosphere between the ensemble and the participants of the course has been unbeatable. I have always felt like I was part of a family and that is something difficult to find in these kind of events."
-Román Gonzáles Escalera
"àktapha have been one of the most forward-thinking, collaborative, and open-minded ensembles I've had the pleasure of working with. Our time together in Athens was jam-packed with eye-opening seminars, fruitful discussions, and radically new approaches to composition, improvisation, and creative music-making. I unreservedly believe their presence, this seminar, and the community being built around it are contributing hugely to Athens' vibrant contemporary music circuit - and I wholeheartedly recommend this workshop to anyone interested in radical compositional process, and novel methods of composer-performer collaboration."
-Zygmund de Somogyi
