SYNOPSIS

A burning piano falls from a skyscraper in 1920s New York.

Selected for:UK Music Video Awards 09onedotzero_adventures in motion 09/10 London / World TourBristol Encounters Short Film Festival, UK 09London Independent Film Festival 09London Rushes Soho Shorts Festival 09London Young Film Festival 09New York Rooftop Films Summer Series 09Munich International Short Film Festival 09Tabor Film Festival, Croatia 09 (WINNER)Australian Centre for the Moving Image, Melbourne (Red Hot Shorts)Canary Wharf Film Festival, UK 09Zero Film Festival Los Angeles & New YorkBornshorts, Denmark 09Shnit International Kurzfilm Festival, Switzerland 09Darklight Film Festival, Ireland 09Shoot Me, Dutch Music Video Competition 09Braunschweig International Film Festival 09Museek International Music Video Festival, St. Petersbourg 09 (WINNER)International Festival of Documentary and short film of Bilbao 09

JEFF DESOM (director / www.jeffdesom.com)

DIRECTOR’S BIOGRAPHYBefore going to filmschool Jeff had made The Plot Spoiler (2006), a no-budget film

about a video store clerk who, in the first scene, spoils the ending of the very film he

is in. At the time Jeff was only 17 and unexperienced enough not to envision that writ-

ing, directing, producing, shooting and editing a 40 minute long film all by himself

would take up 4 years of his life. In 2007 it won the award for best Luxembourgish

short film.

Later that year he graduated from the Arts Institute at Bournemouth (UK) where he

had specialized in directing. Bloksky (2007) is his graduation film and tells the story

of Hektor, a music composer plagued by a writer’s block that manifests itself as a

bone growing from his skull. The main part is played by German experimental pianist

Hauschka who also composed the soundtrack. Morgenrot (2009) was his second collaboration with Hauschka and his first mu-

sic video. Once again, Jeff applied his do-it-all-yourself experience to achieve the illusion of a vintage film depicting a burning

piano falling from a skyscraper in 1920s New York.

His latest short film X on a Map (2009) starring Sean Biggerstaff was part of the official selection at the 31st Moscow Inter-

national Film Festival.

FILOMGRAPHY 2009 X on a Map 2009 Hauschka - Morgenrot 2007 Bloksky 2006 The Plot Spoiler 2005 Reisswolf 2005 Last Man On Earth 2001 Incarnation 2000 The Butcher’s Little Son

Short 35mmMusic VideoShort 16mmShort DVShort 16mmShort 8mmShort DVShort DV

LUXLUXUKLUX Filmpräis 2007 Best Short

UKLUX/UKLUXLUX

DIRECTOR’S STATEMENT“The idea came to me during the late editing stages of Bloksky, the short film for which Hauschka did the acting and wrote the

soundtrack. It’s about a composer who’s plagued by a writer’s block that physically manifests itself as a bone growing from

his skull. For some reason I thought that the image of a burning piano dropping off a building could have served as a recurring

dream of this character. Similar to the dream sequences in Elephant Man if you wish.

I rendered a very short clip in the style of D.A. Pennebaker’s Daybreak Express and sent it to Hauschka. By then his music had

been deeply engraved into the footage. It turned out he liked it very much and wanted me to make a video from it for the song

Morgenrot on his forthcoming album Ferndorf.There wasn’t a budget available, so I started to work on it whenever possible in my free time. On and off it took me about four

months to make. The finished animation is mostly made from early twentieth century photographs that I found while browsing

through the vast collection of the U.S. Library of Congress. I also used old post cards from New York that I purchased at a flee

market in Paris. Most of the time I would only zoom into a tiny portion of the picture and utilise that as my frame. Or I would

combine the foreground of one image with the background of another and add the piano. Some of those elements are entirely

computer generated.

The hardest part was to make it look as if it had been cut together from a lost reel depicting this curious experiment where

they’d lightened up a piano and thrown it off a building only to see what would happen. Like a bullet being fired at a balloon

filled with water. The kind of unnecessary crash test executed under the sole purpose of drooling over the beauty of slow mo-

tion photography.”

HAUSCHKA (music/artist)aka VOLKER BERTELMANN

Following previous releases by Set Fire To Flames, Sylvain Chauveau, and Max Richter, the stunning “Room To Expand” al-bum sees the addition of Hauschka, a new artist to FatCat’s 130701 imprint.

Hauschka is the alias of Düsseldorf-based pianist / composer Volk-er Bertelmann, whose work is based upon an exploration of the possibilities of the ‘prepared’ piano - a playfully disruptive inter-vention into the preconceived idea of the piano as a pure-toned, perfected instrument waiting for a gifted virtuoso to play on it. In-stead, Volker explores and influences the outcome of his playing by getting right down inside the instrument - clamping wedges of leather, felt or rubber between the strings; preparing the hammers with aluminium paper or rough films; placing crown corks on the strings, weaving guitar strings around the piano’s guts, or pasting them down with gaffa tape. These little modifications throw up an array of rustling, drumming, shivering, scraping, resonating sounds which either provide the focus / drive for a piece or hook the ear into an intriguing, slightly unusual frame.

Hauschka has previously released two albums on the Karaoke Kalk label - ‘Substantial’ (2004) and ‘The Prepared Piano’ (2005); and a 7”, ‘What A Day’ (2005) on the Ear Sugar label. Besides working as Hauschka, Volker is a member of Music A.M., a collaboration with Stefan Schneider (To Rococco Rot) and Luke Sutherland (Long Fin Killie); and of the electronic / club tracks duo Tonetraeger, his project with Torsten Mauss. A remix album of tracks from ?The Prepared Piano? will be released on Karaoke Kalk in May 2007, including mixes from Nobukazu Takemura, Tarwater, Mira Calix, Frank Bretschneider, Vert, Wechsel Garland, Eglantine Gouzy, and Barbara Morgenstern.

taken from: www.hauschka-net.de

picture by Estelle Klawitter

QuickTime™ and aPhoto - JPEG decompressor

are needed to see this picture.

TECHNICAL SPECIFICATION

LengthScreening FormatAspect Ratio

SoundLanguageSubtitlesBudgetCountryDate of Production

3 minutes 35 secondsDigiBeta/BetaCam/MiniDV/DVD4:3ColourStereoNo Dialoguen/an/aLuxembourgJanuary 2009

CREW

Writer, Director, Producer,Animation, Editor JEFF DESOM

Music HAUSCHKASong “Morgenrot“Album “Ferndorf“released on 130701 FatCat 2008

CONTACT

Jeff Desom+44 789 176 2966+352 621 720 603www.jeffdesom.com

jdesom@gmx.net4, rue de la CornicheL-5518 RemichLUXEMBOURG

Hauschka (Volker Bertelmann)

FatCat RecordsDave Howell

info@hauschka-net.dewww.myspace.com/hauschka

daveh@fat-cat.co.ukPO Box 3400Brighton BN1 4WGUKwww.fat-cat.co.uk