Neo Hülcker
Gib Pfötchen! (2017)
for 4 performers

NEO HÜLCKER is a composer-performer whose work focuses on music as anthropological research in everyday life environments. Their compositions evolve as situations, perfor- mance-installations, actions and interventions, and deal with digital subculture (like ASMR), childhood, human-animal-relations, queer practice and cultural hacking. Hülcker studied composition with Dieter Mack and Harald Muenz at Musikhochschule Lübeck and with Manos Tsangaris and Franz Martin Olbrisch at Hochschule für Musik Carl Maria von Weber Dresden. Hülcker performs as the ASMR artist Thousand Tingles and is a part of the agency ASMR yourself with whom they performed at HAU Berlin, PACT Zollverein, Akademie der Künste Berlin and Münchner Kammerspiele. Neo Hülcker is a part of the Y-E-S collective, who publishes music dealing with performativity, temporality, sound as physical experience and the cultural frames of concerts. They created compositions and installations such as ear action (2016) with Stellan Veloce, crackles (2016) and good dog (2017) for MOCREP, Da war ich noch nie in meinem ganzen Leben (2017), Musik für tote Tiere (since 2017) and tentaculus ohri (2018) with Antonia Baehr aka Henry Wilde. Hülcker’s compositions have been performed at Wittener Tage für neue Kammermusik, Wien Modern, Warschauer Herbst, London Contemporary Music Festival, Münchener Biennale, Blurred Edges Hamburg, Frontiers Festival Birmingham, Sound Acts Athen, Inter- nationale Ferienkurse für Neue Musik Darmstadt, Klangwerkstatt Berlin, Dark Music Days Reykjavik a.o. Hülcker’s work has been performed by ensembles such as Ensemble ascolta, mam. Manufaktur für aktuelle Musik, Ensemble Garage, MOCREP, Bastard Assignments, Maulwerker, decoder ensemble among others. They have collaborated with Antonia Baehr, Henry Wilde, Mario de Vega, Tomomi Adachi, The Agency, Stellan Veloce, Lucie Vitkova, Johnny Chang, Andy Ingamells, Elisabeth R. Hager, Matthias Kaul, Astrid Schmeling, Eva Zöllner, Bill Dietz, Jennifer Torrence a.o.


What is human, what is animal and what is neither? How do humanity and ‘animality’ manifest themselves on a stage? How do humans imitate animals? How do humans imitate humans who imitate animals? And what does that which we perceive as animal-like tell us about being human?
In Hülcker’s research into these questions, he unearthed a variety of material that he incor- porated into various acoustic and performative situations for this composition. Human-animal relationships, hunting, and human-animal intimacy in ASMR videos were the main sources of inspiration.

see video documentation