MGK x NEKO3 was a large graduation project for MGK composition students, built around new works for the experimental ensemble NEKO3.
I worked to make the project possible: developing the idea, securing support from several funds, hiring the ensemble and placing the concert in the beautiful Musikhuset Copenhagen — a house with a very particular atmosphere for young composers, because it is neither a school classroom nor an anonymous venue. It feels like a place where music is allowed to become public.
NEKO3 was an ambitious choice. The ensemble works between instruments, electronics, performance and precise stage presence, so the students could not hide behind normal ensemble habits. Their ideas had to become concrete: in notation, in sound, in timing, in gesture, and in the room.
For the graduating students, this made the concert more than an exam-like ending. It became a properly staged encounter with contemporary ensemble practice — and with the practical reality that serious composition often begins long before the first rehearsal: in fundraising, planning, trust, logistics, and the ability to bring the right musicians into the right room.