Interdisciplinary artist Constantine Katsiris has been actively working in various creative fields for over three decades, with the range of his practice incorporating elements of composition and improvisation, electronics, photography, design, performance, transmission, and installation. Sound experiments have been a primary focus, to which he has designated the name Scant Intone. The trajectory of this project traces an arc from computer music through a fascination with sampling to the research of psychoacoustics, spatiality, perception, and other such phenomena. Through this scope, his process explores the frequency spectrum by attuned listening to real world sounds through analog and digital devices, ever searching for whatever may catch the ear or inspire the imagination.
The output varies, from stark minimalist tones to densely complex textures, the product of a deeply personal and specialized sound palette that has been patiently developed over many years. Radio frequencies, electromagnetic fields, hand-drawn waveforms, and raw data sonification are just some of the sources used as material to conjure unique sensory experiences through the visceral medium of sound wave propagation. These compositions are excursions in abstract electronic music with influences including ambient, lowercase, microsound, noise, glitch, and drone.
Whether in broadcast, cinema screening, as fixed media in an art gallery, or live performance settings, his work has been presented at Whitechapel Art Gallery [London], La Société des Arts Technologiques [Montréal], Brut Konzerthaus [Vienna], and on MTV Brasil [São Paulo]. Scant Intone has also shared the stage with Fennesz, Merzbow, Okkyung Lee, Sawako, Crys Cole, Tim Hecker, and Zbigniew Karkowski, to name a few. An avid phonographer, he has traveled extensively to conduct field recording expeditions in urban settings like Tokyo, Paris, and Prague to more remote regions such as the Brazilian Amazon rainforest. Conventional microphones aside, his toolkit employs a range of antennas and sensors that can be used to capture what is usually inaudible.
Providing balance to his sound work is an obsession with photography, his practice in both fields drawing upon the same process of sampling from his surroundings and recontextualizing the material. His ongoing Harsh Walls series has documented the weathered surfaces of city streets from Greece to Thailand and countless places in between. These abstract photographs have been commissioned as cover art for albums by bands like xQST and Diminished Men, as well as being included in several visual art exhibitions.
Over the past thirty years, Constantine has been integral in organizing countless events both locally and abroad. With a spotlight on cutting edge experimental, improvised, and electronic music from the underground, these concerts have featured performances by artists from across Canada as well as guests from all around the globe. His extensive experience and eclectic taste have led to programming showcases for world-renowned festivals and booking international tours for artists on Panospria, his own sub-label of No Type Records based in Montréal. He is a longtime proponent of broadcasting, having been involved in campus, community, and pirate radio stations going back to the mid-1990s.
Having laid his hat in many places over the years, he currently lives and works in Saskatoon, located on Treaty 6 Territory in the homeland of the Cree and Métis, the traditional territories of the Dene, Saulteaux, Dakota, Lakota, and Nakota. He is the parent of two young children, and an activist for social justice and environmental issues.