2008

Sao Paulo, Brazil hosted No Music Day 2008. To mark this announcement a number of 21 NOV graffiti appeared around the city over the coming days and weeks.

My Computer was a group show. It featured a NOTICE and a SCORE relating to The17. Text relating to My Computer can be read here. Documentation of My Computer can be seen here

SLICE THROUGH DERBY is the name given to the performance of Score 317 REPEAT performed in the English city of Derby. This work has been commisioned to celebrate the opening of QUAD, the multi-million pound arts centre to be opened in August in Derby. Documentation of this performance was exhibited in QUAD between August 2008 and January 2009. All 100 performances within SLICE THROUGH DERBY are listed on these events pages.  This performance is part of the Coast-to-Coast world tour by The17 and is twinned with a performance of the same score in Jerusalem in 2012.

THE MEANING OF MUSIC includes performances of Score 5. PERFORM with 17 workers at each of the following: A major entertainment retail outlet; an independent record shop; a national radio station; a world-renowned amplification manufacturer; a philharmonic orchestra; a successful record company; a stadium band; an international music publisher; and a leading music college. Each individual performance will have its own entry on these events pages.

The distribution of 500 copies of The First Chapter pamphlet throughout Manchester. Some of these may be on the seats of those attending the 24 Hour Live Conversation at the Cathedral Gardens.

17 a book by Bill Drummond. According to the back cover blurb the book is about: Music, Uncertainty, Bill Drummond, night trains across Russia, girl pop, sitting on a ledge, art, drunken mercenaries on the north sea, starting again, a classroom of 13 year olds, getting everything done before death, a river full of headless eels, waking up to find all music has disappeared & a choir called The17. To read the first chapter click here.

The17 on tour in Siberia. The 7th International Kansk Video Fetival.

Bill Drummond had a Reading & Signing book tour to support the publication of the book 17 at a number of major cities in Scotland and England over a two week period in September. In Liverpool it was only a signing.

The Meaning Of Music - Part Five - A Leading Classical Music Ensemble.

Birth, Marriage & Death is the name given to the performances of scores 9 Welcome, 13 Celebrate, 16 Complement in the the Irish city of Derry, and the documentation of these performances at the gallery VOID, Derry. The exhibition ran from 18 October and 15 November 2008. For further information and documentation visit the World Tour pages of this site.

Bill Drummond delivered a 25 minute talk entitled The History of Music (Part 19) as part of BBC Radio 3's Free Thinking Festival. The talk was followed by a Q & A session mediated by presenter Susan Hitch. The talk and Q & A session were broadcast on BBC Radio 3's Night Waves programme on 8 January 2008.

Year four of a five year plan. Bill Drummond was invited by interested parties in Brazil to host No Music Day 2008 in Sao Paulo, Brazil. He was instructed by his hosts to spend the day handing out No Music Day leaflets (in Portugese) to all those listening to their personal stereos on the main shopping street in Sao Paulo; to apprehend all buskers and tell them that they may want to take a break from their labours for the day and instead re-consider what the position music had in their lives; to enter all the music shop on the cities music shop street and tell them to close their shops and go do something different for the day. He also did numerous interviews with Brazilian magazines, newspapers and radio stations. He doubts that there was even a fraction less music consumed in Brazil on the 21 November 2008 compared to any other day.

Bill Drummond celebrated Saint Cecilia's Day in the streets of the Santa Cecilia district of Sao Paulo, Brazil.

A performance of Score 5 INSTIGATE was performed with the members of the NFA Derby FC.

David Byrne (no, not that one but the other one), tried twice to attend an event at a Waterstone's on the Bill Drummond/17 book tour. Both times he was turned away. The first time because he didn't have a ticket and the event was sold out. The second time he had a ticket but because he was late and Drummond had barred all late-comers, Byrne was turned away. David Byrne thought this to be bad form and let this be known. In response, Drummond agreed to come around to Byrne's place and give him a word for word performance of what he had missed. No date or time was agreed but Byrne said he would be in every Tuesday evening between October and Christmas. Drummond turned up unannounced the second Tuesday before Christmas and did what he promised.

A short statement by Bill Drummond about The17 read followed by a worldwide performance of Score 326 STOP. The Today programme is broadcast between 6am and 9am on BBC Radio 4 each weekday morning. It is the most widely listened to and influential news and current affairs radio programme in the UK. Drummond was invited to appear on the programme by the guest editor Jarvis Cocker. This performance is part of the Coast-to-Coast world tour by The17 and  is to be twinned with a performance of the same score in Timbuktu.