SAN FRANCISCO TAPE MUSIC FESTIVAL 2015

Transcription

1 THE SAN FRANCISCO TAPE MUSIC FESTIVAL 2015 program 3

2 THE SAN FRANCISCO TAPE MUSIC FESTIVAL is presented by the San Francisco Tape Music Collective and sfsound funded in part by: The San Francisco Grants for the Arts, The French-American Fund for Contemporary Music, The Zellerbach Family Foundation, and individual contributors. equipment kindly provided by: The Center for Computer Research in Music and Acoustics (CCRMA), Stanford University. sfsound/sftmf is an affiliate of, and is fiscally sponsored by, the San Francisco Friends of Chamber Music, a not-for-profit organization dedicated to the service of chamber music in California. THANK YOU Wendy Carlos, Byron Evora, Matthew Goodheart, Grux, Benjamin Kreith, Charles Kremenak, Dianne Lynn, Fernando Lopez-Lezcano, John MacCallum, Hadley McCarroll, Collin McKelvy, Sam Nichols, Eric Seifert, and Erik Ulman

3 S A T U R D A Y J A N U A R Y P M V I C T O R I A T H E A T E R P R O G R A M 3 Utopia (2014) Augusto Meijer Notama (2003) Cliff Caruthers interval The Day I Disconnected the Erase Head Pauline Oliveros and Forgot to Reconnect It (1966) Golden (2007) Brian Eno

4 AUGUSTO MEIJER Utopia (2014 :: 8:00 :: stereo) Utopia is an acousmatic composition journey that generates a momentum of colorfully structured sound fields with the intention of creating a temporary utopian mindset in the audience. Prior to the creation of Utopia, I created a series of experiments, primarily involving explorations to the creation of complex sound fields. For example, a simplistic sound phrase is processed in such a structured way that it becomes a complex, layered sound field. Various relating sound fields have been generated this way, using similar sound sources. Utopia was created by organizing these resulting sound fields poetically. AUGUSTO MEIJER (1988) is an electronic music composer from the Netherlands. He obtained a Master of Music degree at the Utrecht School of the Arts, after successfully completing the European Media Master of Arts degree. During these studies, he focused strongly on electroacoustic music, and composition techniques. His compositions are presented at various international venues, including Linux Audio Conferences, International Computer Music Conferences, and many more. He collaborates with artistists from other disciplines, including lighting designers and instrumentalists, creating multidisciplinary art projects in which his recognizable electroacoustic sound creations play a key role. His work is strongly and inevitably based on personal experiences and fascinations. CLIFF CARUTHERS Notama (2003 :: 22:10 :: stereo) Natoma takes its name from Quiet American's Field Effects series at 964 Natoma, where it premiered in October of Sources include the text from a lullaby by Woody Guthrie read by Stacy Parker, Jonathan Benham's rebar bell instrument, field recordings from California, Colorado, Missouri, and New York, and a conversation that never took place in Ontario, Canada. CLIFF CARUTHERS continues to search for direct and tangible relationships to complex technologies, creating narrative soundscapes and psychologically charged atmospheres from recordings of real and imagined environs. His work has been featured at the Society for Electroacoustic Music in the United States (SEAMUS), the San Francisco Electronic Music Festival, The San Francisco Tape Music Festival, Deep Wireless 2006, Noise Pancakes, Quiet American's Field Effects series, and the Prague Quadrennial A California resident since 2000, Mr. Caruthers has established himself as a preeminent sound designer in the Bay Area, working with Berkeley Repertory Theater, American Conservatory Theater, California Shakespeare Theater, Cutting Ball Theater (associate artist), The Acting Company, Guthrie Theater, Aurora Theatre Company, Crowded Fire, San Jose Stage Company, Marin Theatre Company, and TheatreWorks. He joined the San Francisco Tape Music Collective in 2002.

5 PAULINE OLIVEROS The Day I Disconnected the Erase Head and Forgot to Reconnect It (1966 :: 32:36 :: stereo) In 1966, the San Francisco Tape Music Center was awarded a $200,000 grant from the Rockefeller Foundation to move its facilities to Mills College, transforming it into the Mills Tape Music Center. That summer, before Pauline Oliveros was to become the Center s first director, Oliveros studied with Hugh Le Caine at The University of Toronto Electronic Music Studio, one of the best classic electronic music studios in North America at that time. The Day I Disconnected the Erase Head and Forgot to Reconnect It is one of fifteen works she created during her stay in Toronto. These works are note-worthy in their use of live studio improvisation, heterodyning and combination tones created by oscillators tuned below and above the range of human hearing, tape delay, noise, and feedback. A common classic studio technique at that time was to play a tape loop while simultaneously recording to it. If the erasing component of the tape machine was disengaged, a delayed feedback loop was created where sound would be continuously overplayed upon itself. The director of the Toronto studios did not understand why Oliveros insisted on such techniques, accusing her of practicing a black art. He also apparently was displeased that she forgot to replace the erase head one day, inspiring Oliveros s title of this work. PAULINE OLIVEROS is a senior figure in contemporary American music. Her career spans fifty years of boundary dissolving music making. In the '50s she was part of a circle of iconoclastic composers, artists, poets gathered together in San Francisco. Recently awarded the John Cage award for 2012 from the Foundation of Contemporary Arts, Oliveros is Distinguished Research Professor of Music at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, NY, and Darius Milhaud Artist-in-Residence at Mills College. Oliveros has been as interested in finding new sounds as in finding new uses for old ones --her primary instrument is the accordion, an unexpected visitor perhaps to musical cutting edge, but one which she approaches in much the same way that a Zen musician might approach the Japanese shakuhachi. Pauline Oliveros' life as a composer, performer and humanitarian is about opening her own and others' sensibilities to the universe and facets of sounds. Since the 1960's she has influenced American music profoundly through her work with improvisation, meditation, electronic music, myth and ritual. Pauline Oliveros is the founder of "Deep Listening," which comes from her childhood fascination with sounds and from her works in concert music with composition, improvisation and electroacoustics. Pauline Oliveros describes Deep Listening as a way of listening in every possible way to everything possible to hear no matter what you are doing. Such intense listening includes the sounds of daily life, of nature, of one's own thoughts as well as musical sounds. Deep Listening is my life practice," she explains, simply. Oliveros is founder of Deep Listening Institute, formerly Pauline Oliveros Foundation, now the Center For Deep Listening at Rensselaer.

6 BRIAN ENO Golden (2007 :: 16:45 :: 16 channels) Golden uses Scriabin's 'Mystic Chord', which he himself called 'the Synthetic Chord', which is also known as "The Promethean Chord - containing the notes C, F#, Bb, E, A, D. The piece is arranged in such a way that consecutive notes fall onto the 16 different speakers, so any sequence of eight notes would occur, one note in each pair of speakers, moving around the room, with the ninth note falling back in the first speakers. Since the piece is in free time, with some notes hanging for long periods and others following each other quickly, the speed of movement is constantly varying. I hope this will give an impression of a slow rotation, a cloud of sound to get lost in. BRIAN ENO (born Brian Peter George Eno on 15 May 1948 in Woodbridge, Suffolk) is an English electronic musician, music theorist and record producer. As a solo artist, he is probably best known as the father of modern ambient music. Eno first came to prominence as the keyboard and synthesizer player of the 1970s' glam and art rock band Roxy Music. After leaving the group, Eno recorded two highly idiosyncratic and original rock albums, before turning to more abstract soundscapes on subsequent albums such as Another Green World (1975) and Ambient 1/Music for Airports (1978). Eno has pursued several artistic ventures parallel to his music career, including almost 100 visual art installations and, with artist Peter Schmidt, Oblique Strategies, a deck of cards recommending various artistic strategies. He is also one of the founders of the California-based Long Now Foundation.

7 PLEASE JOIN US FOR THE REMAINING FESTIVAL CONCERT SUNDAY JANUARY 11 8pm (featuring sfsoundgroup) two programs in two sets, exploring the relationships between electronics and acoustic instruments Does listening to this constant transition from one state to another tell us anything about the nature of sound? -- Bernard Parmegiani FRENCH PROGRAM Pierre Boulez - ANTHÈMES II (1997 :: violin + electronics) Luc Ferrari - ARCHIVES SAUVÉES DES EAUX (2000 :: improvisers + tape) Horacio Vaggione - PRELUDES SUSPENDUS III (2009 :: tape) Bernard Parmegiani - ACCIDENTS / HARMONIQUES (from DE NATURA SONORUM) (1973 :: tape) AMERICAN PROGRAM Mario Davidovsky - Synchronisms #2 (1964 :: flute, clar, violin, cello, tape) Robert Erickson - Pacific Sirens (1969 :: ensemble + tape) Hans Tutschku - Still Air 3 (2014 :: oboe, bass clarinet, ipads) Matt Ingalls - CrusT (1997 :: clarinet + tape) series@sfsound.org to subscribe to the SFTMC/sfSound event list KEEP THIS PROGRAM ADVERTISEMENT FREE Your kind donation will help us to continue presenting great music Go to sfsound.org/sponsors.html to donate online

8 UPCOMING SFSOUND CONCERTS jan 21, 2015 :: center for new music SÉVERINE BALLON feb 11, 2015 :: center for new music MAZEN KERBAJ feb 17, 2015 :: center for new music JOANA HOLANDA & IGNAZ SCHICK mar 9, 2015 :: center for new music MARCO FUSI mar 18, 2015 :: center for new music CARL LUDWIG HÜBSCH & RADICAL 2 DUO mar 28, 2015 :: center for new music ROBERT ASHLEY TRIBUTE apr 10, 2015 :: april in santa cruz ucsc SFSOUND PLAYS TENNEY & NEW WORKS BY STUDENT COMPOSERS apr 18, 2015 :: tangents guitar center for new music JAMES TENNEY'S "SPECTRUM IV apr (tbd) :: room royce theater WATER-CITY BERKELEY : LIVE MUSIC TO A FILM BY KIM ANNO may 9, 2015 :: center for new music DAVID BITHELL may 22, 2015 :: center for new music HAPPY VALLEY BAND For more information visit sfsound.org