One of the biggest disappointments with my current life is that I simply don't have the time to see live music enough. Yes, I have a one year old, and I love to spend as much time with her as I can, but what really limits my abilities to see live music is that I work as an audio/visual technician evenings and weekends a lot..like five or six nights per week. So when I get the chance to see some cool music, I'm very grateful.
The Seattle Experimental Music Review
This blog is looking to be the first to focus on critical review of experimental music happening in Seattle. This will include concerts, albums, and interviews with people creating great music in a great city.
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Tuesday, June 17, 2014
Concert Review: Thollem McDonas with Paul Kikuchi and Greg Campbell
One of the biggest disappointments with my current life is that I simply don't have the time to see live music enough. Yes, I have a one year old, and I love to spend as much time with her as I can, but what really limits my abilities to see live music is that I work as an audio/visual technician evenings and weekends a lot..like five or six nights per week. So when I get the chance to see some cool music, I'm very grateful.
Saturday, May 17, 2014
Concert Review: Anne LaBerge and Tom Baker at the Chapel
So in that vein, it's been almost two months since I saw two wonderful people put on a concert of wonderful music. On March 24, 2014, I sat with a small audience in the wonderful Wallingford space with pretty high expectations. These are two powerhouse world-class improvisers who have a relatively short history of playing together. They have evolved a pretty cool duo and it's very exciting to hear them play together.
Most of us Seattleites are familiar with Tom Baker. He's one of the big anchors in the Seattle new music scene. The founder of the Seattle Composer's Salon, the Seattle EXperimental Opera, Seattle Creative Orchestra, the Present Sounds record label....Tom may be, more than any other individual, the central figure to new music in Seattle. (EDIT: Tom brought to my attention that he wasn't a founder of the seattle Creative Orchestra, just a commissioned composer. Also, he isn't the founder of the other organizations, but a co-founder. Apologies for the error) Tom blends his musical voice in two worlds: composition and performance. As a composer, Tom has a voice built out of an academic tradition. With a doctorate in music composition, Tom has a skill with composition that is not easily matched. As a performer, Tom is a fantastic guitarist (standard as well as fretless guitar) with an experimental and jazz background. Though it's realistically impossible to completely separate these musical voices, Tom is one individual whose performance sounds very different than his composition. I'll make it clear: I love both voices that come from Tom. His compositions are almost understated and pastoral. His improvisations on guitar are sometimes bombastic and always unpredictable. I think we very much miss his quartet appearing more often (with Jesse Canterbury living in San Francisco, it's hard to know when they'll play), and Triptet also has a member who is not local. So the opportunity to see Tom improvise in a new setting is very exciting.
What can I say about Anne LaBerge? She was my mentor. She is my absolute favorite flutist alive today. I spent three years living in Amsterdam studying with her, and the experience was so incredible, I haven't fully recovered from it almost seven years later. Anne is the only flutist I'm aware of who has a very strong background in traditional flute performance who has been able to completely remove herself from it while she improvises in order to create art. When Anne plays the flute, she plays more like a drummer. Her rhythmic playing and use of percussive techniques transcends experimental flute playing, and it surpasses the new proliferation of beatbox flute playing (something Anne has been doing probably thirty years before its popularity). Anne, more than any other musician or teacher has made me the musician I am today. I hope soon I can surpass my current state and really make her proud.
For this performance, both Anne and Tom were playing with live electronics. Tom was playing his electric fretless guitar, a processed theramin, and his laptop running Reason. Anne had her flute, alto flute, and piccolo as well as her laptop running Max/MSP and a Kyma signal processor. The two players decided to position the speakers on the floor behind them, and this had the effect of blending their sounds much more than if the speakers had been on stands facing the audience. This has made me think of how I will present my own electronic music. With the speakers on the floor, it was like having a garage band with amps sitting on the floor. It felt much more informal and raw.
Anne has been incorporating text in her music for a number of years, and she has always had a strong feminist voice. In one of my first lessons with her, she related many of the struggles women have being composers in Europe. Even though Europe, and the Netherlands in particular, is a bastion of progressive politics, they seem to have a very long way to go in cultural gender equality. The prejudice is that men are on the vangard of art and music. Women don't really have a place as composers or jazz musicians or experimental improvisers. Obviously, this prejudice is awful, and it sickens me to think that this world where my own daughter was born still clings to archaeic and sexist thoughts.
The textual material Anne used was about two groups of women that are nowadays almost forgotten: The All-American Girls Professional Baseball League, and the World War II Soviet Union pilots named the Nachthexen. The stories were wondeful recounting the very talented baseball players and pilots that were shattering glass ceilings during the same decade. Baseball was linked to the overall performance through a Max/MSP patch that had the two players play a musical baseball game.
One thing that I have almost never seen happen with a performance by Anne LaBerge is an awkward interaction with her technology. She inspired me to become a computer musician, and even though I constantly stumbled over my equipment and technology, I was always impressed by her perfection. Strangely, this night seemed to have an element that may have confused her. Using a snowball mouse, Anne pushed buttons and made gestures to trigger audio files. The expression on her face relayed a playful confusion that I couldn't tell if it was intentional or not. Strangely, I found this refreshing since I have never experienced a performance by her that wasn't perfect.
Overall, this was an absolutely stellar performance by two very creative and fantastic musicians. Anyone who ever has a chance to see either of these two play should really make sure they head out and see it.
Wednesday, February 26, 2014
Concert Review: Seattle Chamber Players and On The Boards Present: Icebreaker VII: Open Source Day Two
Saturday, February 22, 2014
Concert Review: Seattle Chamber Players and On The Boards present Icebreaker VII: Open Source Day One
Wednesday, February 12, 2014
Album review: Ascendant by Greg Sinibaldi and Jesse Canterbury
Greg Sinibaldi is the first experimental musician from Seattle I ever met. We were both artists in residence at the Atlantic Center for the Arts about seven years ago. At the time, I was living in Amsterdam. At the ACA, we joined several other musicians and worked with the flute master, Robert Dick. There were also painters and poets working with other masters of their crafts. I made some great friends at this place, and when I moved to Seattle, Greg was the first person I made contact with in order to get into the music scene. In my time living in Seattle, I've really come to see that Greg is my favorite saxophone player in town, and probably one of my favorite alive. In Ascendant, Greg alternates between playing bass clarinet and tenor saxophone.
I actually met Jesse Canterbury in Ellensburg, Washington while I happened to be passing through in the early days of moving to the state after being in Europe. He was playing with the Tom Baker Quartet, and that was a show I found to be quite inspiring. I've seen Jesse play many times since then, and we've had the chance to play together on occasion before he moved to the San Francisco area. He's a very fine clarinetist with a great ear and feel for improvisation as well as written music. In Ascendant, Jesse alternates between bass clarinet and clarinet..
Ascendant was recorded in the Dan Harpole cistern at Fort Worden State Park in Port Townsend, Washington. The cistern was used while Fort Worden was an active military base and drained sometime in the 1950's. Since then it has regularly been used to record music because it has a unique architecture and a forty-five second reverb.
Reverb is in essence, an echo. The actual physics and nature of reverb is more complex, but a succinct way to say it is that reverberation is created as sound bounces off a surface and travels back to your ears. With large spaces and a variety of surfaces, the resulting reverberation can vary greatly. Musicians have been taking advantage of their performance space and natural reverb since the beginnings of music. Cathedrals, large buildings, caves...these places all can have very interesting architectural characteristics and varying reverb times. Computer musicians often artificially emulate these sorts of spaces in order to create their synthesized reverbs. There are also hardware built devices that create reverb. These are commonly used by rock bands and in recording studios. Reverb is so vital that many recording studios keep their recording space acoustically devoid of reverb so it can be created and added to each new album that is to be recorded.
For this album review, I will give a brief review track by track and conclude with an overall review of the album.
Wade
This track has a simple melody and counterpoint that really transforms because of the space. Two bass clarinets play a melody that might not be so memorable when played in a regular concert venue, but the added reverb makes it much more interesting. I actually find the melody to be reminiscent of Percy Grainger. I'm not certain, but I assume both Greg and Jesse are familiar with his music and have played it in many concert bands. Grainger's music is also intended to be played in concert halls with a nice reverberating space. The way this melody builds and the way the counterpoint compliments it is exquisite. With a lot of widely spaced open harmonies, this slow melody is soothing and pastoral.
Second Thoughts
Opening with a series of trills that create a wash of sound, Greg's tenor sax seems to come out of nowhere. The saxophone tone is extraordinary. Starting lower in the register and moving higher, Greg's instrument captures a full range of sound possibilities in this space. By playing in a style somewhere in between a classical saxophonist and a jazz saxophonist, Greg's saxophone tone is unique and interesting. This is a fresh sound to my ears that are more familiar with hearing the saxophone in a jazz combo situation. Greg is always looking for different ways to incorporate his saxophone, and I actually don't think I've ever heard him play in a traditional jazz setting.
Two or Three Back and Around
A powerful opening that can only be Jesse Canterbury and his clarinet(s). By playing two clarinets simultaneously, Jesse creates great dissonances and harmonies with himself. Harsh strong attacks with strikingly loud dynamics permeate through this track. This more than any other track sounds like a duet (trio?) between Jesse and the cistern. The use of two clarinets throughout this piece thrills me. Because they are both being played by the same player, blend and intonation is flawless between the two. The harmonies and dissonances that Jesse creates sound more like very clear multiphonics from a single instrument. With a soft ending akin to a continuous drone, this track ends leaving me with a desire for more.
Beside Ourselves
Back to duets, this time with tenor saxophone and bass clarinet. This is the first piece on the album that has a real strong sense of rhythmic drive, the two instruments compliment each other well. Both Greg and Jesse have an uncanny knack for blend so their ensemble playing is like listening to an organ with many different stops open. This track more than any other is played as a jazz standard. The driving melody is played together, and then one player plays an accompaniment part while the other plays what I assume is an improvised solo. The strong bass notes that recur really fill the recording and the space.
Ugly Beauty
Again, Greg's sax tone is spectacular as the opening for this track. When I listen to Greg play, I hear George Garzone (one of his mentors) of course, but I also hear a strong mix of John Coltrane and Stan Getz. Of course Greg isn't the only tenor player to be influenced by these giants of the instrument, but the effortless way he can call up their sound and influence is fascinating. This track is one that would play well in a concert hall, and it is also reminiscent of what one might hear a saxophone busker playing on the street. The reverb, which does add some nice color isn't particularly necessary in this piece.
If You Look too Close
With an almost jolting contrast to the previous track, Greg plays a tune that reminds me more of the Berio flute sequenza than a Stan Getz inspired saxophone solo. I can picture someone playing this in a concert hall with a computer generated reverb and creating a lot of excitement from the audience. The fact that this is performed inside of a water tower only enhances the experience. Computer programmers and engineers work hard at creating reverb effects that sound this good with a live performer.
Not Forever, Just for Now
This track is a bit infamous to me. When I originally downloaded the album from Bandcamp, I ended up with a track that cut off about a minute early. After contacting Paul Kikuchi, the owner of Prefecture Music, everything got squared away and I got the complete track.
Anyway, the two bass clarinets are haunting in this piece. Greg and Jesse have a great feel for each other's playing. In this track, some of the melodic material does seem a bit stagnant. There's a motif of quickly running notes that gets repeated, but it feels out of place with the slower and more deliberate material. I think if these motifs would have been played more along the tempo of the other material, it wouldn't have jumped out at me so much and drawn me out of the moment.
Web of Lies
This piece really shows off Jesse's dynamic control. As woodwind players, it's much easier to play loudly than it is to play softly. So Jesse's capability to come in at a whisper and keep his dynamics low for so long before bringing up the volume highlights incredible restraint and confidence. At about the halfway mark, he really takes off and plays a cluster of loud repeated notes with the occasional accented note outside of the cluster. The high frequencies really resonate in this space and the amount of sound bouncing from the high register of the clarinet really pleases my ear.
Hold This
The open chordal sound is very Americana. Again, Jesse is playing solo clarinet and using the space and its reverb to create widely spaced and beautiful chords. This reminds me of composers like Aaron Copland (Americana), Benjamin Britten (widely spaced chords), or Erik Satie (ambient). As easy as it would be to make this album one of ambient atmospheric sound, I find it rather astounding that this is the only piece that I could even consider labeling as ambient. It's refreshing to hear long beautiful tone as the penultimate piece on this album. If Jesse is anything like me, I think this would have been the hardest piece on the album to play because of the sparse and open nature of the composition.
Dreaming in Two Million
Monday, February 3, 2014
Concert Review: Han Bennink and Mary Oliver with Wayne Horvitz, Jacob Zimmerman, and Geoff Harper
Even though there were these issues with the audio (I would make recommendations to the Royal Room for some consideration for speaker placement in the bar area), the performance was fantastic! It was a great first show to see after so much time out of the scene working and taking care of my daughter. Was anyone else there? Care to add any more insight?
Sunday, February 2, 2014
First Post
Welcome to The Seattle Experimental Music Review. This is a blog that's starting because of a post I saw on Facebook by local composer/sound artist, Steve Peters. With a simple question, Steve pointed out a significant lack of writing about the experimental music scene that's happening in Seattle. It's not too difficult to find reviews about Seattle music in the realms of pop/rock, hip hop, jazz, or classical music. The goal is for this blog to feature quality writing about live music happening in Seattle and reviews of recordings released by Seattle experimental musicians.
So who am I and what qualifies me to undertake this project?
My name is Clifford Kimbrel-Dunn, and I'm a flutist/composer/electronic musician who lives in Seattle and plays exclusively experimental and avant-garde music. I've premiered over a hundred new compositions that incorporate the flute, and I've spent the majority of my adult life dedicated to exploring the extended capabilities of flute technique. I have a bachelor's degree in flute performance, master's in music composition, and a second master's degree in music and technology.
I'm only recently becoming active in the scene again. Having lived in Seattle for a little over six years, I'm putting down thicker roots. I have a daughter who is almost a year old, and I'm hoping to buy a condo in the city this year. When I'm not working on music, I'm either working as an audio/visual technician at the Seattle Public Library, or spending time with my wife and daughter, Kayla and Aria. Please comment and contact me with any information for great shows and music.
Thanks for coming.