Jacques Demierre & Vincent Barras
Voicing Through Saussure
Saturday, April 23, 2011 at 8pm
Jacques Demierre and Vincent Barras, will perform their 90-minute epic text-sound piece, Voicing Through Saussure, in its entirety for the first time ever in the final presentation in our Live in Studio A spring series. Barras and Demierre have been composing Voicing Through Saussure for the past nine years and have performed and recorded parts of it, but have never before presented a performance of the complete piece. Not only wildly variable in sonorities, vocal interplay, and body-text resonance, the piece is also intellectually profound and compositionally rigorous. Demierre and Barras draw from materials found in the work of linguist Ferdinand de Saussure on various ancient and modern languages--the so called “Indo-Europeans” languages. Detailed analysis of the sonorities of these ancient and modern languages, their re-elaboration and re-composition is finally embodied in a score-text, spread out on stage in its concrete dimensions through the language performance of the two sound artists. The body is where this vocal investigation takes place, digging in the primitive sound matter of language.
Jacques Demierre is a pianist, performer and composer based in Geneva. His musical and sound work takes various directions: improvised music, contemporary music, sound poetry and sound installation. His compositions and sound realisations are concerned with the activity of listening and with sound space, and develop a very cross and interdisciplinary conception of music. He collaborates with many improvising musicians, Barre Philips,Urs Leimgruber, Thomas Lehn, Joëlle Léandre, Axel Dörner, Fritz Hauser, Sainkho Namtchylak, Hans Koch, Brandon Labelle, Jason Kahn, Butch Morris and many more.
Vincent Barras is performer, historian, translator also based in Geneva. He teaches at the University of Lausanne (history of medicine) and at the High Schools of Art and Applied Art in Geneva (sound, history of the body). He is member of Contrechamps Editions in Geneva (contemporary music and aesthetics) and programmer of sound poetry and art language festivals (La Bâtie Festival and Roaratorio in Geneva). He has published various books, essays, articles, on body theory, medicine and psychiatry, contemporary poetry and music. He has translated books by Galen, Edoardo Sanguineti, Theodor Adorno, Carl Dahlhaus, Georges Seferis, John Cage, Eugen Gomringer, Simon Cutts, Robert Lax.
Made possible by generous financial support from Pro Helvetia, the City of Geneva and the Republic and Canton of Geneva.
Kathleen Baird, Taralie Peterson,
& Michael Zerang
Saturday, April 2nd, 2011 at 8PM
Kathleen Baird: vocals, spike fiddle, acoustic guitar, mbira, slide guitar, harmonium, electric guitar, organ, xylophone, percussion, drums, banjo
Taralie Peterson: vocals, slide guitar, lap harp, bowed banjo, spike fiddle, cello, banjo, mbira, zither, electric guitar
Michael Zerang: multiple percussion, zither
Multi-instrumentalists and vocalists Kathleen Baird and Taralie Peterson are collectively know as Spires That In The Sunset Rise, an otherworldly free-folk band from Madison, WI by way of Chicago, IL. Spires' musical palette includes the spike fiddle, cello, bul bul tarang, various drums and bells, ecstatic yelps and cackles, and all manner of plectra. With their unconventional instrumentation and unique vocal technique, they will join forces with Chicago based composer / percussionist Michael Zerang for an evening of extended improvisations.
Michael Zerang has been a professional musician, composer, and producer since 1976, focusing extensively on improvised music, free jazz, contemporary composition, puppet theater, experimental theater and international musical forms. He has collaborated extensively with contemporary theater, dance, and other multidisciplinary forms and has received three Joseph Jefferson Awards for Original Music Composition in Theater, in 1996, 1998, and 2000. He is also the founder and artistic director of the Links Hall Performance Series.
James Falzone presents
"Sighs Too Deep For Words"
Saturday, March 19th, 2011 at 8PM
For solo clarinet and ambient sounds
Being recorded for future release on Allos Documents Records
The work of composer and clarinetist James Falzone exists at the intersection of divergent streams. Equally at home in classical, jazz, improvised and various world music idioms, his career has garnered wide critical and peer respect for the way he traverses and connects these seemingly disparate paths. This performance will be recorded live for release on Allos Documents Records.
Ben Vida
Saturday, March 12th, 2011 at 8PM
Ben Vida is a composer, improviser and sound artist. In this new work Ben focuses on the control and cross-modulation that is communicated when analog and digital sound synthesizing systems intersect. It is in these moments, when the inner ear activating difference tones are punctured by analog exclamations, that a deeper spatialization is revealed and the listener’s aural perception is expanded. Peter Margasak of the Chicago Reader calls Vida's synth music "an ear-tingling blast." Read the full review here.
Jeff Parker
Sunday, March 6th, 2011 at 7PM
Famous for his work in the band Tortoise, versatile guitarist Jeff Parker is an experimentalist in the truest sense, willing to explore and cross pollinate genres from hip hop to soul-jazz to electronic to chamber music. This Live in Studio A performance is a unique chance to hear Jeff in an intimate setting.
Joshua Abrams Natural Information Society
Saturday, February 26th, 2011 at 8PM
Bassist and composer Joshua Abrams has been in the thick of Chicago's vibrant music scene for over fifteen years, playing and recording as leader and sideman in projects across the genres. In 2010 he released the "Natural Information" on Eremite which the New York Times called "one of the rough gems of the post-everything musical era" and the Wire picked as one of the top 50 records of 2010 He recently completed his first soundtrack for "The Interrupters" a new movie by Steve James which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival.
Michael Vorfeld
Light Bulb Music
Heaven Gallery
Tuesday, April 5, 2011
Lecture on the history of the light bulb and performance
Goethe-Institut
Wednesday, April 6, 2011
Improvised performance with James Falzone and Lou Mallozzi
Elastic Arts
Thursday, April 7, 2011
In Light Bulb Music, light dictates the production of sound, composed live via a variety of controllers. Switches, dimmers, relays, flashers and other devices are used to create changes in the light and electrical current flow. These fluctuations are made audible by a range of microphones and pick-ups. Fine mechanical sounds occurring inside the light controllers are amplified and integrated into the music as well. The changes in the light intensity, the incandescence of the filaments and the rhythmic variety of the flickering and pulsing lights is directly transformed into a comprehensive, microcosmic, electro-acoustic world of sound.
Michael Vorfeld's Chicago appearances are presented through a partnership between Experimental Sound Studio, the Goethe-Institut Chicago, The Sound Department of The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Heaven Gallery, and Umbrella Music.
Keith Kirchoff and Eric Glick Rieman
Keith Kirchoff - piano and electronics
Eric Glick Rieman - prepared Fender Rhodes
Sunday, January 9, 2011
The 2011 Live in Studio A series kicks off with performances by two innovative masters of the keyboard: Keith Kirchoff and Eric Glick Rieman. Kirchoff and Rieman will play solo sets in the intimate, acoustically ideal studio slash performance space in ESS. This event is part of the Experimental Piano Series (EPS), which is organized by the Borderbend Arts Collective and IS Productions, in partnership with the PianoForte Foundation. Funded in part through Meet the Composer's MetLife Creative Connections program.
Keith Kirchoff by Experimental Sound Studio
Keith Kirchoff
Eric Glick Rieman and Keith Kirchoff by Experimental Sound Studio
Eric Glick Rieman
Tom Nunn
Performance at ESS: Saturday, December 4, 2010
Tom Nunn has designed and built nearly 200 instruments. He is continually active as a performer, both as a soloist and with other musicians. He is committed to free improvisation, and in 1998 published Wisdom of the Impulse, a book that examines various aspects of the art and presents a theoretical foundation for creative listening, analysis and discussion of improvisation.
Ed Hermann - Track 4 by Experimental Sound Studio
The instruments featured in the performance, which Nunn calls electroacoustic percussion boards, are made from common materials - plywood with threaded steel rods, bronze rods, nails, and other hardware attached. They are visually striking musical sculptures that encourage improvisation and exploration. Each instrument offers a variety of surfaces that can be struck, plucked, bowed, or scratched with mallets, guitar picks, bows, combs, or other objects. The sound is simultaneously familiar and exotic, acoustic and electric.
Will Faber
Performance at ESS: Saturday, November 20, 2011
Will Faber_Track 2 by Experimental Sound Studio
Will Faber is a musician and researcher whose work engages the interactions of melodies, noise, rhythms, and repetition. He is currently a PhD student in ethnomusicology at the University of Chicago and plays in the group El is a Sound of Joy.
Tim Kaiser
Performance at ESS: Saturday, October 30, 2011
Tim Kaiser: Live @ ESS - October 30, 2010 from Experimental Sound Studio on Vimeo.
"Tim Kaiser creates an ethereal sonic landscape on a series of hand-made electronic and acousto-electric devices. The aural imagery that Kaiser conjures is atmospheric and compelling."
Tim Kaiser has been creating experimental art and music for 30 years. His multimedia projects have been presented in Sweden, Brazil, Germany, Hong Kong and Cuba. He has toured his live musical performances throughout the US. Articles and reviews of Tim's work have appeared in Make Magazine, Wired, the Associated Press, CityPages, Time-Out NY, ArtPaper, EnGadget, Vinyl, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, the Daily Collegian, the Smaland Posten, MNArtists, StreetTech, Sonic State, BoingBoing, and the New Art Examiner. Mr. Kaiser has been profiled in the PBS series MakeTV, WCCO's "On the Road" and WDSE's Playlist. When he's not touring, Tim builds experimental musical instruments for other artists around the globe from his studio in northern Minnesota.
Animal Hospital
Performance at ESS: Saturday, October 16, 2010
With guest opening performance by Neil Jendon
Animal Hospital by Experimental Sound Studio
ESS is pleased to present a solo performance by Kevin Micka's one-man performance sound factory Animal Hospital. During performances, Micka buries himself in a pile of electronics-shelves of effects, mixing consoles, amps and delay units-while patiently constructing a layered nest of loops consisting of live drum beats, guitar chords, scrapes, chucks, chimes, and melodies resulting in anything from more conventional songs to meticulously crafted ambient movements on to full on improvisation.
Kevin Micka formed Animal Hospital at the tail-end of his time with Boston band The Common Cold, Animal Hospital slowly began to take on a life of its own in 2004. A self-titled debut CD by Animal Hospital was released on Boston's Mister Records that year and displayed Micka's ability as a composer and engineer in communicating his creative expression. Since then, Kevin has consistently toured the United States, the U.K., and Europe throughout France, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Germany, Switzerland, Belgium, Denmark and Iceland. Within the last 5 years Micka has continued writing and releasing several additional tracks on various compilations around the world. Animal Hospital has won followers from all corners of the music world, earning himself spots with bands as diverse as The Jesus Lizard, Beirut, No Age, Neptune, Thrones, Dosh and The Great Redneck Hope (not to mention a recurring role as bumper music on Boston's NPR station). For more, visit www.animalhospitalmusic.com.
Neil Jendon by Experimental Sound Studio
Over the last 10 years, Neil Jendon’s recordings and live performances have wandered in and out of the spaces of noise, ambience, improvisation and minimalism. His main music-making tools are a modular analog synthesizer, vintage electric organ and guitar. Recent live shows have been with Wolf Eyes, Locrian, PCRV, ONO, Consumer Electronics and BLOODYMINDED. Live collaborations have included Vertonen, Mykel Boyd, Jason Soliday, Mike Weis, Matt Christensen, Eric Leonardson and Carol Genetti.
Lawrence English & David Daniell
2 transcendent solo sets at ESS
LAWRENCE ENGLISH:
Lawrence English is media artist, composer and curator based in Australia. Working across an eclectic array of aesthetic investigations, English’s work prompts questions of field, perception and memory. English utilises a variety of approaches including live performance, installation and found sound/vision to create works that generate subtle transformation of space and ask audiences to become aware of that which exists at the edge of perception.
DAVID DANIELL:
Kamama: with Chen and Marini
AUDREY CHEN and LUCA MARINI: Duo improvisations at ESS
KAMAMAexcerpt by Experimental Sound Studio
Gerry Hemingway/Terrence McManus
Duo Improvisation Performance at ESS
Gerry Hemingway (trap set, acoustic and electronic addenda) and Terrence McManus (homemade guitars, electronic processing) perform a duo music that is primarily improvised, having evolved from several intense years of work together in numerous settings. Their previous work together has primarily been in the context of performing each other's compositions which as a process has more finely honed their collective musical language into a cohesive, thoughtful and far reaching results. There is no limit to the territory these two master improvisors might traverse. A Monk tune might present itself in a sincere traditional setting or may find itself extended beyond hardcore industrial noise textures. It is a music of interplay and listening, that engages, challenges and delights the listener all at once with its virtuosity, sense of humor, intensity and honesty.
Gerry Hemingway/Terrence McManus by Experimental Sound Studio
Darrell Greiwe and Greg Prickett
Guitar improvisations
The 2010 Outer Ear Series continued with a unique performance by folk freakshow rockers Darrell Greiwe and Greg Prickett. Darrell and Greg performed two live sets in the intimate ESS live room. The first set was guitar duets, exploring and manipulating sounds. During the second, they invited the audience to manipulate their sounds while they traded places and played from the audience's side of the room.
2010: Digital Black or Sun Ra pt II
TODD CARTER composes live at Heaven
A live multi-channel composition based on sounds taken from the Sun Ra / El Saturn Collection of the Creative Audio Archive at Experimental Sound Studio.
Outer Ear is a program of Experimental Sound Studio, which has commissioned "2010: Digital Black or Sun Ra pt II" with the generous support of the Gaylord Donnelley Foundation.
2010: Todd Carter - Digital Black or Sun Ra pt II by Experimental Sound Studio
Four Improvisers Meet in the Studio
Boris Hauf, Steven Hess, Keefe Jackson, Judith Unterpertinger
Four remarkable jazz composers met for a special performance in the studio space of Experimental Sound Studio. London-based Judith Unterpertinger and Berlin-based Boris Hauf joined Chicago jazz musicians Steven Hess and Keefe Jackson to create a remarkable, one-time musical event in the ideal acoustics of the ESS studio—perhaps Chicago’s most intimate performance space.
Outer Ear_Excerpt by Experimental Sound Studio
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