Performances

I’m honored to play with musician, poet, writer, philosopher and artist, Jim Ryan at:

Berkeley Arts Festival (2133 University Avenue, Berkeley, CA) at 9pm on Mon 23 July.

Infected by bebop at a tender age, Jim first took up the trombone in Minnesota, and by Mai ’68 was playing flute & sax, living in Paris, and jamming and performing with musicians like Sunny Murray, Albert Ayler, Sun Ra, Archie Shepp & Anthony Braxton, then shortly afterward beginning his musical association with Steve Lacy.

Jim Ryan

After stretching the boundaries of improv with the “Free Music Formation” in Paris and other European cities, Jim returned to the US, first jolting the scene in Washington, D.C., then moving to the Bay Area not so long before the Loma Prieta Earthquake (coincidence…?)

Since then, Jim has led a remarkable variety of improv groups, e.g. Green Alembic, Forward Energy, Left Coast Improv Group, the Electro/Acoustic Sextet of Oakland, Subjects of Desire, and Retro Blue, as well as participating in Marco Eneidi‘s “American Jungle Orchestra,” and the Orchestra for World Peace of Sun Ra trumpeter Eddie Gale.

Those who’ve heard Jim play have never been the same, and, after hearing his poems about surrealist elf sexuality, or seeing the powerful color energies of his paintings, are often never the same all over again.

One alembic makes you smaller....

Green Alembic is Jim’s “new approach to multimedia presentation of Image, Word, & Sound” … the group transmutes projections of original art used as graphical scores and spoken word into rare musical elements.

In addition to Jim Ryan (kalimba, flute, horn, word, image & leader), the line-up will also include:

Jeff Hobbs – cornet +?

Bob Marsh – bass

Jeff Hobbs (L) & Bob Marsh (R)

Ron Heglin – trombone/voice

Ron Heglin (photo by Tom Djll / Djll Pixels)

Michael Cooke – bassoon & sheng (笙)

Michael Cooke (photo by Danny Nolan)

Sheng (笙)

Doug Carroll – cello

Doug Carroll & friend

Joe Lasqo – piano

Meridian Gallery, 11 Jan 2012 (Photo: PeterBKaars.com, http://www.peterbkaars.com)

Set 1: Emergency String (X)tet (Bob Marsh, ringleader)

Bob Marsh, is a mad cellist / bassist / pianist / guitarist /found-instrumentist / vocalist / +++ (& tap-dancer), inventor of many sonic suits & personae (Butoh Bob, Dr. Bob, Mr. Mercury, etc.), and curator of the Music in Motion series.

Bob Marsh

Bob Marsh (R) as Mr. Mercury, processed by Joe Lasqo, Turquoise Yantra Grotto, 15 Feb 2012 (Photo: David Samas)

Grasping that the lack of an indeterminately-numbered amorphous unclassifiable string ensemble in the Bay Area constituted an emergency situation, Bob founded the Emergency String (X)tet to head off the unspeakable consequences. Among their many musical interventions have been Michelins VII and Michelins X, based on French roadmaps and premiered at Meridian Gallery.

Do not expect all the sounds to come from strings, and do expect chopsticks, alligator clips, and other instrument preparations.

Emergency String (X)tet with Rent Romus (R) (photo by Michael Zelner)

Jeff Hobbs, Matt Ingalls, Adria Otte, Angela Hsu (violins), Doug Carroll, Angela Roberts (cellos), Bob Marsh (contrabass), Mateo Lugo (e-guitar), David Michalak (lap steel guitar), Kanoko Nishi / 西鹿乃子 (koto / 箏) are members of the (X)tet who have a good quantum probability of appearing at this show.

Possible particles predicted by (X)tet string theory…

Matt Ingalls

Adria Otte (L) & Angela Hsu (R)

Mateo Lugo (manifesting as SoundCloud avatar)

David Michalak

Kanoko Nishi (西鹿乃子)

Hope you join us for an alchemical evening!

Joe

Outsound New Music Summit’s Touch the Gear is a free, hands-on, family-friendly event that lets the public roam among 25-30 musicians & inventors with their various different configurations of sonic “gear.”

Philip Everett, Cheryl E. Leonard, & Mark Soden Jr. @ Touch The Gear 2011 (Photo: Peter B. Kaars, http://www.peterbkaars.com)

Everything from oscillators to planks of wood with strings attached. Everyone gets to ask questions, make sound and experience how these set-ups work.

One of the best things about Outsound New Music Summit’s Touch the Gear is that you never know what and whom you’ll find there. For example, it was at a Touch the Gear that I first met collaborator Todd Lerew and saw his amazing flame-activated Quartz Cantabile:

Todd Lerew's flame-activated Quartz Cantabile

And that was just one of many astonishing inventions and kits…

A bit of a junglee patch...

My “gear” for this year’s Touch the Gear will be virtual and consist purely of software — so if you have a taste for junglee MSP patches — or you want to see some of the most unique music and sound-generating devices and electronic kits that the Bay Area has to offer — come have a look!

Partial list of musicians:

Dan Ake, Laurie Amat, Audible Disease Pedals, Shani Aviram, CJ Borosque, Amanda Chaudhary (अमांडा चौधरी), Matt Davignon, Tom Duff, Walter Funk, Omer Gal, Sung Kim, Joe Lasqo, Bob Marsh, Joshua Marshall, David Michalak, Tom Nunn, LX Rudis, Daniel Steffey, Benjamin Tinker, Andrew Wayne, Peter Wong

Address, transit, Outsound New Music Summit schedule, & details at: http://www.outsound.org/summit/12/schedule_details12.html

Look forward to see you there!

Joe

The Bun Mountains - 包山

Outsound Series @ Luggage Store Gallery, 1007 Market St. @ 6th Street, San Francisco, 8pm.

This all-laptop show will feature luminous and dark harmonic spectra, and doppler’d / computer-restructured time —  especially time-warped and processed sound from my field recordings of the excited crowds, street percussion, snatches of Cantonese opera, etc. from the Cheung Chau Bun Festival (長洲包山節), with synth’d sound overlay.

Climbing the Bun Mountain to get the luck

In this culminating point of the yearly rituals in honor of the Daoist god Pak Tai (北帝) and the birthday of Buddha on the Outer Island of Cheung Chau in Hong Kong, there’s a fierce scrum to clamber to the top of huge “bun mountain” towers and snatch the most and highest buns to get the best luck for the coming year, after which a giant paper effigy of the King of Ghosts is burnt. All senses are engaged, not least the ears, and the soundscape is gorgeous.

The show will also feature extended multi-dimensional Indo-modernist “meta-rāgas”, where the “notes” are changes in sound-color, harmonization, or degree of randomization as well as changes in pitch, as the basis for improv structures in forms like Rāgam-Tānam-Pallavi (ராகம் தானம் பல்லவி).

Cassini Saturn Probe results - Melody harmony or spectrum?

This will include a piece in the Saturnian meta-rāga Śani-Haṭakaṅgi (शनि–हटकङी), using samples of Saturn’s signal-scape as recorded by the Cassini space probe.

Warren Stringer

My partner in this show is multimedia artist/inventor and software fiend Warren Stringer, who’ll be image-jamming using the dazzling aesthetic of multi-dimensional moiré and cellular automata he’s developed as a pioneer of visual synthesis.

Warren’s work is polyvalent, ranging from visual music synthesizer, Sky, to social media ontology, Tr3, that connects human input devices, game engines, and social media, into a new kind of performance mash-up.

A virtuoso of technology, Warren’s many adventures have included 2D & 3D visual synthesis, Vuppet gestural game input devices long predating the Wii, acoustic fingerprint integration for sound distribution services like Snocap, patents in e-distribution methods, and key roles in various start-ups and tech companies ranging from Coincidence, Inc., TestDrive Corp., AdWare, Inc, Lotus, Borland, to Aha, Inc. and current project Muse.

His real-time visual synthesis is as vast and beautiful as his tech acuity, and you’ll experience a lush new visual world you never knew existed.

We’ll be followed in Set 2 by Oakland meta-drone duo Glou-glou (Gretchen Jude & Arjun Mendiratta).

Glou-GLou's Music for Koto, Pitch Pipe, and Samplers

Glou-glou, active in the Bay Area since the beginning of 2012, is dedicated to creating improvised electronic music that’s primarily ambient and consonant. Gretchen Jude plays koto, Roland SP-404 and sings (among other things); Arjun Mendiratta plays violin, laptop and rocks (and such).

Gretchen Jude

Gretchen Jude has studied with a variety of teachers in Japan, Idaho, and the Bay Area: vocal performance & technique with Molly Holm, Giselle Wyers & Bruce Browne; improvisation with Fred Frith, Roscoe Mitchell & Zeena Parkins; traditional Japanese music with Sawai koto master Curtis Patterson & shamisen expert Nishimura Makoto (西村真琴); Urasenke tea ceremony with Hagiwara Kimiko (萩原きみ子); electronic & computer music with Ted Apel, John Bischoff, James Fei & Chris Brown.

Gretchen has appeared with artists such as Kazue Sawai, Willie Winant, Keith Rowe & Lona Kozik, in new works by composers like Christian Wolff, Fred, Frith, Amy X Neuburg, Ellen Fullman & Edward Schocker.  In addition, she has played/composed music for dance works by Anne Bluethenthal, Shinichi Iova-Koga (シンイチ・イオヴァ・コガ), Peiling Kao (高沛齡) & many others.

Gretchen has an MFA in Electronic Music & Recording Media (with the Donna Peterson Vocal Prize) from Mills College, as well as an intermediate koto certificate (with distinction) from the Sawai Koto Institute (沢井箏曲院) in Tokyo.  She teaches music technology at University of the Pacific in Stockton, California.

Arjun Mendiratta / अर्जुन मेंदिरात्ता

Chemist and process engineer by day, Arjun Mendiratta (अर्जुन मेंदिरात्ता) has maintained a vigorous programme of electro-acoustic chamber music performance through his days at MIT & CalTech to his collaboration with Gretchen in a music refracted by his tech perspectives and thorough knowledge of the effects of sulfur compounds in burgundy.

Rather than try to describe their awesomely beautiful thrum, I suggest you listen (and buy!) their Music for Koto, Pitch Pipe, and Samplers here.

Join us for an unforgettable night of sight and sound at the longest standing experimental music series in the Bay Area, curated since 2002 by Outsound!

Joe

After a great recent show at CNMAT, Aaron Bennett’s phenomenal ensemble Electro-Magnetic Trans-Personal Orchestra returns! — Appearing at:

Berkeley Arts Festival (2133 University Avenue, Berkeley, CA) at 9pm on Wed 13 June.

I am again honored to be adding MSP and piano into the mix.

If you’ve already heard the first album released by Electro-Magnetic Trans-Personal Orchestra (cover below) you know exactly what I’m talking about, and you’re already coming to this great show. If not, run, don’t walk, to get a copy at http://emtpo.bandcamp.com/ and hear what the fuss is about.

Electro-Magnetic Trans-Personal Orchestra (cover art: Nancy Bennett)

To quote Aaron: “The members of this ensemble utilize the electro-magnetic field of their collective mind to attain a unitive transcendent state of sonic consciousness and in turn, create sublime and/or unusually expanded sonic experiences for their listeners.”

‘Nuff said…

Aaron Bennett in Space

Bio note: Saxist/composer Aaron Bennett has been bending space in the Bay Area jazz and improvised music communities for more than 15 years. Beyond his studies in composition and performance of western music at California Institute of the Arts, Aaron has also studied and played the music of West Africa, Indonesia, India, and Traditional Japanese 雅楽 (Gagaku) music. He has performed throughout the United States and abroad including performances with Wadada Leo Smith, Peter Kowald, John Butcher, Donald Robinson, Marco Eneidi, Gianni Gebbia, Weasel Walter, Adam Lane, Larry Ochs, Steve Adams, John Raskin, Victoria Williams, Aphrodesia, Lagos-Roots, The Rova Saxophone Quartet and many others.

Aaron Bennett in Time

He leads his own groups Go-Go-Fightmaster, Electro-Magnetic Trans-Personal Orchestra and performs in the Oakland Active Orchestra , Lisa Mezzacappa’s Bait & Switch, Vijay Anderson Quartet, and Guerilla Hi-Fi. Aaron has composed for large ensembles, chamber groups, plays, films, dance performances, wind quintet, saxophone quartets and trios as well as pieces for solo instruments.

In addition to Aaron Bennett (sax & compositions), the line-up will also include:

Darren Johnston – trumpet

Darren Johnston

Rob Ewing – trombone

Rob Ewing

Dina Maccabee – violin

Dina Maccabee

Bob Marsh – cello (and spiritual guidance counselor)

Jeff Hobbs (L) & Bob Marsh (R), performing in OPEYE Orchestra, @ Tuva Space

Joe Lasqo – piano & MSP

Meridian Gallery, 11 Jan 2012 (Photo: PeterBKaars.com, http://www.peterbkaars.com)

Preceding us in Set 1 (8pm): Nathan Clevenger

Nathan Clevenger

Composer/guitarist Nathan Clevenger was born in Oakland, and started the first edition of his Nathan Clevenger Group while living in Brooklyn, with successive editions in the Bay Area since 2003 appearing at venues such as the Revolution Cafe, The Make Out Room, Cafe Royale, the Jazz House, the Ivy Room, and Cafe Van Kleef.

In 2010, the Nathan Clevenger Group released their debut album, The Evening Earth, on Evander Music.

The Evening Earth - the debut album from Nathan Clevenger Group

The current edition of the band features Nathan Clevenger (guitar), Aaron Novik (clarinets), Kasey Knudsen (saxophones), Sylvain Carton (reeds), Sam Bevan (bass), and either Jon Arkin or Eric Garland (drums).

Besides many gigs with the musicians in his Group, Nathan has worked with Bay Area jazz luminaries including Lisa Mezzacappa, Patrick Cress, Darren Johnston, Aram Shelton, Cornelius Boots, and Eric Perney, among others.

Nathan was a member of composer/clarinetist Aaron Novik’s Cutting Guard and the large ensemble that performed and recorded Novik’s extended work The Samuel Suite (released on the Evander label in 2008).

He has also composed & performed original music for theater and played guitar, keyboards, bass, vibraphone and drums on the occasional rock session. He has studied guitar and theory with Morris Acevedo and John Schott.

The press on Nathan:

“A fascinating composer. Long-form, dreamy, sectional without being rigid, and bluesy — albeit in a non-traditional way.” – Rachel Swan,  East Bay Express

“Clevenger’s writing takes a lot from the swing era, but it’s packed with odd time signatures, twisty compositions, and passages of improvisation that go well beyond the old concept of a solo. You don’t get the breakneck tempos of bebop, but neither is the music frozen in the ’40s; the writing is fresh, and the musicians are given free rein to turn things upside-down. Peppy, often pretty, and just a little weird.” – Craig Matsumoto, Memory Select

Nathan on Nathan:

“I am preoccupied with close harmony and a tangled style of counterpoint and I enjoy pushing what one might call tight, precise Chamber Jazz harmonic/melodic elements through a volatile jazz ensemble.”

Join us for a fantastic and unique evening at one of the Bay Area’s longest running creative music series, now in an especially vibrant phase at its current University Ave. location.

Joe

I’m very excited to have been asked to play with Aaron Bennett’s phenomenal ensemble Electro-Magnetic Trans-Personal Orchestra at CNMAT (1750 Arch St., Berkeley) at 8pm on Fri 27 Apr.

I’ll be adding MSP and piano into the mix.

If you’ve already heard the first album released by Electro-Magnetic Trans-Personal Orchestra (cover below) you know exactly what I’m talking about, and you’re already coming to this great show. If not, run, don’t walk, to get a copy at http://emtpo.bandcamp.com/ and hear what the fuss is about.

Electro-Magnetic Trans-Personal Orchestra (cover art: Nancy Bennett)

Among Aaron’s many stellar contributions to the Bay Area improv and new music scenes (like sax trio arrangements of Bollywood standards!)  are fantastic “breathing chart” compositions for large improvising groups that deliver heightened coherence and adventure at the same time. They stand as Himalayas of group improv music. And Electro-Magnetic Trans-Personal Orchestra is the Mt. Everest.

Vapor Trails of Structure in Electro-Magnetic Trans-Personal Improv

To quote Aaron: “The members of this ensemble utilize the electro-magnetic field of their collective mind to attain a unitive transcendent state of sonic consciousness and in turn, create sublime and/or unusually expanded sonic experiences for their listeners.”

‘Nuff said…

Aaron Bennett in Space

Bio note: Saxist/composer Aaron Bennett has been bending space in the Bay Area jazz and improvised music communities for more than 15 years. Beyond his studies in composition and performance of western music at California Institute of the Arts, Aaron has also studied and played the music of West Africa, Indonesia, India, and Traditional Japanese 雅楽 (Gagaku) music. He has performed throughout the United States and abroad including performances with Wadada Leo Smith, Peter Kowald, John Butcher, Donald Robinson, Marco Eneidi, Gianni Gebbia, Weasel Walter, Adam Lane, Larry Ochs, Steve Adams, John Raskin, Victoria Williams, Aphrodesia, Lagos-Roots, The Rova Saxophone Quartet and many others.

Aaron Bennett in Time

He leads his own groups Go-Go-Fightmaster, Electro-Magnetic Trans-Personal Orchestra and performs in the Oakland Active Orchestra , Lisa Mezzacappa’s Bait & Switch, Vijay Anderson Quartet, and Guerilla Hi-Fi. Aaron has composed for large ensembles, chamber groups, plays, films, dance performances, wind quintet, saxophone quartets and trios as well as pieces for solo instruments.

In addition to Aaron Bennett (sax & compositions), the line-up will also include:

Darren Johnston – trumpet

Darren Johnston

Rob Ewing – trombone

Rob Ewing

Jeff Hobbs – violin

Bob Marsh – cello (and spiritual guidance counselor)

Jeff Hobbs (L) & Bob Marsh (R), performing in OPEYE ORCHESTRA @ Tuva Space

Eli Crews – bass

Joe Lasqo – piano & MSP

Meridian Gallery, 11 Jan 2012 (Photo: PeterBKaars.com, http://www.peterbkaars.com)

Set 2: Aram Shelton: Octet & others, for sax quartet & processing

Aram Shelton composed three minimalist works for an octet of winds and strings via loop pedal back in 2002. For this concert, he’ll re-imagine the first of these, Octet, for saxophone quartet and processing via Max, bringing the piece close to its initial form. Each saxophone will be live-sampled, and the processed sound will be distributed through the space at CNMAT. Aram will be joined by Ritwik Banerji, Cory Wright and Jacob Zimmerman. They may also play A Rare Thing (Shelton, 2003), originally played by the 774th Street Quartet (Bloody Murder).

Aram Shelton

Aram is very familiar to Bay Area lovers of jazz and new music, leading many ensembles and playing in even more (for example, Cylinder, one of my favorites)

Beginning on tenor while growing up on a small ranch in southeast Florida, Aram switched to alto in college, moved to DC and then Chicago, where he played creative jazz and improvised music in many groups, including Dragons 1976, Arrive, and Rapid Croche. Over time he began to use computer-based electronics for the live sampling and manipulation of acoustic instruments, and with Johnathan Crawford formed the group Grey Ghost.

Aram moved out west to study electroacoustic music at Mills College and developed compositions that focused on the technique of phrase modification, wherein written phrases played by orchestral instruments are recorded in real time and rearranged via custom built patches in MAX/MSP.

Aram has performed with a wide variety of talented musicians including Tim Daisy, Ken Vandermark, Jason Ajemian, Josh Berman, Audrey Chen, Darren Johnston, Fred Lonberg-Holm, Dave Rempis, Damon Smith, Steve Bernstein, Weasel Walter, Jason Roebke, Liz Albee, Rob Mazurek, Matt Bauder, Jessica Pavone, Håvard Wiik, Josh Abrams, Harris Eisenstadt, Jeb Bishop, Tim Perkis, Kevin Drumm, Kjell Nordeson, Frank Rosaly, Guillermo Gregorio, and Chris Brown.

Aram’s partners in crime for this outing include monster saxists Ritwik Banerji (pathfinding creator of AI improvising agent, Maxine), Cory Wright (creator of uniquely structured jazz/post-jazz compositions, member in many ensembles, and leader of Green Mitchell & the Cory Wright Quintet), and Jacob Zimmerman (organizer/member of the Lawson Ensemble performing music inspired by the rich cultural heritage of the Lawsonite people and Anteater, specializing in rhythmically complex original music).

Ritwik Banerji (ঋত্বিক ব্যানার্জী) & Maxine perform with Joe Lasqo & Maxareddu, 25 Jul 2013 @ Outsound New Music Summit (Photo – Peter Kaars, www.peterbkaars.com)

Cory Wright

Jacob Zimmerman

Join us for an amazing and unique evening in one of the world’s foremost computer music centers!

Joe

El Valenciano - Home of the Next Now series

A solo show as part of a great ticket in the spatially-aware Next Now series @ El Valenciano (1153 Valencia Street, SF; BART: 24th & Mission).

Many of you have traveled to new musical planes on Thursdays at El Valenciano under the obliquely brilliant direction of Eric Moffat and/or guest curator Mika Pontecorvo. I am honored to be a part of Mika’s Next Now 4 @EV on 12 April.

OBAFGKM Star Spectra

Continuing focus on a period of inner musical exploration, practice as meditation, & new solo work, this show will feature interplay of computer/piano at the edge of melodic space, luminous and dark harmonic spectra, and doppler’d time on both sides of the light speed barrier.

Cassini Saturn Probe Spectra - Melody, harmony, or sound-color?

Neo-gaku extensions of Japanese/Korean 調 modes + multi-dimensional Indo-modernist “meta-rāgas”, where the “notes” are changes in sound-color, harmonization, or degree of randomization as well as changes in pitch, will be the basis for improvisation structures to relate synthesized spectra, melody and harmony in forms  like Rāgam-Tānam-Pallavi or “Jō-ha-kyū” (序破急).

One of the featured pieces will be “Dark Matter Music via Gravity Lens” in the Saturnian meta-rāga Śani-Haṭakaṅgi (शनि-हटकङी). The program will also include material from my recent album, Turquoise Sessions.

Note or instrument...?

The Polychromatic Mika Pontecorvo

My set will be the 1st wave of Next Now 4, part of the ongoing Next Now series organized on some Thursdays at El Valenciano by guitarist, flutist, live electronicist, composer, improviser, & process architect, Mika Pontecorvo (for a few persepctives on Mika, see left).

Mika’s music specializes in in emergent structures of improvisation based on live interaction between an ensemble of musicians and generative sound architectures and systems he constructs in MAX/MSP and other hardware/software elements .

Playing in set 2, Mika’s band Cartoon Justice melds free and modal improv with structured song and experimental noise processes. The resulting sound often draws on elements from world musics, jazz, dark psychedelic rock and funk, and European modern / post-modern experimental traditions, and is a sound like no other you’ve heard.

Cartoon Justice - Apr 12th's personnel will include Mika Pontecorvo: guitar/flute/live processing, Kersti Abrams: alto sax/rhaita (غيطه‎)/flute, Greg Baker: clarinet/percussion/live processing, Aaron Levin: drums/percussion, Elijah Pontecorvo: electric bass

More Mika & Cartoon Justice:

http://cartoonjustice.edgebuzz.tv

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Cartoon-Justice/87384782854

Set 3 closes out the show with Mutual Aid Project, who do in music what Kropotkin proposed in politics.

Взаимопомощь: The MAP is the territory...

“Through our music and recent projects, Decolonizing the Imagination: Arts Practicum and R&D (Research and Development), Mutual Aid Project is a Creative Music collective engaged in discovering of our connections to our histories and ourselves.”

Band members:
Tracy Hui (guitar)
Nick Obando (alto saxophone)
Marshall Trammell (percussion)

Rangshar Tracy Hui is an Oakland improvisor/composer/guitarist living in CA.  He has lived and played in protean formations often unrecognizable from previous incarnations and studied/played/observed intently with/about/(   ) a plethora of musical entities. He has a deep commitment to realizing a better society through a persistent practice and theoretical searching. He actively musicks in the communities he serves, expressing indignation, joy, suffering, love and collectivity.

Nick Obando is a Bay Area native saxophonist. After studying jazz at a southern CA State University, he moved back to Oakland & began to educate youth through different media. Nick also continues to be a student emerging himself in his Filipino culture by studying & teaching traditional folk music. Working in free improv he makes sure to keep a deep root in blues and R&B.

Marshall Trammell was raised in Oahu, Hawaii. His  Multi-Aesthetic approach to Improvisation is a framework for his development as a percussionist. His other projects include: film, curation, cognitive embodiment video projects, the Oakland Tenderness Project, a mutual aid, alternative currency and participatory research pilot project, and composition. A very versatile player, who can play in very different styles on different nights with different people.

Together they forge a powerful but spacious meta-jazz force field that will energize you into the night.

Mutual Aid Project: Tracy Hui (guitar), Nick Obando (sax), & Marshall Trammell (percussion) [photo: Stuart Dixon]

More Mutual Aid Project:

http://www.mutualaidproject.com

Look forward to join you in the revolutionary re-folded space of Next Now 4.

Joe

Next Now 4 @ El Valenciano, 12 Apr 2012

A solo show at the wonderful musical and literary gem of Glen Park  – Bird & Beckett! (653 Chenery, SF CA 94131; BART: Glen Park; www.birdbeckett.com)

Bird and Beckett - the cozy in-spot for poetry, jazz & much more

As many of you know, I’m refocusing on a period of inner musical exploration, practice as meditation, and new solo work.

This solo show will bring some of this new work out, exploring new blends of MSP computer sound synthesis + piano in an extended electro-acoustic space.

A special area of exploration will be the oceanic expanse of Indian music, pursued both in relatively traditional as well as highly extended ways — including further developments in multi-dimensional “meta-rāgas” using unorthodox scales where the “notes” can be changes in sound-color, harmonization, or degree of randomization as well as changes in pitch, and adapting Indian classical structures like Pallavi-Charanam to compositions and improvisation in these meta-rāgas.

Along with these explorations, I seek to travel further down a road that is at once among the most simple and challenging for all musicians — to better use (i.e., to better get out of the way of…) silence, quietness, and space.

In this show my aim will be to explore as if listening to the wind in the reeds under the moon by a river via a gently avant combination of MSP sound synthesis, traditional rāgas, Indo-modernist meta-rāgas, and some surprises.

Of course, since it is my great pleasure to present this work at Bird & Beckett, I’ll also play from my jazz repertoire to honor the wonderful tradition of B&B jazz that has so enriched San Francisco over a period of many years. The program will also include material from my album, Turquoise Sessions (on sale at B&B).

If you don’t know the wonderfully intimate Bird & Beckett space and its creator, Eric Whittington, now is the time to acquaint yourself with this marvelous & highly BART-accessible San Francisco treasure. You’ll not only find the cosiest jazz boîte in SF, but wonderful home for words, books, and poetry guaranteed to put you in contact with ideas and writers you’ll find essential.

The man who makes it possible:

Eric Whittington, Bookseller & Friend of Jazz, at the Bird & Beckett piano (Photo: Paula Levine)

Setting the words to music…

Jerry Logus, flute & Don Prell, bass @ Bird and Beckett (Photo: Michael Waldstein)

I look forward to see you at this contemplative show….

Joe

Some photos from our fabulous show on 15 Feb 2012 with Bob Marsh and Jack Wright!

Joe Lasqo processes Mr. Mercury, Turquoise Yantra Grotto, 15 Feb 2012 (Photo: David Samas)

新年快樂！

“Sparkling, fiery, flowing like molten iron, the Fire Dragon’s flying dance greets Spring!”

Start things out with a *bang* and join us to open the Dragon Year with special guests: extraordinary East Coast saxophonist Jack Wright, and Bob Marsh, performance artist, musical agent provacateur/éclatiste, mad cellist/bassist/pianist/guitarist/found-instrumentist/vocalist/+++ (& tap-dancer!)

We’re also privileged to present Bob Marsh’s unique invented instrument, the Silver Park, as played by its invented musician, Mr. Mercury (see more below).

I’ll be joining our guests throughout on the Gamelan Piano, laptop & the Steinway and also play some meta-rāgas and material from my album Turquoise Sessions during the between-set candlelight tea.

Fellow TYG-Host David Samas will sing and play in both sets with extended vocal techniques of Хөөмей (Tuvan throat/overtone singing), Inuit vocal competitions, bird & whale song, as well as a virtuoso performance on his Zen Industrial Carillon.

大坑舞火龍

Part of this unique experience will be based on MSP (laptop) transmigrations of field recordings from the 大坑舞火龍 (Tai Hang Dancing Fire Dragon), made when I lived in Hong Kong. The Fire Dragon is a grand and awesome creature made of thousands of huge lit incense sticks that does a triumphant dance on Lunar New Year in its district of Tai Hang.

Check it out:

Tai Hang Fire Dragon (大坑舞火龍)

Bob Marsh will channel the Fire Dragon in one of his unique sonic suits, with added sparkle from laser light FX for an immersive son et lumière (optionally, he may also chase a flaming pearl…).

Sonic suits are part of Bob’s poetry technology toolbox, simultaneously instrument, costume, and shamanic sound device.

Bob in performance with Brenda Hutchinson at the 2011 Outsound Festival:

Bob Marsh & Brenda Hutchinson @ Outsound Music Festival 2011 (Photo: Peter B. Kaars, http://www.peterbkaars.com)

We’ll also be visited by Mr. Mercury, world’s foremost player of the unique Silver Park.

The Silver Park (Photo: Amanda Chaudhary - http://www.catsynth.com)

Mr. Mercury on the Silver Park, with Massimo Falascone at R-de-Choc, 21 May 2010.

M. Mercure à R-de-Choc, 21 mai 2010 (pour plus de détails sur R-de-Choc et son organisateur, Pascal Marzan, svp. voir: http://r-de-choc.blogspot.com)

Joining us also will be (in)famous East Coast saxist Jack Wright.

Jack Wright with Guillaume Viltard, St. Marks Church, London, Nov 2007

After teaching at Temple University in the 60s and leaving academia in the early 70s to engage in radical politics and community organizing, Jack directed his energies into music. Through years of near constant touring throughout the US and Europe, often performing for audiences in cities and towns where improvised music had never before been heard, he came to be regarded as something of an underground legend, “the Johnny Appleseed of Improvised Music”. He is accused of impersonating pigs, ducks and human blowhards, but lately has been remembering the proper use of the saxophone –to support up the tottering universe. He and his partners are true believers in absolutely free, unrestrained, unstructured, unselfconscious improvisation.

Er wächst in einen Klang-Fluß... Jack Wright auf Toulouse

The Washington Post says, “In the… world of experimental free improvisation, saxophonist Jack Wright is king”.

The German publication, Bad Alchemy, says: “Wright does not make music, he embodies it, he transforms it with a naiveté of another order. It grows into a sound river, he is part of the diaphragm through which the heterogeneous whispers.”

Jack says: “…and yet because I feel I‘m working with a certain material the end result is not mine… I‘m not expressing myself so much as aiding the material to express or organize itself.”

Bob Marsh (R) & Jack Wright (L) - 2 Great Tastes That Taste Great Together!

More Bob:

http://www.bobmarsh.net/

http://edgetonerecords.com/marsh.html

More Jack:

http://www.springgardenmusic.com

Turquoise Yantra Grotto music circle takes place in a unique space near Glen Park in San Francisco, offering, in addition to a normal piano, site-specific invented instruments like the Gamelan Piano, Zen Industrial Carillon, and the new Ventifacto Crystalithophone (pictured below) — a cozy laboratory to explore the world chamber music of the future in an unexpected dialog between global roots traditions and modernist music.

The New Cookie: David Samas' Ventifacto Crystalithophone

As usual, on hand will be a shamanic healer and a neo-tea practitioner (our hosts) to facilitate your listening experience.

Planning continues for Wayang Turquoise puppet opera accompanied by the gamelan piano in the new year.

A scene like nowhere else.

Tea from 7:30pm, show starts at 8pm. $12-$15 donation. Due to limited seating, by advance reservation only.

To reserve, send me an email at joe@joelasqo.com, and I’ll confirm and send location and details. (Please note in case of allergies: Birds are present in the venue).

Look forward to see you at this once-in-a-lifetime show!

Joe