Coming this weekend at Philly’s Bowerbird:
KEITH ROWE
TOSHI MAKIHARA / TOM BORAM@ Physick House [ website ]
321 South 4th Street
Philadelphia, PA
[ directions ]
8:00pm, $10 general admissionKEITH ROWE electronics
england / franceKeith Rowe (born March 16, 1940 in Plymouth, England) is an English free improvisation guitarist and painter. Rowe is a founding member of AMM in the mid-1960s (though in 2004 he quit that group for the second time) and a founding member of M.I.M.E.O. He trained as a visual artist, and Rowe’s paintings have been featured on most of his own albums. After years of obscurity, Rowe has achieved a level of relative notoriety, and since the late 1990s has kept up a busy recording and touring schedule. He is seen as a godfather of electroacoustic improvisation, and many of his recent recordings have been released by Erstwhile Records.
more info:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keith_Rowe
http://efi.group.shef.ac.uk/musician/mrowe.htmlvideo:
http://web.mac.com/misha_david/iWeb/mishaXdavid/
Keith%20Rowe.htm http://youtube.com/watch?v=HnUVpiFHhmMaudio:
http://erstwhilerecords.com/catalog/018.html (click on ‘tracks’)
http://erstwhilerecords.com/catalog/030.html (click on ‘tracks’)
http://erstwhilerecords.com/catalog/041.html (click on ‘tracks’)TOSHI MAKIHARA percussion
TOM BORAM guitar, electronics
philadelphia / baltimoreToshi Makihara studied drums, percussion and improvisation with Sabu Toyozumi, a prominent percussionist in Tokyo. Since arriving in the United States in the late 1970’s he has worked with various new music ensembles as well as with numerous dance and theater companies internationally. Makihara has provided original music to Arden Theater Company, Diversions Dance Company (Wales), Pennsylvania Ballet, ZeroMoving Dance Company and Leah Stein Dance Company among others, and has worked with musicians including Steve Beresford, Peter Brotzmann, John Butcher, Nels Cline, Eugene Chadbourne, Tom Cora, Amy Denio, Thurston Moore, William Parker and John Zorn. He has also collaborated with poets, visual artists, filmmakers and performance artists widely. Since the fall of 2000, Makihara has been focusing on three separate performing styles: 1. New Jazz performances on a conventional drum-set, 2. music for theater and dance using a variety of percussion and discovered sound media, and 3. the experimental free improvisation using a simple setting consisting of one snare drum and one small cymbal.
Stochaistic composer Tom Boram studied twelve-tone and computational methods of high complexity with Nori Applebaum and Vincent Charles Peale at IRCAM in Paris in the early 80’s before moving on to create his own completely deterministic form of composition which analogizes musical forms to receding sheaves and other structural devices of Topose Theory. As a young man, Boram was highly affected by reading Rene Thom on Catastrophe Theory and so decided to dedicate himself for life to a restrained form of dandyism which he considered to be both a reaction against Europe AND The United States–a commitment to a nearly static 18th century world outlook. He lives and works in Baltimore with his three cats and a large collection of original hand-carved puppets.
bowerbird@LANDMARKSThe Concert Series
Bowerbird@LANDMARKS is an ongoing curatorial partnership that expands cultural offerings in Philadelphia by bringing experimental and improvisational music, film, dance and other creative, genre-defying performing arts to historic sites in the region. Showcasing the newest performing arts is nothing new for Landmarks’ four historic, 18th century houses—Grumblethorpe, Physick House, Powel House and Waynesborough. These houses would often have been the locations for recitals of the most “fashionable” music of their time. Even Thomas Jefferson was known to have played the fiddle in the Powel House, which was the one of the most significant cultural and social centers of colonial and revolutionary Philadelphia. Events in the bowerbird@LANDMARKS series revive this long-lost tradition of intimate concerts, and provide an intelligent alternative for contemporary audiences. http://www.philalandmarks.org/projects5.aspxThe Physick House: An Inventive Spirit
Built in 1786 by Madeira wine importer Henry Hill, the Physick House, formerly the Hill-Physick-Keith House, was named after Dr. Philip Syng Physick, the “Father of American Surgery.†Dr. Physick took up residence in the house in 1815 after separating from his wife, Elizabeth Emlen Physick, and lived there until his death in 1837. One of the foremost surgeons of the time, Dr. Physick was among the few courageous doctors who remained in the city to care for the sick during the yellow fever epidemic of 1793. Among his many patients were John Adams’ daughter, Dolly Madison, Dr. Benjamin Rush, and Chief Justice John Marshall. President Andrew Jackson consulted Dr. Physick about lung hemorrhages and was told to stop smoking.Many of Physick’s medical accomplishments were years ahead of his time. He pioneered use of the stomach pump, used autopsy as a regular means of observation and discovery, excelled in cataract surgery, and was responsible for the design of a number of surgical instruments and operative techniques. Dr. Physick was affiliated with America’s first hospital, Pennsylvania Hospital, and was one of the most sought after medical lecturers of the 19th century. His lectures prepared a generation of surgeons for service throughout America. It is because of his status as a teacher that he was dubbed the “Father of American Surgery.†In addition to beautiful period rooms, the second floor of the Physick residence houses a medical museum depicting the amazing career of Dr. Physick as well as a collection of medical instruments from that era.
The square, four-story brick Physick House is the only free standing Federal townhouse remaining in Society Hill. With its huge doorway fan light – the largest in any Pennsylvania residence in 1786 – plus grand proportions and straight, classical lines, Physick House is an exceptional example of the Federal style. Its collection has outstanding examples of French-influenced Neoclassic furnishings. Its unusually large city garden contains plants popular in the 19th century and features a winding path, grotto and classical statuary.
october 27th (sat)
JULIEN OTTAVI
MICHAEL BULLOCK
SETH CLUETT
with ALBRO / FRASER / HURT@ Music 107 [ website ]
201 S. 34th St (just below Walnut)
[entrance at rear of music building]
Philadelphia, PA [ directions ]
8:00pm, FREE (donations accepted)JULIEN OTTAVI electronics
franceJulien Ottavi: Studied drums and percussions, he learned sound et photography at the Art school of Nantes. Since 1997, he develops a composition works on the voice and his transformation by computer. If his researsh are base on artists’s works came from Sound poetry like Henri Chopin, Bernard Heidseick, Kurt Schwitters, Jaap Blonk…etc, he’s also influenced by Contemporary music with composers like Karlheinz Stockhausen, John Cage, Morton Feldman, Giacinto Scelsi…, composers came from « Concrète » music like Pierre Henry, Michel Chion, Luc Ferrari… also by musicians-composers came from Noise music like Merzbow, Zbigniew Karkowski or Bernard Günter. http://www.noiser.org
MICHAEL BULLOCK contrabass, electronics
troy, nyMichael Bullock (contrabass, electronics, video) is a composer and improviser based in Troy, NY. He has performed in an eleventh century stone chapel, a Czech monastery, and on the side of mountain. As a soloist, in duo with cellist Vic Rawlings, and with electronic duo rise set twilight (with Linda Aubry), Mike has performed across the US and in France and Czech Republic. He has collaborated with Bhob Rainey and Greg Kelley (of nmperign), Mazen Kerbaj, Christian Wolff, Lê Quan Ninh, Daniel Carter, and Theodore Bikel. Mike is a member of the BSC, a large ensemble of improvisers originating in Boston, which has collaborated with musicians and composers from all over the world. His recordings appear on Grob, Intransitive, CIMP, Emanem, Kissy, Fargone, Rounder and Naxos. In 2002 he founded Chloë, a label dedicated to electro-acoustic music. Plus One Events, an experimental music series, was founded in 2005 in collaboration with Linda Aubry. Mike is a doctoral candidate in the Electronic Arts department at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy. http://finenoiseandlight.net
SETH CLUETT electronics
with
Tim Albro – guitar, electronics
Ian Fraser – electronics
Dustin Hurt – trumpet
princeton / philadelphiaSeth Cluett (born 1976, Troy, New York) is a composer and visual artist whose work includes photography, drawing, video, sound installation, concert music, and performance. His pieces are an exploration of the role of sound in everyday life, engaging the boundary between the auditory and the other senses as an active field of experience for the audience. His work has been shown/performed at galleries, festivals, sound art venues, and concert spaces both traditional and alternative throughout the Americas and Europe. Seth’s work is documented on Errant Bodies Press, Sedimental, Crank Satori, Boxmedia, and Wavelet records as well as upcoming releases on Kissy and Televaw records. http://www.onelonelypixel.org/
october 28th (sun)
THOLLEM MCDONAS / TATSUYA NAKATANI DUO
with KATT HERNANDEZ
MEICHT / MITCHELL / SZEKELY TRIO@ Broad Street Ministry
BSM [ website ]
315 South Broad St
Philadelphia, PA [ directions ]
8:30pm, $5-$10 sliding scaleTHOLLEM MCDONAS piano
TATSUYA NAKATANI percussion
san francisco / japan
with KATT HERNANDEZ violinThollem Mcdonas, pianist/vocalist/composer/improviser, recipient of the 2006 National Endowment of the Arts Meet The Composer grant, was born Feb. 23, 1967 in the San Francisco Bay Area of Irish and Cherokee descent. He is touring perpetually, the previous year in Europe, currently in the U.S. He began his musical training as a young child rigorously studying the keyboard repertoire from the renaissance to the 20th century. After graduating with degrees in both piano performance and composition he chose to become homeless for several years, opting to wander and live out of a backpack, rather than pursue a career as a concert pianist with a suit and tie. It is because of these dichotomies and rich, wildly disparate experiences that his music is so dynamic and appeals to such a wide variety of audiences.
Tatsuya Nakatani (percussion) is originally from Osaka, Japan. In 2006 he performed in 80 cities in 7 countries and collaborated with 163 artists worldwide. In the past 10 years he has released nearly 50 recordings on CD. He has created his own instrumentation, effectively inventing many instruments and extended techniques. He utilizes drumset, bowed gongs, cymbals, singing bowls, metal objects, bells, and various sticks and bows to create an intense, organic music that defies category or genre. His music is based in improvised/ experimental music, jazz, free jazz, rock, and noise, yet retains the sense of space and beauty found in traditional Japanese folk music. In addition to live solo and ensemble performances he works as a sound designer for film and television. He also teaches Masterclasses and Workshops at the University level. He also heads H&H Production, an independent record label and recording studio based in Easton, Pennsylvania. He was selected as a performing artist for the Pennsylvania Performing Artist on Tour (PennPat) roster as well as a Bronx Arts Council Individual Artist grant.
SETH MEICHT saxes
MATT MITCHELL piano
MIKE SZEKELY drums
philadelphiaSeth Meicht was born in 1976 and grew up in the Philadelphia area. He studied saxophone at the University of the Arts and studied privately with Ron Kerber, David Murray, Odean Pope, and Ben Schachter. Seth leads his own trio as well as being a founding member of The Meicht Group and The Sepia Trio. The Meicht Group garnered critical acclaim for the recordings Dig the Sound Live (2000) and Loud Like Hemlocks (2001) which were released on Scrapple Records. The Sepia Trio’s newest release is on Utech Records and is entitled cleft. The Seth Meicht Trio has just released its debut CD on Cadence Jazz Records (CJR1196) and, adding Matt Bauder, has released Illumine on C.I.M.P. (#350).Seth has shared the stage with such luminaries as Michael Brecker, James Carter, Ravi Coltrane, Byard Lancaster, Prince Lasha, Joe Lavano, David Murray, Odean Pope, and Bobby Zankel. Seth is a member of the Odean Pope Saxophone Choir and also the Lars Halle Jazz Orchestra.
Matthew Mitchell was born on July 19, 1975 and his interest in music quickly became apparent. As a toddler, Matt would sit down with a Fisher Price record player and a stack of vinyl LPs and memorize lyrics, track times, musicians and other trivia about his parents’ albums: The Beatles, Stevie Wonder, Jimi Hendrix and others. Matt began playing piano at the age of 6, with composing beginning at age 10. As his appetite and aptitude for music grew, so did his involvement, and by age 13 came the knowledge that music would be his life. Following high school, Matt attended music schools for five years, spending three years at Indiana University and two at the Eastman School of Music, culminating in a Master’s degree. During his school years, Matt played a wide variety of music in a wide variety of contexts, including experiences with rock, fusion, hip-hop, salsa, Brazilian, and polka bands, as well as the ‘usual’ assortment of jazz and classical experiences. Notable teachers from this time period include David Baker, Luke Gillespie, Michael Cain, and Elizabeth DiFelice. In the jazz realm, Matt has performed and/or recorded with Ralph Alessi, Wes Anderson, David Baker, Jimmy Coe, Ravi Coltrane, Peter Epstein, Pookie Johnson, Ayelet Rose Gottlieb, Josh Roseman, and David Young. Since 1999 he has played with both the improvising trios Kaktus and Feigner as well as the art rock band Thinking Plague. He currently lives in Philadelphia and performs, composes, assembles, and records music that reflects his continually growing array of interests, musical and otherwise.
Michael Szekely studied jazz at the Hartt School of Music, led by saxophonist Jackie McLean. He has also studied percussion with drum master Milford Graves. Since 1993, Michael has co-led various projects with saxophonist Allen Livermore, resulting in two recordings: Feet Music’s Assertions & sketches (Chroma Independent Media, 1995) and the ALMS Trio’s Advocates (Eighth Nerve Records, 2005). Michael also plays with the improvisational quartet Double-clutch and the Courtney Parker Quartet and has worked with Anthony Braxton, Toshi Makihara, Ed Mann, Stephen Haynes, and Taylor Ho Bynum.
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