Basement Instrument Repairs

Yamaha CS-50

As so many of us do, I have some vintage instruments hanging out in my basement.  I played with these as a child, but actually understand how to use them now, so I was definitely interested in bringing them back up to spec.  The first of the three is circa 1977 Yamaha CS-50 Analog Synthesizer.  All I could do with this as a child was make garbage noise, but I had a feeling I would know what to do with it now that I understood what all those little markings like VCO, VCF, and LFO mean.  I was very excited to get this awesome vintage synth up & running again.

The second instrument is also very exciting.  It is a Hohner D6 Clavinet... like the kind Stevie Wonder uses.  This really cool instrument has a keyboard that frets a note on one string for each of the 60 keys.  After a quick soldering of the battery connector, and a fresh 9v, I had this thing making funky noise immediately!  But there was definitely still something wrong, a few of the settings weren't working and not every key worked.  Fortunately I found a very good resource to fix these things.  More on that later.

Hohner D6 Clavinet

Finally, and I think this one has the least hope, there is a Chinese Hammer Dulcimer or Yangqin rotting away in a case that is falling apart.  The finish is cracking and all of the bridges are starting to separate from years of mis-tensioned strings.  The hammers are missing and one of the bridges has entirely detached from the body of the instrument.

CCRMA Tour

20110615

Foyer Exhibit/Study Area

While I was in California, I happened to be very close to the Stanford Campus.  Stanford has a program within their music department that I have been interested in for quite a while.  So I set up a tour of the building and the program, CCRMA (Center for Computer Research in Music and Acoustics), pronounced "karma".  The building was relatively empty, as this was the first day on campus after the spring graduation.

The center is located in the old governors mansion at one of the highest points on campus and has a fantastic view of the  buildings below.  Right as you enter the building, you know that you are in the right place.  There are various keyboards, speakers, and other things I would bet are instruments, but not like any I've ever seen.  There is also a reel to reel, next to a pyramid shaped speaker array, and a giant machine that appears to be one of the earliest GUI based DAWs.

Carnivals and Snowstorms

Better late than never...
20110429-30

I've had a hard time coming up a way to summarize the experience of working on this show.  That's not a bad or a good thing.  For over a year, I worked with Daniella Vinitski (a CU PhD. Theatre candidate) helping her to execute the technical aspects of her production Carnivals and Snowstorms.  I thoroughly enjoyed working with her and the team, and we executed a complex show with relatively small amount of rehearsal time within the Black Box Space.

The production played through four different scenes (I. Brilliant Silence, II. Carnival Barkers, III. Apotheosis, IV. Memory) carrying an avant-garde pacing, with multi-disciplinary collaboration throughout.  There were dancers, actors, music and a violinist with live audio processing, alongside a complicated curtain-rigged system juxtaposing a relatively simple set.  All in all, there were a few mixed reactions, but it was very well received.  I really enjoyed the outcome of the final show despite some last minute delays in production, and am proud to put my name alongside these fantastic artists.  In fact, it was one of the most pleasurable shows I've had to work on, as our run and production crew was extremely professional and creative (with a few exceptions, as always).  Videos below and more pictures here!

Shpongletron

201104
The Boulder Theater







So I'm pretty much over this acid-techno type of music, but I am still interested in seeing what these artists are doing visually as well as with their music.  Simon Posford is a world-famous DJ from the UK and tours under many monikers, such as Shpongle and Hallucinogen.

Shpongletron

DAM TYPO! :: Tara Rynders & Maximilan Shiffman

20110325

"In 'Typo', Tara and Max use text to generate movement, imagery and sound. 'Typo' brings together several disciplines in a dynamic environment.  Text drives the performance, controlling video, sound art, and coreography.  While 'Typo' is a technological performance rooted in its time, Tara and Max push the limits of text using it to communicate on numerous levels."

 

Golan's inadvertent contribution

Tara and Max were given the opportunity to perform alongside the Blink! exhibit this past Friday.  This is such an honor to be invited to help out and document, and I was very proud of Max and Tara's performances.  Max performed music and text that was both planned a improvised based on text messages from the audience.
Tara was able to interact with both a Jitter patch (framesub), and an installation by Golan Levin.  This interactive projection creates noise and colored shapes as you cast shadows on the screen.  The shapes are created by closed spaces, like if you made a circle with your thumb and forefinger, for example.  This is a very fun part of Blink! and was a cool addition to the  performance.

Ok, so there's a really awesome video at the end here, but you're only allowed to watch it if you read the whole article :)

A Digital Media Explosion

Well, the end of February and beginning of March certainly kept me away from my creativity time.  Fortunately, now that my employers are all on Spring Break, I've had the chance to work on some music, video, patching, and all kinds of art.

A sample from one of my Glossom collections...
I suggest you try it for at least give it 1 second,
it is interactive and is a unique concept.

My main goal has been to continue to increase my net presence... to I've added quite a few social networking sites to the mix.  Twitter (@iEEEj), Scribd (a site to publish papers), and my personal favorite, Glossom.  This site lets you create a collage of your work (video or picture or text w/ links) in a grid you must conform to.  It is a very interesting concept, and I suggest checking it out if you have any things you want to share on the microwebs.

Additionally, I've been making lots of digital art, both music and video.  I even overloaded my Vimeo upload limit, so I have to wait a week to post "Digital Paint : in 2 movements" (the second video).  So here are a some of the videos that I made over the past few days... I'll give some details after each one.

Fact of Life

This is a sound responsive physical and digital melding. The video is of TriLEDs (LEDs that can output any combination of red, blue, and green). They are controlled by filters that respond to the music being played. There's a little editing at the end, but it was just to keep the piece short.

... Yes there's more; I figure if you're interested I might as well just keep it all on the same page...

Tim Eriksen and the Batteries Die Media Ensemble

The Batteries Die Media Ensemble

20110305

Over the weekend, Michael Theodore held a reincarnation of the What I Saw at the Apocalypse show from February of 2009. He brought Tim Eriksen, a "shape note" or throat singer, back for the very special reunion. The Apocalypse show was one of my first shows to work on at ATLAS, and this reunion was, by far, one of the most complex audio patches I've built in the space. We routed about 30 channels to the FOH mixer and about 24 channels into the ProToolsHD system. Additionally, we documented the concert with a live-mixed three camera shoot.

Here is an edited video from my Zoom Q3-HD:

More info and pictures after the break...

Feburary bLOrk-taculair

20110225/6

Last weeks bLOrk concert was an amazing collaboration of musicians, dancers, and digital artists. Here is a full video from the uStream copy of the Saturday concert if it is still being hosted (It starts around the 20:00 mark), try this link.  Keep reading, I also have a high quality, edited version of the Friday night show, and a few pictures.

I was fortunate enough to perform alongside new and returning members of bLOrk, and even performed my piece about tuning and calibrating the laptop orchestra, 'Tuning Up'. This time, I included a malfunctioning computer which is designed to give me troubles throughout the piece. We were also excited to have Trace Reddell and a couple of his students from the Digital Media Studies program at DU showcase Jitter patches they have developed.

New levels of interaction

Feburary Pendulum

20110223

Wow, what a week.  Pendulum followed by blOrk only two days later.  The Pendulum New Music Series showcases new works from composers at CU, and this month's performance had a very eclectic bill. This installation of Pendulum included these world premiers:
Kari Kraakevik  - Canyons Leading Home: Los Angeles to Lost Angel (2010)
Keane Southard - Two Symmetries for Disklavier (2010)
Cole Ingraham - Chaos Geometry (2010)
Leanna Kirchoff - The House Explodes
Hunter Ewen - Invasion of the Monkey Mind (2010)

Also featuring "Open Score," an audience-participation piece with Paul Miller and Jeff Nytch.

Poster

Upcoming Events!!

There's lots of cool things happening in the Black Box in the next few weeks or so... be sure to get your free tickets, a lot of these will reserve fast.  However, if they do get a full list, still put your name on the waiting list.  Most of time, people on the waiting list still get in.  Do this especially for the blOrk show, because I'm performing a piece I wrote!

Mohr-Fire Studios... meet The Ira Liss Show

20110129

The Ira Liss Show

One of my favorite things to do is visit different recording studios and drool (not literally) over all of the channels, preamps, and routing options each studio puts together.  So when I found out my friend Ira Liss would be doing a live studio session, I was very excited to come hear the music and check out the space.  Located in Lafayette, CO, Mohr-Fire Studios was the perfect environment for this intimate concert with Ira, whose style is comedic and witty.

The Ira Liss Show is a combination of Ira's music and poetry slammed into a quirky piano-bar style that is both humorous and witty.  His songs are introspective and are centered around lyrics such as "If it weren't for Adam and Eve" or "...I'd rather be pissed".  His timing and writing are brilliantly intertwined, providing an entertaining show for everyone (mostly adult audiences however).  Ira seems to like to sing about sex a lot, including sex with dinosaurs...  just to give you a glimpse into his sense of humor.  His songs are designed to speak to all of humanity, touching on the topics of God and human existence.  At the same time, his lyrics are filled with puns and word play.  This unique combination creates an exciting, new type of musical entertainment that is rare to find in this day and age.

The Arc... and The Future of Music Controllers

monome.org - The Arc

 

 

So, one of the things that I like (but also one of the things that scares me) about technology is how quickly the hardware and software we use changes.  There are many approaches to address this problem, and one is to read as much as possible about what is on the cutting edge.  Recently, on createdigitalmotion.com they featured a new digital music controller made by the same folks at monome. 

C3 showcase at DU

LED globes

I was unexpectedly invited to a new media showcase at the new Digital Media Studies and Electronic Arts, Media, and Design center at the University of Denver.  These are two degrees the university offers.  Their new center "C3" (Center for Creation and Collaboration) had just recently been finished and this was the inaugural gallery event.  I didn't know exactly what kind of work I'd be seeing, other than the work of students and instructors of the various programs.  I was invited by Synthia Payne who might possibly be teaching a Digital Audio and Telematic Music course next semester (if you're intrested, email her).

One of my very first UX designs from 2007

I found this while reworking some of my portfolio things.  I built it in flash... this is probably one of the first user experience things I ever created.   And boy is it crappy... but the loops are fun!

Loops created using the RC20-XL Loop Pedal during 2007:

Scoring for Film

Instead of adding this back to the Long Neck Big Heart post, I decided to make a new post about scoring for film.  During the performance, there is a stop-motion video that required music.  As the sound-designer for the show, I decided to try my hand at it.  There are many challenges to scoring for film.  You really have to understand what the picture is saying, and putting that to music is difficult.  This short piece is a dream about a man and his relationship with his blue robe.




The Beast of Dreams from EJ Posselius.

I have a degree in what...?

Go ahead... ask me. I can explain it to you, but the best way to understand it is to experience it. But that's the best part! Anyone can experience ethnomusicology, if they have some interest in learning about music and how we as humans interact with it. That is essentially what ethnomusicology is.  Now, who here doesn't like music? Moving on.

I graduated with a Bachelors in Ethnomusicology with certificates in Music and “Technology, Arts and Media” from the University of Colorado Boulder. While it took five years, I learned a lot during my progression from engineer to musician to technologist. At each step I learned a little more about how they are all related. What’s next?

I’m currently thinking about some graduate schools, as well as just jumping into the workforce. Either way, I am going to take a little time to clear my head from school and work on projects I’ve had to put off for so long now. Projects that will ultimately show up in this blog...

(Seriously if you want to know more about ethnomusicology, email me)

ATL&S Fall 10 Shows

 These were some of the most technically advanced shows to come through ATL&S in my time.  It was also my last semester here, and my skills were pushed to their limits.  In addition to my usual sound duties, I did a lot of projection work for many of the shows.

There are links to more information about each program.  There are pictures and information in the links.

2010.07.30-31 & 08.05-07

CU New Opera Workshop 

"Sister Carrie", "Rozencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead", "Autumn Orchard" 

Leigh Holman, Andrew Metzroth, Hally Albers, Robert Aldridge, Herschel Garfein, Daniel Kellogg, J. Michael Martinez

  

2010.08.27-29

Dangerously Safe

Gemma Wilcox and Liz Barron, Betsy Tobin, Jessica Bynam, David Ortolano

2010.08.10

reConstruction

Ryan Wurst

2010.09.17-18 & 24-25

Disappear Here

Nathan Montgomery, Kim Olson, Ana Baer Carrillo, Jessica Bynam, David Ortolano

2010.10.03

Stockhausen Festival

Paul Miller, Bryan Wolf

2010.11.18

UNA

Katie Key's MFA Dance Thesis Performance

Kristin Dalleske, Autumn Bjustad, Rebecca Holley, Esmeralda Kundanis-Grow

2010.12.12

Bridging Imaginary Boundaries

real-time collaboration between CU, NYU, IUPUI

John Gunther, Synthia Payne, Cole Ingrahm

Bridging Imaginary Boundaries

Broadcast Station

Back in March, Synthia Payne and John Gunther organized a telematic music event "Memory and the Internet".  This was a collaboration between CU, NYU, and KAIST in Korea over Internet2.  Gunther and Payne returned this Fall for another installation of the event, "Bridging Imaginary Boundaries".  I feel these remote performances are truly on the cutting edge of music technology, so I was very excited to have another such collaboration.  For this version, we changed a few things, and collaborated with IUPUI (Indiana University Purdue at University of Indiana) as opposed to KAIST.

UNA - Katie Key's MFA Thesis Performance

 

"Una is a trip through the shadows of our subconscious.  The audience witnesses the main character, Una, surrender to her demons as she moves through worlds made of materialism, emotion, and spirit.  Each world grows in abstraction as her journey travels deeper into her subconscious.

The overarching narrative is a dreamscape, yet each world shifts into its own style of narration from verbal, to non-linear vignettes, to singularly visual.  This is not just a story about Una; I hope that the audience will see glimpses of themselves."

~Katie Key

Stockhausen 2010

Kreuzspiel

CU Pendulum New Music in conjunction with ATL&S has begun to do an annual contemporary composer series.  Last year was George Crumb, and this year featured Karlheinz Stockhausen.  Paul Miller organized to have Stockhausen's personal engineer, or sound projectionist, Bryan Wolf come from Pforzheim, Germany to run with the event.  Stockhausen was a pioneer of experimental electronic music and has created some amazing compositions for surround sound systems as well as orchestration.