Recording: Jonathan Adjemian

Artist: Jonathan Adjemian

Song: Dry Reciprocity [excerpt]

Recorded at The Music Gallery ("Emergents III"), March 19, 2015.

Jonathan Adjemian - Dry Reciprocity [excerpt]

The opening half of this Christopher Willes-curated "Emergents" night once again saw the idea of traditional composition being pushed against with Geoff Mullen's site-specific work hovering over the borderlands between composition and sound art. Footsteps on the creaky floor and distorted, ghostly music one room away gave the audience an opportunity to confront sound in a different way within the sanctuary (although there was no break for snacks this time 'round).

In the night's second half, Jonathan Adjemian brought what might be his most formally rigourous work to date with "Dry Reciprocity", a forty-minute piece arranged for drones and human breath. The latter was provided by narration, singing voice and wind instruments by Bojana Stancic, Isla Craig, Heather Segger and Kyle Brenders. There was definite room for improvisation by the performers, but situated in a framework of dronepulse and narration for them to work within. With the performers gathered to face each other in a small circle in front of the audience, the piece felt like a pulse generator of some half-hidden message, hope being broadcast in the sinewaves' subcarrier frequency.