Sunday, April 22, 2018

Recording: Circuits Bending Frames Ensembles

Artists: Circuits Bending Frames Ensembles (Christine Duncan/Paul Dutton/Laura Swankey + Jonathan Adjemian/Ryan Driver/Tiina Kiik/Laura Swankey + Christine Duncan/John Oswald/SlowPitchSound + Paul Dutton/Tiina Kiik/Wes Neal + Ryan Driver/Jonathan Adjemian/Mani Mazinani/Tiina Kiik/John Oswald)

Songs: [various improvisations]

Recorded at The Tranzac's Main Hall (Somewhere There Creative Music Festival – Show 3: Circuits Bending Frames), February 24, 2018.

Christine Duncan/Paul Dutton/Laura Swankey - [improvisation]

Jonathan Adjemian/Ryan Driver/Tiina Kiik/Laura Swankey - [improvisation]

Christine Duncan/John Oswald/SlowPitchSound - [improvisation]

Paul Dutton/Tiina Kiik/Wes Neal - [improvisation]

Ryan Driver/Jonathan Adjemian/Mani Mazinani/Tiina Kiik/John Oswald - [improvisation]

The Somewhere There Festival's Saturday night show was an ambitious multimedia undertaking, with live performances responding to the films of Laurie Kwasnik. Kwasnik is a familiar face at improvised music shows, especially anything in the orbit of Michael Snow (she's been collecting footage for her documentary Fields of Snow for many years now). It was a treat to get a glimpse into her archives, especially to see some of her artfully-arranged works responding to the music with their own visual improvisations. In between filmed snippets (and some visual mashups mixing together music from a wide range of performances) a group of improvisers recombined into a series of small ensembles for miniature performances.

The second half turned to cymatic visualisations, driven by a trio of synth players (Jonathan Adjemian, Ryan Driver, and Mani Mazinani), whose oscillations set pans of water and salt wiggling — which was then live-mixed on the big screen. There were a few technical difficulties along the way, but it was on the whole a pleasing and unique evening.

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