“…the first thing to say is that the in-front-of-me dimension does not exist as such, since immediately below me there opens the void, which then becomes the sea which then becomes the horizon which then becomes the sky…” Calvino
We have an upcoming performance on Saturday, December 2, 7:30pm @ The Montauk Club in Prospect Heights Brooklyn.
**The Montauk Club is private. If you’d like to see the show please contact us and we’ll put you on the guest list.The club has a restaurant and bar, for additional information go here.
Indeterminacy Society /Stanzi Vaubel Artistic Director, presents: it happens like this Lili Maya, Video Installation James Rouvelle, Electronic Music w/ Special Guest on Cello
This pair of works is part of a new (April ’23) music and video project.
Dioicus derives from a Greek term meaning “of two houses”.
Our plan is to compose/record/publish movements of this piece on our sites, and play them live. We’re organizing some performances now.
In a previous M/R project Lili had developed some video techniques she wanted to explore further. In the interim I had become involved in some music/alternative tuning/synthesis work (see previous post) and over the past few weeks it became clear that the music I was making and the imagery Lili wanted to create were aligned.
Musically, the individual pieces are Polytonal – i.e, based on relationships between different scales derived from different fundamental tones that occur simultaneously. My entry point to scale development was Erv Wilson. I’m currently working with a handful of different scales, not all of which occur together in each piece. Maybe I’ll write more about my methods.
The synth patches have varied degrees of generative capability – meaning they can make some decisions on their own based on input (pitch, expressive gestures, etc.). My intention was to develop a responsive system for improvisation. We’re currently expanding the system to incorporate visuals, so that Lili will be able to similarly improvise with her visual language via a responsive agent.
My music project, a Lattice of Unplanned Measurements (see previous posts, or click here) took an unplanned (…) twist a few months ago when I was invited to play some of the music live at a party. While I played on all the recordings, I hadn’t conceived of the aLUM as performative; preparing the pieces to play live was not something I thought was feasible and didn’t fit with the intention of the project.
However, I was very interested in playing live.
So I worked out some new material, practiced, and played for a small group in early January.
It felt good. Playing for, and connecting with a live audience was very rewarding.
The music I played was much different than anything I’d posted before. In fact I’d developed some new scales, programmed a new synthesizer, created some adaptive backing tracks, etc. While I was pleased with everything, the works seemed like points on a curve leading elsewhere, and I don’t think I’ll post any of it.
At around the same time I was offered work doing R&D for a development group working with music, and tech. While I can’t go into details, it was acceptable to them, in fact preferable, if the ideas they were exploring were presented in the form of original music – meaning I was getting paid to compose and play – albeit within parameters specific to my client’s needs.
It was a great opportunity as it got me into a weekly compose/play groove and slowly my facility with the instruments I use improved to the point that playing my own work live seemed not only possible but preferable.
I’d received a few emails over the past year wondering if Lili and I were planning to do some shows incorporating her visuals and my music. I was timid about this as I’d been out of serious music making for quite a long time. I responded at the time with “that would be great, we’ll let you know”.
I’ve recently followed up on these and we’re planning some events beginning in June.
With all of that in mind, below are a few examples of the music I’m now making.
If you’ve listened to the early works you’ll notice the newer music is a different. I’m now using two scales simultaneously, one tuned to 432Hz and one to 440Hz, one a Hexany, and one a Dekany. I’m also using some generative synthesis techniques that are evident in the 2nd and 4th tracks below. The synths I’m using are playable, of course, so they’re responding to what I’m playing and have some ability to make decisions on their own.
I’m envisioning the music below as elements of one piece, that I’m tentatively naming Until the dream is knowledge and knowledge is a dream. Those words come from Delmore Schwartz’ At a Solemn Musick (linked below). I’ve sketched out a few additional movements and I’ll post them later.
I’m posting the piece in progress to give a few interested listeners a chance to hear what I’m working on to aid them in making some plans.
Lili will be working on the visuals this month, and we’ll post something when it is available.
As the other works in this series (Soundcloud for audio , for additional videos click on the video of this movement above ), the music is derived from a 10 note scale (a “Dekany”) inspired by the work of Erv Wilson.
Charles Jones (1910-1997), was a composer and violinist. He taught me composition/counterpoint/harmony/orchestration. He was a wonderful teacher, and, to me, a medievalist.
He set William Langland’s Piers Plowman to music. Piers Plowman is a late 14th-century allegorical poem in a sequence of 22 dream-visions that Langland termed ‘passus’ [‘step’ in Latin]. In these visions, the narrator, Will, meets a series of allegorical characters.
Charles had a small study in his home in Manhattan (he lived there with his family in an actual house with a white picket fence in front) that we would often visit after lessons. He had a wonderful library and collection of art and artifacts that he loved to draw connections between.
He had many students over the years and it seems a lot of us felt that Charles had an uncanny ability to maintain a deep memory of our individual works, influences and thoughts – making us each feel our own efforts were dream-visions somehow simultaneously for us as individuals yet authentically conjoined with his.
This music and imagery reminds me of time with Charles.
Music composition and performance: James Rouvelle
Video: Maya+Rouvelle
As the other works in this series (Soundcloud, for videos click on the video of this movement above ), the music is derived from a 10 note scale (a “Dekany”) inspired by the work of Erv Wilson.
Music composition and performance, Image software: James Rouvelle
Video: Lili Maya
We think of the imagery as dynamic Asterisms(a group of stars that form an observable pattern other than the official 88 constellations). Asterisms may be part of an official constellation. An interesting topic, no?
Music composition and performance, initial image/software: James Rouvelle Video: Lili Maya
James wrote some software that generates static images from keyboard interaction that he thought worked with the music. Lili worked with the software to generate images that she used/edited as she composed the video.
This music is derived from a 10 note scale inspired by the work of Ervin Wilson.
