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Invented Instruments Series:

Over the 2005/2006 fall-to-spring series, I'll be hosting an informal series of concerts
focusing on inventors of unusual musical instruments.  The shows are being held irregularly 
at the Luggage Store Gallery in San Francisco, 21 Grand Gallery in Oakland,  and possibly other venues.

The Next Shows:

 

Bay Inventors #3

Thursday, Dec 1 2005, 8:00 PM
Luggage Store Gallery
1007 Market St. @ 6th Street
San Francisco
$6-10 sliding scale

Bob Marsh presents the Silver Park, and instrument based on an architectural model.

Eric Glick Rieman presents his deconstructed, mutated Prepared Rhodes Piano 

Bob Marsh:
"Silver Park is a kind of stage upon which I act out various sonic events and ideas. Silver Park began as a model of a proposal I was making for a park in downtown Detroit several years ago. A few years a ago, inspired by a couple guys playing an amplified cactus at High Zero Festival in Baltimore, I decided to try adding a couple piezzo transducers to it to see what I might hear. After a recent visit by Johannes Bergmark of Sweden I decided to re-double my efforts with Silver Park.

"In this performance I hope to combine the desolate desperation of Detroit as portrayed on Silver Park with the rather frenetic desperation of the Market and Sixth area of San Francisco which will come through the open windows of the Luggage Store Gallery. This combination will then become the ground for my own desperate improvising."

Eric Glick Rieman:
"I modified a Rhodes electric piano by installing two extended sound boards which house vertical tuned zinc rods. These can be played by bowing or striking. I also prepare the inside of the Rhodes, which is left exposed so I can play the tines and resonaters. I play the insides with my hands, with files, with mallets, with rocks and chains, and occasionally with the keyboard."

 
Bob Marsh's Silver Park

  
Erick Glick Rieman's  Prepared Rhodes Piano   
(Photo by Donald Swearingen)

 

Other future editions to be announced.

 

Past Editions:

Bay Inventors #1

Thursday, Sept. 1st 2005 at the Luggage Store

 In a trio, David Slusser played the Sluss-o-Matic, Len Paterson played the Lenotone (both synthesizer devices created by Timothy McGovern using an old video game audio chip) with Tom Nunn on his own unique sound sculptures.

Then Larnie Fox presented his Hand-Crank Instruments in a 6-piece ensemble.

I forgot to bring my camera, but here are some other pictures of the instruments:


Tom Nunn's "Bug"


2 of Larnie Fox's Cranks

If anyone has Slussomatic or Lenotone photos, please send them to me.

 

Bay Inventors#2:
Tuesday, Nov 8 2005, 8:00 PM
21 Grand Gallery
416 25th St @Broadway (behind God's Gym)
Oakland
$6-10 sliding scale

Kitundu presents his original turntable inventions with visual environments by Rick Rivera.

Krystyna Bobrowski presents her Gliss Glass and Harmonic Slide instruments instruments with a small ensemble including Guillermo Gallindo.

Since it's Election Day, free treats will be provided to people who voted. (Bring your "I voted" sticker!)

Bios: Kitundu is a sound/visual artist, graphic designer, composer and instrument builder. He uses an interdisciplinary approach to develop compositions-installations-instruments that blur the boundaries between media. He has constructed elemental turntables that rely on wood, water, fire and earthquakes for their power and pitch. Kitundu is the creator of a family of Phonoharps, beautifully crafted multi-stringed instruments made from record players. He strives to reconnect the technology of new music to fundamental principles drawn from the natural world.
Kitundu has an ongoing residency at the Exploratorium Museum of science, art and perception in San Francisco. He has recently been in residence at Eagle Rock School in Colorado, the Science Museum of Minnesota, and the Singapore Science Centre. Kitundu is also developing a Geologic Sound Casting project for volcanically active regions and was granted a five week artist residency at Skriduklaustur in Eastern Iceland in September 2004. He was raised in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.

Krystyna Bobrowski is a sound artist, composer and musician living in Oakland, California. In addition to french horn she plays acoustic and electronic instruments of her own design. Her collection of original instruments includes prepared amplified rocking chairs, bull kelp horns, leaf speakers, gliss glass and harmonic slide. Over the last few years she has worked on sound exhibits for the Exploratorium in San Francisco. Currently she teaches electroacoustic music at the College of San Mateo.
Gliss Glass is a series of custom glass vessels interconnected by a simple hydraulic system of tubes and valves. Gliss Glass’ sound and design are a variation on the sound and form of a common wineglass. Valve position and vessel height control the water flow. While playing, musicians manipulate the valves and heights. As water drains or fills a vessel, the frequency of the glass slowly rises or falls.  One hears rising and falling glissandos moving at different rates.  Harmonic Slide consists of a loudspeaker tied to a string inside a 5 foot tube mounted in a modified cymbal stand. The loudspeaker acts as a moveable stop for the tube, in effect changing the tube’s length and resonance. As the musician slides the speaker up and down the tube, she/he slides through the harmonics of the audio material being played.


 
Kitundu with his Phono-Koto


Krystyna Bobrowski with Gliss-Glass