Weekend Cat Blogging: Return to the Beginning

For our first Weekend Cat Blogging of 2012, we reprise the original photo that launched this site. Here is Luna with the Novation keyboard on the beanbag chair near the turn of the new year.

Luna is all grown up compared to the youngster in the original photo in 2006, but she still has the same fur and eyes.  And she still favors this particular beanbag chair as her own.  Indeed, it’s a favorite napping spot here in the studio area:

I didn’t realize until looking at the original against these photos how similar the windows look, even though the original was in a completely different place.

The studio is a currently a focus of attention here at CatSynth HQ in that I am trying to further make it into a better organized laboratory for musical and visual creativity.  And it also has to continue to double as the office, the place where the computers sit and where I pay the bills.  I expect that Luna will continue to spend lots of time here as well.

Weekend Cat Blogging #344 is hosted by Mog with assists from Meowza and Ritzi at Mind of Mog.

The Carnival of the Cats well be hosted by Kashim, Othello and Salome in Vienna.

And the Friday Ark is at the modulator.

CatSynth pic: ZiLaiHong – DDRM “LiangZhiMao” / ZLH-02

From Meng Qi, via matrixsynth:

Passive dual diode ring modulator with internal connections that can be break by inserting audio plugs.
When only input 1 and 2 are used, output 1 is the ring modulation output, output 2 is the singal of output 1 being modulated again by input 2 (de-modulation output).
When input 1, 2, 4 are used, output 1 is the ring modulation output, output 2 is the singal of output 1 being modulated by input 4.
When all 4 inputs are used, it can be 2 totally indepented ring modulators.
Very versatile!”

Apparently, the cats love it.

Fun with Highways: Iowa

Our four-year civic ritual begins in its official manner today, and we at CatSynth are once again following the presidential primary schedule with our “Fun with Highways” series. Today, all eyes (or at least a great many of them) are focused on Iowa. A lot will be said about Iowa, it’s cultural and geographical stereotypes. But I would like to rethink the image of the state through my own interests, and thus begin with this image of Des Moines, the capital and largest city.

From what I can tell by looking at maps of the city, this was taken looking north from a railway bridge. Des Moines is a small city but seemingly well laid out, taking advantage of its river to visual effect. It does have a somewhat dense and vertical downtown core, and a rather interesting feature, the Des Moines Skywalk.


[By Dsmspence (Own work) [CC-BY-SA-3.0], via Wikimedia Commons]

The skywalk is a highway of sorts for pedestrians, allowing easy movement around the downtown area through elevated glass-enclosed walkways. As someone who dislikes cold, I’m sure I would appreciate it in January. The skywalk does seem like it would have had a bit of a futuristic quality to it when it was built, though not the dystopian beauty of New York’s High Line. But perhaps I speak to soon. Check out these images of a desolate Des Moines on the blog lonelystreets.com, for some beautiful images of an eerie empty city from the skywalk and elsewhere.

[By Des Moines Guy (Own work) [CC-BY-SA-3.0 or GFDL], via Wikimedia Commons]

Before leaving the city, we should also acknowledge the Des Moines Art Center, an architecturally interesting complex with pieces designed by Eliel Saarinen, I.M. Pei and Richard Meier, with three differet styles of 20th Century Architecture, but all seemingly designed to take advantage of the horizontal expanse, open space and light that have long made the Midwest an inspiring setting for architects.

Just north of both the art center and the downtown core is I-235, the main highway running through the city. We will head east to where I-235 ends at a junction with I-80 and I-35, and then continue east on I-80. I have personally seen the expanses of farmland along this nearly straight stretch of highway, with the occasional road passing overhead on via artificial mounds and the connected with a diamond interchange. We cross US 6, which once stretched across the entire country but now ends in the eastern Sierra in California. We pass by Iowa City and give a shout-out to the infamous Iowa Writer’s Workshop. The program has turned out numerous winners of the Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award, among other honors. My own experience with the world of writing is a bit limited, but it seems very different than the world of music.

As we approach the eastern edge of the state, we come to Davenport, which among other things is home to the Figge Museum.


[By Ctjf83 (Own work) [CC-BY-SA-3.0 or GFDL], via Wikimedia Commons]

The museum it itself an interesting building, and has a varied collection. But perhaps most interesting is the collection from the University of Iowa that is being temporarily housed there (after the University’s building was flooded in 2008) and displayed in the exhibition A Legacy for Iowa: Pollock’s Mural and Modern Masterworks from the University of Iowa Museum of Art.

Although it seems natural to explore the state along and east-west axis, one can also travel south to north. Indeed, Iowa has what could be dubbed a “concept highway” running north-south called the Avenue of the Saints because it connects St Louis, Missouri, to St Paul, Minneapolis. It was only designated as a single route, Iowa State Highway 27, in 2001, and mostly overlaps with other longer established routes. In particular, it overlaps with I-380 from near Iowa City northward, passing through Cedar Rapids, the second largest city in the state.


[By en:User:Interiority (Own work) CC-BY-SA-3.0 or GFDL, via Wikimedia Commons]

Downtown Cedar Rapids was submerged in the massive 2008 floods (the same floods that damaged the University of Iowa Art Building and forced the collection to move to the Frigge). Many of its cultural institutions were damaged along with countless homes and businesses. One story of particular interest the Paramount Theater. The theater was severely damaged in the flood and the console of its historic Wurlitzer organ was destroyed. It seems so many stories with theaters named Paramount or Paradise or anything else that evokes the golden age of movie palaces have tragic overtones, but some do come back. From information provided by the city, the plans are for the Paramount to reopen later this year as a cultural center. The concept renderings of the lobby look to include the best modernist elements of Art Deco.

If anyone reading this knows more about what is happening in Cedar Rapids or any of the other cities profiled in this article, please do comment.

RIP Richard Lainhart

I received some sad and sudden news this past Saturday that Richard Lainhart had passed away on December 30. It was only the day before that I had posted about our show in November at TheaterLab, in which I had played in the his project, the “Orchestra of the Future” that improvised a score to his film “The History of the Future.” I don’t know whether this was his last performance, but I am honored to have had the chance to share it with him. My condolences go out to his family.

Richard Lainhart had a long history in electronic music as well as more traditional jazz and rock idioms. He was deeply involved in the resurgence of analog synthesizers in contemporary electronic music, and I had seen him bridge old and new technologies with a Buchla synthesizer, Haken Continuum keyboard and laptop. His music had a richly textured minimal feel to it, but with a lot of timbral detail that comes from practice with electronic musical instruments. (Listen to (soundcloud tracks for examples.) He also was involved in animation and filmmaking, combining his electronic music and animated films at major festivals.

Below, are two videos. First, his duo with Lucio Menegon at the TheaterLab performance, and in 2010 at the Omega Sound Fix.

PAS presents Experi-MENTAL Night with a duo by Richard Lainhart and Lucio Menegon at Theaterlab from PAS Music on Vimeo.

Richard Lainhart live at Alfa Art Gallery (Part 1) for the Omega Sound Fix Festival from PAS Music on Vimeo.

We had first met in person at the Omega Sound Fix. He was friendly and open, and has been supportive of my music and of this site. He will be missed. His Facebook page continues to receive messages from friends and admirers. And matrixsynth has a full article in remembrance of him and electronic musician Mel Morley (midimel) who also passed away recently. Of Lainhart, he says “Rest in peace, Richard, you were one cool cat.” I think that statement would apply here, too.

Farewell to 2011

As has become a tradition here at CatSynth, we present our end-of-year image.


[Click to enlarge.]

It was a bit of a challenge to decide what to put in, as there were so many this time. But I think these are particularly representative. And it’s also significant that it is more colorful than previous end-of-year images.

The first few days of this year were quiet and a bit dark. That changed quickly, with tumultuous events around the world, and new experiences close to home. It’s the year I finally had a photography show, and by the end of the year I had several. There were new surprising types of performances and the costumes to go with them. I deepened my connections back in New York with friends, music, art and the landscape. And I no idea what I would have the chance to participate in something like the Occupy movement . There were many sad moments as well, with the loss of friends.

In all, 2011 has been particularly rich and productive, if sometimes a bit chaotic. If one had told me at the end of 2007 or 2008 (or 2001 for that matter) that this is what life would be like now, I would have been pleasantly surprised. There is a sense, however, that the patterns of this past year are not sustainable. This will have to be part of the plan for 2012, in particular getting organized, staying healthy and trying to make good choices. We will see how that unfolds as the new year progresses…

Happy New Year and thank you for all the support and warmth from those who read these pages!

Space Music Night at the Luggage Store Gallery, San Francisco

Earlier this month, I participated in a show at the Luggage Store Gallery in San Francisco called Space Music Night that turned out to be quite memorable. So what exactly is “space music”? It is not straightforward to come up with a definitive answer, except that it should reflect some sense of “outer space” as one might imagine it. Or, perhaps more accurately, as people might have imagined it in the 1960s and 1970s. The music that we performed that evoke “space rock” that one might associate with early Pink Floyd or Gong, but also more freeform ambient soundscapes. The latter comes closer to ambient music one might hear on NPR’s “Hearts of Space” program but without crossing over that dangerous line into New Age. The music was certainly contemplative at times, but retained an edge to it and often veered back to rock and jam idioms, and moved back and forth between defined harmonies and more abstract timbres. The “space” effect was also heightened by having a dark room with abstract video projections by Tim Thompson.

The show was divided into two sets with four musicians each. Although many of us were familiar to one another, this was the first each each set of four played together as a group. The first set featured Matt Davignon on drum machines and effects, Kristen Miltner on electronics, Karl Evangelista on guitar, and Andrew Joron on theremin. Musically, this set had a very thick electronic texture with a soft beat from the drum machines that came in and out of presence. The electronics and heavily processed guitar provided anxious harmonies, and the theremin seemed to be narrating a space story with warbles and slides that approached the rhythm of human speech. At moments, the rhythm dropped out altogether, while at others it came closer to an extended jam. You can hear a bit of the set in the following video:

In the second set, I performed with iPad and the Dave Smith Evolver, along with David Leikam, Sheila Bosco on drums, and Steve Abbate on guitar. Perhaps it was the instrumentation of the set, or the musical leanings of the performers (including myself) towards strong rhythm, but we very quickly gelled into a steady rock jam rhythm that extended for most of the length of the set except for avery deliberate breaks. I mostly used Sunrizer on the iPad to provide ethereal harmonies to set again Leikam’s Moog Rogue and his “electric bass cello” and provide structure for melodic improvisation. This was definitely approaching the “space rock” idiom that inspired the evening.

I was quite happy with how well we able to play together despite having not played together before, and indeed a few people afterwards expressed some surprise that we hadn’t. But perhaps we will get a chance to play again.