jonathan segel

Rent Romus and Emergency String (X)tet, Meridian Gallery

Last month, I attended the CD release of Emergency Rental at the Meridian Gallery. Emergency Rental is a collaboration between the Emergency String (X)tet and Rent Romus “exploring sound in and outside the elements of free improvisation between saxophone and strings.”

The personnel for the Emergency String (X)tet changes (hence the “x”), but does have a stable core of regulars. Founder Bob Marsh was joined by Doug Carroll on cello, with Adria Otte, Angela Hsu and Jonathan Segel on violins, Kanoko Nishi on bass koto, and Tony Dryer on contrabass.

Overall, the music moved back and forth seamlessly between free improvisation with extended techniques and passages that borrowed from more idiomatic jazz ideas. Early on, there was a bit of a shuffle beat and jazz-like saxophone lines set against more anxious tones from the strings, a mixture of both long tones and pizzicato. There were times when the saxophone and strings seemed to match one another in both tone and musical structure, such as a section that featured glissandi and scraping tones. The next section featured long bass notes and more scratching melodies set against a very lyrical saxophone line. This gave way to loud growling saxophone against a rich pad of strings.

One piece focused on extended techniques, including prepared strings with chopsticks and other items placed between the strings and bodies of the instruments – something I have often seen the Emergency String (X)tet do. Doug Carroll also reoriented his cello upside-down and sideways at various times. Romus played his saxophone without a mouthpiece, blowing directly into the body the way one might on a brass instrument. He also used a sound that I dubbed the “angry breath noises.”

The second half started off very percussive, and even though the ensemble was entirely acoustic, this section reminded me of the analog electronics in early electronic music like Stockhausen’s Kontakte. This segued into a more idiomatic duo of saxophone and walking bass was set against atonal glissandi from the other strings. There were other interesting sections, such as a syncopated rhythm that came together and broke apart, and a section of pure percussion by all the instruments that reminded me of tapping and bouncing balls.
Emergency Rental, which marks Romus’ 25th album release, is available from Edgetone Records.

Emergency (X)tet, Meridian Gallery (and The Candy Store)

Last Saturday I attended a performance of the Emergency (X)tet at the Meridian Gallery. Unlike a normal string quartet or quintet, the number of performers in the (X)tet is variable. And on this particular evening X was equal to 7, with Adria Otte, Angela Hsu, and Jonathan Segel on violin, Bob Marsh and Doug Carroll on cello, Kanoko Nishi on bass koto, and Tony Dryer on contrabass.

All Emergency (X)tet performances involve free improvisation. But like all good free improvisation, a structure emerges within each piece. Some sections focused on short tone bursts, others on long harmonics, and others on extended techniques such as striking the body of the instrument. I particularly noticed the use of “prepared violin”, in which objects were inserted between the strings of the violin to change the timbre and performance characteristics (similar to a prepared piano). At various points the violins as well as the contrabass were all performing with various rods inserted in between the strings.

In the second half of the performance, the string (X)tet was joined by Kinji Hayashi performing butoh dance. Butoh dance emerged in post-World War II Japan. Most performances of butoh that I have seen involve very slow and deliberate motion, usually in white make-up and has an overall dark or absurdist theme. As with the purely instrumental pieces, the dance movements were improvised in response to the music, but it had an overall structure. Hayashi first emerged from the hall covered in newspaper, forming a sort of a sort of “newspaper monster” or large mass moving slowly. Every so often, one could glimpse his hands or face underneath.


[Click to enlarge image.]

The slow movements were punctuated by dramatic or even comical fast motions (at one point, an audience member’s purse was pulled underneath the newspaper). As the piece unfolded, more and more of the newspaper was cast away to reveal the dancer in full traditional costume, with dramatic movements along the full length of Meridian’s performance space. As with many improvised pieces, the ending came at an unexpected moment.

On display at the Meridian Gallery during the performance was the exhibition The Candy Store featuring the work of John deFazio and Leigha Mason. DeFazio’s 100 Xerox collages based on cantos from Dante’s Divine Comedy was on display in the music room, and was probably the closest aligned to my artistic interests, featuring graphic and text images in black and white. Some were abstract, some featured cultural or historical references, others included disturbing imagery. He also designed several large funerary urns with very whimsical designs dedicated to mythical figures as well as popular culture. The title piece for the exhibition was Mason’s life-size candy shop installtion. The resin and sugar objects are bright and translucent, and seem very inviting, until one gets closer and sees the hair and fingernails embedded within. Mason seems to play upon this mixture of invitation and revulsion, which also was apparent in her accompanying drawings that featured children with grotesque faces expressing joy, perhaps that of “kids in a candy store”.

Expanded Strangelet at oakuff

Last night I performed with Expanded Strangelet at the Oakland Underground Film Festival. The Expanded Strangelet was described as “Lucio Menagon’s peripatetic ensemble with Suki O’kane, Michael Zellner, Jonathan Segel, John Hanes, Amar Chaudhary, and Allen Whitman.”

This was a combined “music jam” and “projectionist jam”, with several improvised video and film projections on the screen, a free-form piece that followed the more formal screenings earlier in the evening. The screen was filled with several changing images projected from different angles:

It was particularly interesting in the context of the theatre itself. This was one of those classic cavernous movie theaters with stylized art-deco details, but with very contemporary abstract lighting in deep blues, reds and violets, as can be seen on the right side of the image above.

It was in this context that we set up on the floor of the theater and made music. Basically, the performance was a collection of bleeps and bloops, noises, glitches, loops, crashes and snippets of melody and harmony here and there. Nonetheless, it was all musically done with phrasing and dynamics, loosely “conducted” with ongoing whispered directions from Suki O’kane.

In order to keep things light, I bright a very small setup, consisting of red Korg Kaos Pad, an iPhone now loaded with multiple software synthesizers, a circuit-bend instrument with photovoltaic modulation, along with a small mixer and amplifier.

As expected, it was difficult to pay attention to the screen during the performance, while attempting to manage the instruments and listen to the other performers. Fortunately, I did get to see the first half of the projectionist jam with another group providing the music: POD BLOTZ (Suzy Poling) and lazyboy (Bruce Anderson, Dale Sophiea and Gregory Hagan). The combination of images, sounds and environment combining old and new elements, noises and images, was quite captivating.

I would also be remiss if I didn’t mention the beer from Linden Street Brewery. I particularly liked the stout.