Performance at Harvestworks with Rachel Mason and The Use

Today we look at the second of my two performances in New York this past November. This one took place at Harvestworks, a non-profit organization in lower Manhattan that supports musicians and helps them work with technology. It was also a bit of a homecoming for me, as I had interned at Harvestworks in the summer of 1993 – yes, 20 years ago!

The concert was actually part of artist-in-residence Rachel Mason’s ongoing work, and featured a collaborative performance with Michael Durek of The Use that exploited Harvestworks’ surround-sound system. The piece included a mixture of videos, both found online and created specifically by Mason, and live music that featured electronics from Durek and voice by Mason. You can see their full performance in this video.

Rachel Mason and Michael Durek, Harvestworks, November 30, 2013 from CatSynth; on Vimeo.

It opens with a found video of an odd fellow talking about using electro-magnetism to detect ghosts. He explains basic electronics to the video (at one point getting his units wrong), with Durek slowly entering with discrete tones on the theremin. Soon the texture becomes thicker and moves into more beat-based music that I have heard in The Use’s more recent work. Rachel Mason’s vocals were quite expressive and melodic. The videos changed to show Mason in interesting costumes walking around both Brooklyn and Joshua Tree, two particular favorite environments of mine.

Then it was time for me to take the stage. I also used video, a very simple live-processing patch in Jitter that combined generated images with live input. For this piece, I had a set of cat-themed playing cards, which I would draw, show via the video processing, and then interpret for the next section of music, either as a literal specification for a patch on the Dave Smith Evolver, or more abstractly with the analog modular synth and Garrahand drum. You can see the full performance in the following video.

Amar Chaudhary at Harvestworks, November 30, 2013 from CatSynth; on Vimeo.

Overall, it was a great show, and we managed to have a full house, which is always a nice experience as a performer. I certainly hope to be able to work with these artists and with Harvestworks again in the future.

CatSynth pic and video: Zafo the Sub Phatty Cat

From Jonh Wei-Haas and our friends at Moog Music, Inc., we present Zafo, the Sub Phatty Cat.

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By now, we’ve all seen Keyboard Cat. In the original video from 1984, a cat named “Fatso” plays a decade-approriate jam on his electronic keyboard. Nearly 30 years and 30 million views later, we have a successor to the Keyboard Cat throne. Armed with only a Moog synthesizer and plento of gusto, “Zafo” the Sub Phatty Cat treats his audience to 53 seconds of incredibly decade-appropriate jams in the video below.

For more videos by John Wei-Haas, please visit his YouTube page.

CatSynth video: Midnight Juggernauts, Uncanny Valley

Midnight Juggernauts – Systematic (Official Video) from Record Makers on Vimeo.

Submitted by our friend Jack Hertz via our Facebook page.

Taken from “Uncanny Valley”, Midnight Juggernauts’ new album : smarturl.it/UncannyValleyiTunes & “Systematic EP” : bit.ly/1btTvLS
Grab your CD/vinyl copy of the album on our shop : bit.ly/dmslqA
Directed by Mrzyk & Moriceau
Produced by Division
Follow Midnight Juggernauts :
midnightjuggernauts.com
facebook.com/MidnightJuggernauts
twitter.com/Juggernauts

I love the bass+synth disco thing they have going in this track. Oh, and the cats, too 🙂

CatSynth video: Circuit Bent Cyber Cat by freeform delusion

Cyber Cat – rehoused McDonalds toy – it doesn’t say a lot but I just had to circuit bend it!

switched mono 1/4inch jack output
Momentary button to trigger each sound
Pitch Up/Down Control
Warp switch

.fd. online
Facebook – freeform delusion
Twitter – https://twitter.com/freeformd
eBay – Search for – Circuit Bent
My older Circuit Bending channel – http://youtube.com/eecouk

Also on matrixsynth.

Note: if you want to bid on this, you might find yourself going up against me 🙂

CatSynth video: Make Noise MMG Jam with Kitten

From grillobeats on YouTube via matrixsynth.

“Now that I have a kitten, it’s become basically impossible to jam on my modular synthesizer. featuring mfb triple osc, peg, doepfer 132, make noise rene and my new mn MMG”

Lots of familiar modules in this one. The kitten seems particularly interested in the Make Noise Rene. I actually haven’t tried out the MMG yet but now I’m curious.

Report from BPOW!!! Part 2: The Concerts

Today we conclude our reports from the Battery Powered Orchestra Workshop (BPOW!!!) in Portland, focusing on the evening concerts. Like the workshops, which we covered in Part 1, the concerts focused on DIY technologies, as well as analog synthesis.

The Saturday-evening program opened with Stephanie Simek performing on her custom multi-armed turntable.

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The arms on the turntable were outfitted with contact microphones which picked up vibrations from the grooves of hand-cut records. Each arm fed a separate audio channel, creating a multi-track, spatialized performance from a single record. Musically, the repeated sounds of jungles, space, human activity and instrumental sources formed complex rhythms with changing syncopations and graduation motion over time. The effect was quite hypnotic. Even with the enveloping sound system, there was something intimate about the performance, probably related to the visuals and distinct sound of the record player.

Simek was followed by F-DT (Future Death Toll). F-DT is an artist collective and performances feature a rotating lineup, but on this occasion it included Edward Sharp and Nathanael Thayer Moss. F-DT describe themselves as “a throbbing mess of noise that eats technology and shits performance art.” And it was certainly a performance filled with loud noise in a variety of aural ranges – high electrical noises and pounding low-frequency patterns – set against a relentless stream of glitchy visuals and text.

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Although it is hard to tell from this photo, much of their gear was colored orange, which seems to be an important part of the group’s identity. The music and presents is undeniably challenging, but well worth for those who make the effort.

Then it was my turn to take the stage. My setup focused on the analog modular synthesizer, along with another analog synth, iPad, the dotara (Indian string instrument), and Skatch Box. I also used the Synthrotek 4093 NAND synthesizer that I built during one of the workshops earlier in the day.

catsynth_bpow

The 4093 worked flawlessly, as did the modular and the Luna NT analog synth. The acoustic instruments (dotara and skatch box) also worked well. As with any experimental electronic improvisation performance, there were a few technical glitches and a few things I would have done differently in hindsight. But overall, I thought it was a good performance, and it was very well received by the attendees. You can see and hear it in its entirety in the video below:

CatSynth (Amar Chaudhary) at BPOW, August 10, 2013 from CatSynth on Vimeo.

The final act of the first night was Mechlo. His performance combined lo-fi glitch audio and video from an NES console.

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Clearly, there were modifications made to allow the system to be performed in a way that a traditional NES could not. Nonetheless, the graphics and audio were reminiscent of what one would expect from the classic 8-bit games. There were repeated modulating patterns, some of them more melodic, some noisier, with occasional glitches and pauses.


The Sunday evening concert opened with a performance by analog modular virtuoso Jeph Nor with Dan Green on analog video. Green brought an LZX modular video system, while Nor had a large collection of audio modules from different manufacturers.

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Nor built complex patterns of sound that went from sparse and resonant to thicker and more pad-like. There were moments of eerie ambience and others that had a machine-like precision. Overall, he was able to give his improvisation with this instrument a musical and even narrative quality. The visuals focused on patterns of colors, curves and lines that were constantly changing, but occasionally slowing to a standstill before shifting rapidly and switching to a completely separate collection of shapes.

Next was Mike Todd performing custom visuals and sounds. Unlike the sharper edges from Nor and Green earlier, or the noisy intensity from F-DT the day earlier, Todd’s performance was software and more organic. The visuals, based on his own software, were composed of curving liquidy shapes that seemed alive. Similarly, his music had an equally liquid quality, with more open space between fast elements, as if a swarm of moving organisms.

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Todd was followed by JMEJ, who assembled sonic circuits live on stage. One can think of this as “analog live coding”.

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The process was fun to watch. As one might expect, the sounds were a bit on the noisier and unpredictable side, but with a lot of good crunchy lo-fi texture. As the performance continued, the circuits grew more complex and culminated in this tangled product:

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The final performance featured Claus Muzak performing some of his electronic-music compositions.

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This was a more structured performance, divided into songs. His music had a strong rhythmic and harmonic foundation, realized with a diverse collection of synthesizer and drum-machine sounds. It was dark and richly textured, and at times danceable, especially when he employed rhythmic lines with high-Q filters. It was probably the most “traditional” of any of the performances on either night, well crafted electronic music that would be at home in a club setting. But it was a fitting conclusion for evening’s performances and for the festival as a whole.


You can see and hear brief excerpts from all the performances in this video:

BPOW!!! Battery Powered Orchestra Workshop – Aug 10-11, 2013 from Molecule Synth on Vimeo.

Overall, both the concerts and workshops from BPOW were a rewarding experience. It would be great to visit again to participate in future events, and in the meantime I look forward to hearing more from the artists involved. Thanks to Travis Feldman of moleculesynth for organizing BPOW and Myles de Bastion of Cymaspace for hosting.