?Fear, Karaoke, Discipline and Paintball?
A Concert/Performance of original compositions
by Seattle School
ACT I
SUNDAY/MONDAY - for accordionist and UTC shortwave radio station - KORBY SEARS
performed by Korby Sears, Ben Houge and Mike Min
Folding - for one vocalist and three electronic manipulators - MIKE MIN
performed by Mike Min, Ben Houge, Korby Sears and Guy Whitmore
Chains - for a four person chain ensemble - GUY WHITMORE
performed by Ben Houge, Mike Min, Korby Sears and Guy Whitmore
Foiling - for one vocalist and three electronic manipulators - MIKE MIN
performed by Cheryl Serio, Ben Houge, Korby Sears and Guy Whitmore
- intermission -
ACT II
Study for Air Guitar - for one guitarist. - BEN HOUGE
performed by Ben Houge
Empty Orchestra - for four karaoke vocalists and tape - MIKE MIN
performed by Cheryl Serio, Ben Houge, Korby Sears and Mike Min
Relay - for radio and four telephoning vocalists - BEN HOUGE
performed by Cheryl Serio, Ben Houge, Korby Sears, Mike Min and Guy Whitmore
A Reading From John Cage?s ?Silence? - for four vocalists and one text - BEN HOUGE
performed by Ben Houge, Korby Sears, Mike Min and Guy Whitmore
Party Kit - for 14 person party choir and conductor - KORBY SEARS
performed by the Seattle School Party Choir. Korby Sears, conductor.
Music for Clothing - for one clothed performer - MIKE MIN
performed by Mike Min
Competition and Distraction - for three competitive karaoke vocalists, tape, and one paintball gun operator - MIKE MIN
performed by Ben Houge, Korby Sears, Mike Min and Guy Whitmore
ABOUT COORDINATED UNIVERSAL TIME:
Coordinated Universal Time - abbreviated as UTC - is the world's clock. It is defined and maintained by the Bureau International des Poids et Mesures (International Bureau for Weights and Measures, or BIPM) based in the Pavillon de Breteuil in Sèvres, France. The task of the BIPM is to ensure world-wide uniformity of measurements and their traceability to the International System of Units (SI). It does this with the authority of the Convention of the Metre, a diplomatic treaty between fifty-one nations (including the US) going back to 1875.
There are several official "timing laboratories" throughout the world recognized by the BIPM that are linked to maintain this time system. "Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) is the basis for legal time worldwide" says their website. It was agreed upon in 1971 by all the nations within the treaty, and officially began on January 1, 1972.
UTC is broadcast on shortwave radio on the 2500htz, 5khtz, 10khtz, 15khtz and 20khtz bands. The station is broadcast out of Fort Collins, CO and Hawaii by the US Military. Military and commercial ships, machines, satellites, computers, etc all calibrate to this station. More than likely you own and operate an object in your own home that has been calibrated to UTC (a watch, computer, TIVO, cable TV, etc).
The Seattle School Party Choir is:
Carolyn Agacinski (Aquarius)
Frank Barbieri (Pleadies)
Shawn Connaway (Aries)
Jeannette d'Armand (Sagittarius)
Grace Davis (Scorpio)
Lita Gratrix (Leo)
Ben Houge (Scorpio)
Paul Jensen (Sagittarius) *
Mike Min (Pieces)
Cheryl Serio (Aquarius)
Candice Stephens (Aquarius)
Guy Whitmore (Libra)
Marcus Wolland (Scorpio)
Korby Sears, conductor (Taurus)
PROGRAM NOTES
SUNDAY/MONDAY - I?ve always had problems with time. When I was 13, I stumbled across one of the Co-ordinated Universal Time stations on a jam box with shortwave radio bands, and it scared the hell outta me. I?ve since found out it scares a lot of people. I thought I would excercise my fear of the UTC stations with a public performance/confrontation duet, using the best approach possible for war: flirting. - KORBY SEARS
Folding is a memory piece, albeit digitally aided memory. The content of what is sung is irrelevant, although it does add an aesthetic arc. A salient point is the real-time manipulation of perception and blurring of the notion of original source. Since the performers can sample and loop the singer as well as the entire mix, the sonic manipulations beg the question: what is purity? What you thought you just heard was not actually what you just heard. It was actually an approximation of a memory. Also, although I generally avoid improvisation and would rather explore insular impulsions of flawed recall and regurgitation, the singer must output signal based a large part on what is being heard at the time, which once again taints the origin. - MIKE MIN
Music of Chains began with a fit-of-rage recording session, after a late night Home Depot run to buy random chains, spikes, and all things metallic and clanky. After banging, scraping, dropping, and recording percussive rhythms, I also captured feedback loops, and often singing along with the harmonics created. The chain instruments came out of a desire to perform the music in live situations such as this. The obvious metaphor of chains as 'that which enslaves us' is present, yet I wanted to create a sense of tribal dance and ceremony. There is a tension between 'fighting against' vs. 'dancing with' those metaphoric chains. The acknowledgement and recognition of being bound is the first step towards freedom, and turning the literal sound of chains into 'music' creates a ceremony of acceptance. - GUY WHITMORE
Foiling, like other game pieces, pits the performers in a battle royale. Each performer has the capacity to manipulate the whole mix, meaning they can work together to produce a unified sound or they can sabotage what the others are trying to do. Either way, none of the performers have any chance of achieving a singular individual vision. Which cracks me up. The sound source employs a human voice as a transducer for aleatoric radio. Derivatives (rates, i.e. how fast a person scrolls through radio stations) have interested me lately. As far as I know, little has been explored in the notion of calculus in music. Whether it be the lackadaisical approach to accelerandos, or avoidance of creating relationship functions between dependent variables, we've failed to mine the vast possibilities afforded in analysis and composition beyond the fourth dimension. Which means I should stop whining and get off my ass. - MIKE MIN
Empty Orchestra is the literal translation of the word "karaoke". Karaoke is wrongly oft maligned and ridiculed. However, only it's popular execution is deserving of cursory dismissal, like all media. Karaoke, in its true, un-suburban form, is an insight into communal memory and aesthetic promulgation. Karaoke is not a game. There are and never were rules to karaoke. At its genesis, karaoke was just a player piano that encouraged people to sing along. There were no rules. Then mimicry happened. And suddenly, rules - rules never officially decreed, just somehow generally acknowledged. It's no longer about what's beautiful or what's interesting. It's about what's right. And weirdly, not what's objectively right, but how the audience remembers what right is. Empty Orchestra breaks down elements of what's right: 1) persona, 2) mechanics, 3) performance, and 4) style, cleaved from the whole and presented as conspicuous parts.- MIKE MIN
Relay is a kind of musical relay race for any number of vocalists and a radio operator. In it, the first vocalist in the chain listens to a brief snippet of sound from a radio, which he then replicates with his voice, repeating it over and over until the radio operator introduces a new snippet. At this point, the first vocalist in the chain begins repeating the new snippet, while the second person in the chain takes on the original material. In this manner the burst from the radio is passed along the chain and unwittingly transmuted, while a tapestry of voices unfolds connected by the common source of whichever radio station is chosen. The frequency of radio bursts increases over the duration of the piece, requiring increased concentration and listening from the performers, culminating in a flurry of overlapping ideas. - BEN HOUGE
A Reading from John Cage?s ?Silence?consists of a scrambled and re-ordered reading from any found text, the name of which goes in the blank for a given performance. This piece is a study in form, systematically exploring the idea of musical non-linearity as theorized by composers like Earle Brown and implemented computer game soundtracks. - BEN HOUGE
Party Kit - I grew up around parties. My family was one of four families on my block who would find any excuse for a barbecue or pool party. My earliest memories are of joking and laughing drunken adults surrounded by us kids running around like maniacs. Most of these parties were loud and eventful (i.e., my father doing a perfect backflip off the roof and into a swimming pool, etc.). Years later, I now find a certain level of din and confusion to be as pleasantly comforting as a home-cooked grilled cheese sandwich, but in particular, I love the rolling chaos of house parties. I thought I would isolate the auditory and verbal events of a party to create a musical piece, to be performed in a choral setting and conducted by myself. Influences include dub reggae, Ben Houge?s A Reading from ____, my misunderstanding of how John Zorn?s Cobra works, the 60s TV comedy show Laugh-In, and Guy Whitmore?s recent suprise birthday party. - KORBY SEARS (click here for PARTY KIT sample scores)
Music for Clothing was written from thinking about that great snappy sound from Bruce Lee's clothes when he threw a punch or flew through the air . I realized that unless the performers are naked, most performances are accompanied by the sound of moving clothing. I decided to isolate the sound and make it into a performance in and of itself. Music for Clothing also deals with how we filter information and, for the sake of bandwidth, prevent total perception from being saved into our memories. So although we're all very familiar with the sound of clothing, when it is isolated, it sounds foreign. Perhaps all things foreign are not actually new things perceived, but in fact old things perceived fully for the first time.- MIKE MIN
Competition & Distraction was written around the time of the sniper shootings in DC. People were saying that the fear and dread were palpable. I wanted to hear what dread sounded like. Also, I wanted to hear competitive karaoke. And really, dread is only funny when there's pain and earnestness involved. A big part of this piece, as well as the others, is the necessity of extreme acts of discipline in the performer. The only way to yield the enormous amounts of perceptible effort in terms of self-discipline from performers is to ask them to perform acts that they cannot do well. Neo-amateurism is intriguing not for the intended output, but for the bi-product - the sonic manifestation of a human trying, the blatant expression of effort, the apprehensive possibility of utter failure. Beauty is not perfection; beauty is the flawed attempt towards perfection.- MIKE MIN