Rick Reed & Colin Andrew Sheffield | untitled (Live in Austin)

Excerpted from a live improvisation, recorded in concert at the Church
of the Friendly Ghost in Austin, Texas - December 13, 2003.

Recorded by Colin Andrew Sheffield. Accompanying artwork from a
painting by Rick Reed.
Thank you: The Gates Ensemble, Iron Kite, and Numbers On The Mast.
Special thanks to Brandon Cunningham.

Rick Reed and Colin Andrew Sheffield (14:16)

Michael Tanner

The Piano.

"The piano looks up to me as if I am an older brother. 'why?' I would ask.

But the piano just gives me a baleful look, eager to please with a grin full of yellowing ivory. I hear him inhaling in the night time when I'm trying to sleep, inviting cat hair to dance a tune across his entrails and sew his proud hammers shut.

'I'm muted' he told me this morning over coffee. 'my belly is wound up tight with dust-bunnies' – meaning I (alice-like) would have to chase them down ornately carved holes, cheap red scissors in hand.

Inside my brothers' belly was like a gloomy porch. I wandered around and brushed the spiderweb of grey follicles which covered his wrought-iron ribs...web upon web, mesh upon mesh. Beneath my fingers I felt the grain of his timbers and pondered an appropriate cutting pattern. All the while he could be heard above me tapping impatiently in f #.

'I have an awkward touch' I reasoned 'you know this'.

Eventually the scissors eased through his worries like snowflakes, my fingers brushing the taught strings as I went. "ahhhhh" - he sighed a deep serene hum from his widening diaphragm, as the net around his lungs popped apart.

I reassured him as best I could before playing a long crude B-major - fingers held in position, we felt the vibration through both our chest bones and gradually deaden... Silently I closed his lid, turned the key and placed it back on the string round my neck."

Michael Tanner - Bridegroom. (04:07)
Michael Tanner - Sing the reverberate hills. (04:49)

Trevor Simmons - Eleven Pages, of a sketchbook.

A dynamic, tempts most of me to make a display of myself and draw. I eventually forfeited my surroundings, without moving. All of the drawings included, are from sketchbooks and the things described-marks of a calligraphy pen- like constellations. The white space of the page, infinite.

Trevor Simmons - Eleven Pages, of a sketchbook.

www.okya.co.uk/trevor_simmons
www.myspace.com/skulking_rooms

Mark Peter Wright - Mal de Mer

Mal de mer is a soundscape composition that consists of field recordings from the North East coast of England; Staithes, Sandsend, Robin Hoods Bay and Burniston.

Although specific in location and recording provenance, Mal de mer alludes to sound, and more specifically, an individual’s ability to listen beyond contextual site specifics. Here the listener is not necessarily searching for markers of a given environment, but opening the ear to an immersive and engaging experience. The intention is not to replicate place, but encourage a deep shift in perception and listening.

Mal de mer was first exhibited at the Manchester Victorian Baths during the FutureSonic07 Festival. All recordings made on location during 2006. With warm thanks to Patrick and Sarah.

*Headphones recommended.

Mark Peter Wright - Mal De Mer (09:08)

Julia Holter - A Gold Thunder

"The text is a phonetic translation into English of the sounds of the words of some Yugoslavian epic poems, but only so far as I could guess based on writing. I don't think my song left much hint of any other language besides English, but maybe. Mainly I just did it to make the song, and was inspired by the idea of these Yugoslavian performers who would play for all nightlong for the bar crowd, improvising stories with their instrument on their laps.
This song is a one-track live recording of me singing and playing ukelele and casio simultaneously, both on my lap."

A GOLD THUNDER

hey, it's very drowsy here
poor mahogany rose

amid rose's hopelessness, a gold thunder

poor mahogany, oh,
it's lucky not
having such luck

A Gold Thunder (02:24)

Jeph Jerman - Live at Listen Space, NYC.

From the first of two nights at Listen Space in NYC. My most minimal set-up yet. Pistachio shells, pine cones, rusty spring, superball bows, tin lids, wooden bench, brass bowl. The photo is of the floor behind the stage. Thank you Chris and Brian, Sarah and Patrick.

Jeph Jerman - Listen Space (19:49)

Elklink (Graham Lambkin & Adris Hoyos) 'Farm Stories part 1'

"I was beginning to feel rather saddened by the initial optimism now undermined by such jerky abstraction, when boom!...Elklink...Hmm...Such fine, nice folks, too. Over from England, not a reptillian bone about Graham Lambkin and Adris Hoyos...Shadow Ring vagabonds..."Well, I thank it went accadin' ta plan", Lambkin commented to me when asked about their performance while under the rush hour heat of learning all about parking meters in between the show's intermission. You betcha', if your plan was to have a pre-recorded tape sail the sounds of 'carrots gittin'-chopped up" as some guy named Scott, who looked too much like AL Franken wearing an orange jumpsuit, stands and literally shreds a dozen carrots with a grinder onto a plastic bowl on-stage in obvious effect and product to the sound that seems to be the only thing doing much of anything; while Lambkin rips open the flat of his guitar strings with screws and all compressors available on hand, and lastly, Hoyos, back turned to the audience, slapping one cymbal for half an hour to an absolute pulp, hellenic rape and nothing stands stood...yeah, sure, it went all to plan, jesus. But I believe, and boy do I, that there are a few people left in this world who take life a little more seriously besides shootin' up a lot of urban noise and indulgence that we and I all day pretend to call music, cuz', well, hey, it's easy. Stop!... Call Jack Rose" - Carson Arnold

Recorded at Green Chimneys rehabilitation centre, Brewster, NY. August 2002.

Graham Lambkin - Organ, Tapes.
Adris Hoyos - Guitars

Farm Stories part 1 (10:39)

Another Timbre mini-fest

Two concerts at Café Oto:

8pm Thursday 21st January
The Sealed Knot
(Burkhard Beins|Rhodri Davies|Mark Wastell)
+
Chris Burn / Simon H Fell
+
Stephen Cornford / Samuel Rodgers


The first concert for nearly two years by The Sealed Knot whose members were all key figures in the emergence of the New London Silence and Berlin Reductionism movements, which swept over improvised music a decade ago. This concert launches their new disc ‘and we disappear’.
Chris Burn is one of the earliest and most accomplished exponents of 'inside piano' playing, constantly uncovering new sounds from the belly of the instrument. This duo performance with French-based bassist Simon Fell launches their new trio disc (with prepared pianist Philip Thomas) ‘The Middle Distance’.
Stephen Cornford is better known for his sound sculptures and installations than for improvisation, but using piano feedback he has established a fascinating improvising duo with pianist Samuel Rodgers. They are launching their new cdr 'Turned Moment, weighting'.

8pm Friday 22nd January

John Tilbury / Sebastian Lexer
+
Loris
(Patrick Farmer|Sarah Hughes|Daniel Jones)
Cafe Oto
18-22 Ashwin Street, Dalston, London E8 3DL
www.cafeoto.co.uk

John Tilbury is a legendary figure in contemporary music, a peerless pianist whether improvising or interpreting scores. In this concert Tilbury plays minimalist piano works by the almost-forgotten Fluxus composer Terry Jennings, and, in collaboration with the electronics pioneer Sebastian Lexer, presents a live version of their ground-breaking realisation of John Cage's 'Electronic Music for Piano', which is being released alongside Jennings' piano works on a new cd on the Another Timbre label.
Loris brings together three of the UK's finest young improvisers - Patrick Farmer, Sarah Hughes and Daniel Jones. What exactly they will play is anyone's guess; their instruments vary from natural objects such as branches and stones, through lo-fi electronics and household goods, to more traditional instruments such as zither, piano and guitar. They too are launching their new disc on Another Timbre, 'The Cat from Cat Hill'.



at Cafe Oto
18-22 Ashwin Street, Dalston, London E8 3DL
www.cafeoto.co.uk
Advance tickets from www.anothertimbre.com