a guide to the ruins: Composers

Http://www.suntebo.org/history/Composers/Barnett

Bonnie Barnett's TUNNEL HUM PROJECT, a series of participatory vocal events taking place in acoustically interesting environments. Since 1982 she has produced 51 HUMs in a variety of contexts, including 2 satellite-linked live national radio broadcasts.

Http://www.suntebo.org/history/Composers/JoeCat/Oceans

Joe Catalano's Oceans: Fill a room with as many audio speakers as possible. Connect these speakers to as many audio channels as possible. Generate and alter a drone continuously for the eight hour duration of the piece, all the while keeping in mind the idea of the deep ocean layer, the long rolling breath of the ocean.

Http://www.suntebo.org/history/Composers/D.Cope/DavidCope

David Cope's The Way: one of the great pieces. Cope created a massive two hour work for a single performer based on the history, lore, and religions, of Canyon de Chelley in Arizona. He went to live there for a time, exploring it thoroughly and continuously sketching musical ideas. During this time he built many instruments. Some were made with materials such as prayer stones and sheepbone mallets, though very few artifacts were removed and all with permission. Cope declares "...slowly but surely a piece is emerging, one so personal and intensely real that 'performance' hardly describes the results."

Http://www.suntebo.org/history/Composers/B.Davis/DavisSoon3

Bob Davis has been the composer for SOON 3's productions of Renaissance Radar, Voodoo Automatic, Red Rain, and Outcalls/Riptides. Mr. Davis' pulsating score for Renaissance Radar was described as "magnificently Baroque/New Wave," in American Theater; and as both "beautiful and predatory" by B.A.R. for his music in Voodoo Automatic and Red Rain.

Http://www.suntebo.org/history/Composers/Frasconi

Miguel Frasconi: "well weathered performance" in concert April-July 1994. *April 24 Sun: Asphalt Design Fashion Show. Frasconi solos from the ground up. 551 Hayes. *May 10 Tues: Post industrial Urban Folk Music double bill: Frasconi solo and Oliver DiCicco's M”bius Operandi. Hotel Utah. *May 27 Fri: Music for Rocks, Wood, Voice, Metal. Frasconi solo. Engaging the imagination improv Festival. 848 Divisadero.

Http://www.suntebo.org/history/Composers/BGolden/Hits vol1

Barbara Golden's revised and expanded "Home Cooking." It includes many new recipes, poems, paintings, and scores (6 x 9 inches, wire-bound, 112 pages). And, slipped neatly into the back is a digitally-mastered compact disc of Barbara's wild and of course raunchy tunes.

Http://www.suntebo.org/history/Composers/Gresh.-Lan./Scot Chron

Scot Gresham-Lancaster, 1982: Mills College - Supervised the design and development of Hang Glider based musical instrument - NASA created instrumentation to detect ionization above wing tips and nose - Tim Perkis's Casio hack (pre-MIDI) on keyboard switch array - Hercules wireless mic transmitter (weak point of instrument) - performed three times twice at Fort Funston (San Francisco) once at Torey Pines (CME 1983)

Http://www.suntebo.org/history/Composers/Mathieu

W.A. Mathieu's SYMPHONY NUMBER 2. Downtown Santa Rosa, California. It is a summer evening -- after dinner but still daylight. I am on the perimeter of a pedestrian area surrounded by shops, a restaurant, and a movie theater, sitting on a stone ledge near the theater entrance. I hear the footsteps of a couple passing by. The guy's keys hit against his belt. Thirty yards away, city traffic: light trucks and cars. The big glass doors of the theater open with a squeak and close with a whoosh and a click. The high whine of an engine. A truck tailgate slams open. A car starts. ...

Http://www.suntebo.org/history/Composers/M.Masaoka/Mia bees

Mia Masaoka took her musical experiments to a new level by miking the hives of 3,000 bees (as part of what she calls her "Bees Project" series) and then playing a duet with them on her koto.

Http://www.suntebo.org/history/Composers/Ostertag/BobOst

Bob Ostertag has taken an art of quotation and transformed it into an art of resistance...a scream of protest against the iron heat of the system, against the oppression of El Salvador, against the repression of gay rights in California, and against the silencing hand of censorship.

Http://www.suntebo.org/history/Composers/Perkins/Perkins_Gagn e

Phil Perkins' sophisticated feeling for timbre is part of the secret of his success. Take, for example, two sections of Apartment Life. For "Ear to the Ground," Perkins used a contact mic on a large concrete and steel fountain to record ever-changing deep bass harmonics, which he then further alters. In "Party Mix," he manipulates the voices of several simultaneous conversations into one sustained event of amazing beauty.

Http://www.suntebo.org/history/Composers/Reid/W.Reid

Wendy Reid: TREE PIECE #34 creates a landscape in which live performers play with and against a background of two taped ostinati of croaking frogs. The oboe assumes the role of an 'abstract frog' playfully interacting with the taped 'real frogs,' while the percussion is transformed throughout the work from reflector of the 'abstract frog' (-- sounds seemingly 'bouncing off' the frog croakings) to imitator of the 'abstract frog' by use of various timbral techniques to finally breaking away and becoming an independent voice,--another frog which interacts with the others.

Http://www.suntebo.org/history/Composers/Wendt

Larry Wendt: Upper and Lower California. Narrative pieces using processed vocal and environmental sounds. From a series of personal remembrances on what makes post-apocalyptic California a really neat place to live in and be from.

Http://www.suntebo.org/history/Composers/E.Wold/MusicOf Love

Erling Wold, the Erik Satie of Berkeley surrealist/minimalist electro-artrock.

Http://www.suntebo.org/history/Composers/PamZ/Parts of Speech

Pamela Z with her grace and enormous performance presence, is a master of the body synthesizer MIDI controller. With a shrug of her shoulder, a flick of her wrist she orchestrates feedback or previously recorded sounds, as an integral, finely tuned part of the piece. In fact, she is a grandmaster of feedback, setting up a loop of her pure, clear operatic sounds, her spoken text, her thought-provoking lyrics, and layering past and present to create a rich texture of repetition and variation.