Doors 7:00 | Q&A 7:30 | Music 8:15 Tickets
Matt Robidoux & Lori Varga - Music For Aluminum Corn
Matt Robidoux is a San Francisco based composer, improviser, educator, and community organizer interested in the convergence of movement and sound, especially with regards to accessibility in contemporary music and the communicative capacities of sonic energy. Their primary instrument is the corn synth — (kinetically operated randomness system [k.o.r.n.]) a modular architecture that interprets physical input from two "ears of corn" sculptures cast in aluminum.
"Music For Aluminum Corn" is informed by accessible kinetic music technology in my development of "corn synth", a modular synthesizer controlled by touching aluminum cast ears of corn. Their focus' on the modularity/ubiquity of corn and the causality of reactive generation and regeneration of sound and movement mining and composing for an ethos of free improvisation.
Matt's solo work with the "corn synth", a modular environment configured around two touch controlled aluminum cast ears of corn is informed by my ongoing work with Pauline Oliveros' final project AUMI (Adaptive Use Musical Instrument) in direct collaboration with the disability community and multidisciplinary arts organizations in the San Francisco Bay Area. The powerful echo and artistic legacy of Mills College CCM (1967-2022) resonates in their design of the corn synth, modeling it after the Buchla 158, the original synthesizer used at the San Francisco Tape Music Center. The instrument was invented during their residency at ACRE in Wisconsin, where I cast two corn cob moldings in aluminum. Movement and touch determine the parameters of pitch, velocity, and duration. This makes for an accessible instrument, at once charming and absurd, while also a powerful merging of my practice creating space for unrestricted musical improvisation.
Bay area native Lori Varga is a analog Visual performance artist & noise /drone provocateur. Since 1992 she has experimented with large amounts of film projectors, found footage films, and early synthesis & sound experiments. Lori also makes 35mm slides using unconventional methods & is well known for her light shows for experimental & touring psychedelic bands in Northern CA and central TX . She also houses one of the largest collections of "special interest" and experimental video tapes in CA, providing endless access to materials for experimental film screenings & curation of more than 1000 edu 16mm films & Super 8 oddities. For several years her passion has been building /hacking low cost electronics into drone instruments or Sourcing the most peculiar oscillating sound instruments for her unique live performances. Strange Film will mix with her dark & haunting tones & loops that are all performed thru analog or custom built equipment. No two shows are ever alike. Lori has designed large scale & intimate sized down filmsets for the Butthole Surfers, Helios Creed, St37, & Acid Mothers Temple. She has done several solo shows thru Shapeshifters Cinema and Craig Baldwins Other Cinema series. Her Exp./ transgressive collage films have been screened Internationally around Europe & Japan. Lori will provide all live visuals for this performance using found VHS/16MM as well as direct animation and techniques with a multi-projector setup.
Personnel:
Matt Robidoux - Corn synth, electronics | Lori Varga - 16MM film, expanded cinema, analog pedals
post doom romance
A collaboration between sound artists, seah and Mykel Boyd. Both artists work with field recordings, digital manipulation of field recordings, synthesizers, and bowed instruments - often times Tim Kaiser instruments. Seah also plays cello and/or glass harp. For the Summit, post doom romance will be debuting their recently completed work from a one month artist residency in the Finnish Archipelago, funded by Finlandia Foundation National. The sound pieces of this body of work include field recordings from the residency and are composed with the intention of describing the tone and feeling of a place from memory.
Personnel:
seah and Mykel Boyd - field recordings, digital manipulation of field recordings, synthesizers, and bowed instruments