Reviewing

urMix

Michael Schumacher

Featuring Brian Chase, Lee Gilboa, Dan Joseph, Zach Layton

urMix is an interactive listening project based on the idea of multitrack recording and surround-sound listening. A listener interacts with urMix using 4 cables routed to 4 channels of output, either a pair of vintage quad headphones or to 4 speakers placed around the room. Since there are 8 tracks of music but only 4 output channels, the listener can only access up to 4 tracks at a time and must physically connect and disconnect the plugs to hear different combinations of tracks.

Location: The Art and Technology Program exhibition in Building 10a, Nolan Park, Governors Island

May 28th – 29th, 2022. Open to the public from 11 am to 5 pm Weekends

A typical song is organized as tracks – individual parts like instruments, voices and effects, that play simultaneously as a so-called “mix”, usually accomplished by an experienced technician. What we normally hear as a unity, therefore, is actually a series of separate performances and processes that magically gel into an ensemble through the art of sound studio technique and technology. I was curious if this unity could be broken down and pieced together again – not by a technician but by the “end user” – the listener – who rarely considers the “constructed” nature of the typical electronic sound piece. The trick is that no more than four tracks can ever be heard at once, meaning the listener has to complete the song by memory, the memory of the other tracks not heard at that particular moment. So, in one instance, only a snare drum, hand clap, bass and a harmonizing vocal may be audible, meaning the main vocal line (as well as other parts) will need to be “added” in the imagination. Or perhaps the kick drum, hi hat, piano and the reverb effect will be heard, foregrounding an effect that’s usually subliminal. As the listener exchanges channels and hears more parts, the full contents become clear, but so too does the inherent boundaries and even disconnect between the parts become apparent. Even as Humpty-Dumpty is put back together, the cracks show.

urMix contains a collection of disparate pieces and “studies”: familar pop songs, newly commissioned works, scales in various tunings, tones played using different timbres, beats split into 8 parts. Contributing artists include Brian Chase, Lee Gilboa, Dan Joseph, Zach Layton and others to be announced.

Bio

Michael J. Schumacher (concept, curation) has worked with spatialized sound, computers and electronics since the 1980s, creating multi-channel, generative “Room Pieces” presented in galleries, museums, concert halls, public and private spaces. XI Records has published a DVD set of five sound installations as computer applications, playable on up to eight speakers, which may be installed on a computer to create sound environments in the home. Schumacher’s composition “Grid”, a computer-generated score, has been in exhibitions in New York, Barcelona and Houston. His building-wide installation at EMPAC, in Troy New York, ran 24/7 for one year.

A Harvestworks Sponsored Project funded in part by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Kathy Hochul and the New York State Legislature.

Lee Gilboa

Lee Gilboa is a US based Israeli composer, researcher, and audio engineer. In her work Lee uses speech, audio spatialization and vocal processing, and engages with different themes around the sonic identity such as naming, representation, collectivity, self-expression. While living in New York between 2017-19 Lee began her work as a curator for Daniel Neumann’s CT::SWaM, and developed her debut album The Possibility of Sonic Portraiture which was released by Contour Editions. Her works have been presented at Roulette Intermedium, The Immersion Room in NYU, The Cube at Virginia Tech, Ars Electronica Forum Wallis Festival and NYCEMF among others, and in conferences such as The Audio Testimonies Symposium, Borderline Sonorities, and The Sound of Sound Studies. She participated in several master classes and artist residencies internationally, including the Atlantic Center for the Arts, The Honk Tweet, and IRCAM Manifeste Academy. Lee holds degrees from Berklee College of Music and Columbia University. Currently, she is pursuing a Ph.D. at Brown University’s Music and Multimedia Composition program and serves as an Assistant Professor at Berklee College of Music’s Electronic Production and Design department.

Michael Schumacher

Michael J. Schumacher has worked with spatialized sound, computers and
electronics since the 1980s, creating multi-channel, generative “Room Pieces”
presented in galleries, museums, concert halls, public and private spaces. XI
Records has published a DVD set of five sound installations as computer
applications, playable on up to eight speakers, which may be installed on a computer
to create sound environments in the home. “Living Room Pieces” is another generative
installation designed for home listening; in 2021 Schumacher created an edition of
10 for Raspberry Pi. “The Portable Multi-channel Sound System” is an 8 or 12 channel
system that fits in a suitcase, with which he has toured Europe and the United
States. His interest in the intersections of musical form, architecture and social
spaces led to the founding, in 1996, of Diapason, a gallery devoted to the
presentation of multi-channel sound installations, long-duration performances and
intermedia artworks. In its 15 years of existence Diapason presented over 300
artists, at a time when sound art was emerging as a distinct practice in the United
States. Schumacher is the music director of the Liz Gerring Dance Company and
performs regularly with choreographer Sally Silvers. He studied music composition
with Stanley Applebaum, Bernhard Heiden, John Eaton and Vincent Persichetti and
piano with Seymour Bernstein, John Ogdon and Shigeo Neriki, and has degrees from
Indiana University and Juilliard. He also worked with La Monte Young and Milton
Babbitt. He has collaborated with choreographers, poets, architects, musicians and
filmmakers including Oren Ambarchi, Bruce Andrews, Tom Chiu, Charles Curtis, Ken
Jacobs, Victoria Meyers and Ursula Scherrer.

Brian Chase

Brian Chase is a drummer and composer living in Brooklyn, NY. His diverse range of work includes that with Grammy nominated rock band Yeah Yeah Yeahs, the community of the New York experimental music scene, and his solo project entitled Drums and Drones. Performance collaborators range from leading improvisors Zeena Parkins, Anthony Coleman and Catherine Sikora to contemporary classical groups String Noise and Experiments in Opera to visual artists Ursula Scherrer, Erik Zajaceskowski and Keti Kartveli. Presentations of Drums and Drones have included those at arts festivals and venues such as New Ear Festival (Fridman Gallery, NYC), X Avant Festival (Toronto), Constellation (Chicago), National Sawdust (Brooklyn) and Secret Project Robot (Brooklyn). As an educator, Brian was a visiting professor at Bennington College and guest lecturer at So Percussion’s Summer Institute at Princeton University. Writings have appeared in John Zorn’s Arcana anthology, Modern Drummer magazine and Talkhouse culture blog. Performer and artist residencies have been held at The Stone and Headlands Center for the Arts. In 2018, Brian started his own label, Chaikin Records, named after his original family surname.

Dan Joseph

Dan Joseph is a free-lance composer, curator and writer based in New
York City. He began his career as a drummer in the vibrant punk scene of his native
Washington, DC. During the late 1980s, he was active in the experimental tape music
underground, producing ambient-industrial works for independent labels in the U.S.
and abroad. He spent the ‘90s in California where he studied at CalArts and Mills
College. His principal teachers include Pauline Oliveros, Alvin Curran and Mel
Powell. Equally influential were his studies with Terry Riley during several
workshops in California and Colorado. A New York resident since 2001, Dan’s work has
been presented at Merkin Concert Hall (NYC), Diapason Gallery for Sound (NYC),
Roulette (NYC), Issue Project Room (NYC) The Kitchen (NYC) Yerba Buena Center for
the Arts (CA), Human Resources (CA), Harrison House (CA) and other venues. He has
received commissions from several ensembles and performers, including Gamelan Son of
Lion, the sfSoundGroup, baritone Thomas Buckner, and clarinetist Matt Ingalls. Dan
has held residencies at Headlands Center for the Arts, the Lower Manhattan Cultural
Council and Harvestworks Digital Media Arts Center. As an artist who embraces the
musical multiplicity of our time, Dan works simultaneously in a variety of media and
contexts, including instrumental chamber music, free improvisation, and various
forms of electronica and sound art. Since the late 1990s, the hammer dulcimer has
been the primary vehicle for his music. As a performer he is active with his own
chamber ensemble, The Dan Joseph Ensemble, as well as in various improvisational
collaborations and as an occasional soloist. He has collaborated with a variety of
creative artists including Miya Masaoka, Pamela Z, Loren Dempster, JD Parran, India
Cooke, Andrea Williams, William Winant and Miguel Frasconi and John Ingle. As
curator and presenter, he has organized over 100 concerts as an independent producer
and as a member of organizations such as Harvestworks, Mutable Music (producers of
the acclaimed Interpretations series) and the San Francisco Electronic Music
Festival. He currently produces the monthly music and sound series Musical Ecologies
at The Old Stone House in Park Slope, Brooklyn, and is a co-producer of the Music
for Contemplation series in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. His writings on various music
related topics have appeared in Musicworks Magazine (Toronto), The Brooklyn Rail,
NewMusicBox.org and other outlets.

Zach Layton

Zach Layton is a New York based composer and artist interested in
biofeedback techniques, psychoacoustics, perception and generative algorithms.
Zach’s work has been performed by the Cleveland Chamber Symphony and has been
exhibited at the International Congress for Performance Art in Berlin, Neue Berliner
Initiative, and many other venues in New York and Europe. He also is the curator of
Brooklyn’s monthly experimental music series “darmstadt: classics of the avant
garde” which features leading composers and improvisers from around New York City.
Zach has received grants from the Netherlands America Foundation and the Jerome
Foundation and is a student at NYU’s Interactive Telecommunications Program.