Friday – March 6, 2020 – Nightlife 2 – 8:30pm – Art Gallery – UCM Art Center

Nightlife 2 – Friday, 8:30 (approximately, following 7pm concert) – Art Gallery – UCM Art Center

(20 minute sets)

  • The Choir Boys (Jeff Kaiser and Andrew Pask) – Tusalava for woodwinds, trumpet, electronics, video
  • Eric Mandat – Before the Breath of Spring, clarinet and electronics
  • Mouths – Elliott Lupp and Kris David Bendrick, electronics

*****

The Choir Boys

Tusalava

The Choir Boys (Jeff Kaiser, trumpet/laptop; Andrew Pask, woodwinds/laptop) have a long term relationship with the animation of New Zealand artist Len Lye’s particular brand of mesmerizing/hypnotic work. First performing to Tusalava 15 years ago, Andrew and Jeff revisit it now. http://trippyhorns.com/

*****

Before the Breath of Spring

Eric Mandat, clarinet

Between exhale and inhale icy silence swirls around edge-bound shards and empty arms extending upward toward a colorless expanse.

For nearly 40 years, clarinetist/composer Eric Mandat has been on the leading edge of clarinet extended techniques explorations, particularly multiphonics, microtones, and timbral modulations. He has developed a deeply personal artistic expression as a performer and composer, and is recognized worldwide as one of the foremost authorities on clarinet extended techniques.

Eric tours regularly as a concert soloist, performing his works throughout the world, and at international festivals in Europe, Asia, South America, and the United States. He was a member of the Chicago Symphony’s MusicNOW ensemble for 15 years, and he performs regularly in solo and small group improvisation contexts.

Eric’s solo compositions have become staples in the repertoire of adventurous clarinetists throughout the world. He has received numerous awards and honors for his innovative solo and chamber music works featuring clarinet, including multiple Illinois Arts Council Composition Fellowships, and he has been awarded more than 25 artist residencies at the Ragdale Foundation and at Brush Creek Center for the Arts.

Eric is currently Visiting Professor of Clarinet and Distinguished Scholar at Southern Illinois University in Carbondale, where he has taught since 1981. He received the 1999 Southern Illinois University Outstanding Scholar Award, the university’s highest honor for research/creative work.

Eric Mandat is a Buffet Crampon USA Performing Artist and Clinician.

*****

N/A

MOUTHS

Elliott Lupp, electronics
Kristopher Bendrick, electronics

MOUTHS is a collaborative improvisation ensemble consisting of composer/improvisors Elliott Lupp and Kris David Bendrick that specializes in both composed and improvised electroacoustic music. MOUTHS was formed in early 2019 out of a love for both electronic instrument building, noise music, and laptop improvisation. Independently, Lupp and Bendrick have performed at a variety of electroacoustic conferences and festivals including PMF, SPLICE Institute and festival, Ball State Electroacoustic Summit, SEAMUS, MOXsonic, Electronic Music Midwest, and many more. MOUTHS as an ensemble, is a chance for both artists to come together, listen, build, create, and perform with both virtuosity and group musicianship, while exploring and experimenting with electroacoustic noise, gesture, and form.

MOUTHS presents a unique and visceral live set that not only showcases the laptop as a dynamic and gestural instrument, but exhibits the performer’s personalized interactive controllers as improvisational tools. 

Elliott Lupp is a composer, improvisor, visual artist, and sound designer whose work often invokes images of the distorted, chaotic, visceral, and absurd. This aesthetic approach as it relates to both acoustic and electroacoustic composition has led to a body of work that, at the root of its construction, focuses on the manipulation of noise, extreme gesture, shifting timbre, and performer/computer improvisation as core elements. Elliott has received a number of awards and honors for his work, including a 2019 SEAMUS/ASCAP Commission, the 2019 Franklin G. Fisk Composition Award for Chamber Music, and Departmental and All-University awards in Graduate Research and Creative Scholarship. His music has been performed at a variety of electroacoustic festivals including N_SEME, CHIMEfest, Electronic Music Midwest, MOXsonic, Fulcrumpoint New Music Project, SEAMUS, and Electroacoustic Barn Dance, and by such ensembles as the Dutch/American trio Sonic Hedgehog (flute, clarinet, and electric guitar), the Atar Piano Trio, Found Sound New Music Ensemble, various members of MOCREP, The Chicago Composer’s Orchestra, Fonema Consort, and Ensemble Dal Niente. He is currently pursuing a PhD in music composition and technology at Northwestern University

Kristopher Bendrick’s acoustic and electronic compositions explore a balance between the seriousness of academic processes and the levity of absurdism. Often working in extremes, he asks his performers to create complex sounds with flailing gestures while his electronic music works with shaping harsh noise aggregation, which, at times, grates against the comfort level of his audience. Kristopher is a Kalamazoo based composer pursuing a Master’s of Music Composition at Western Michigan University, with a Bachelor’s of Music from Columbia College Chicago. In his time at Columbia, he studied with Kenn Kumpf, Eliza Brown, and Ilya Levinson and is currently studying with Christopher Biggs and Lisa Coons at Western Michigan University. He has worked with numerous performers and ensembles including the Dutch/American Trio Sonic Hedgehog, the Atar Piano Trio, members of Mocrep, members of Fonema Consort, and members of Ensemble Dal Niente. He is a winner of the MTNA National Composition Competition, the recipient of the Turner Award, and a Hokin Award nominee.

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