April 2008
Exciting things on the horizon this spring:Jazz-in-Analogue, a new project inspired by free jazz recordings, with my absolute favoritest musicians in town/the world, debuts at Intersection for the Arts Wednesday May 7, 2008 at 8pm. More info at www.theintersection.org
More news coming soon ...
October 2006
Yes, the duo B. CD is here, and available for purchase at CDBaby.com We are mighty proud of it, and plan to never ever make a record again.
The duo is playing a pretty special concert on Friday October 27 at Maybeck Studio in Berkeley. In addition to performing our usual repertoire of gnarly original compositions, improvised songs, textural soundpieces and deconstructed covers, we will premiere newly-commissioned works by Bay Area composers Heather Frasch, Darren Johnston and Jeremy Hunt, composed especially for us! We couldn't be more excited.
In other news I have been helping put together the music and performances for the Headlands Center for the Arts' annual Mystery Ball Fundraiser. It's Saturday October 28, from 7pm - midnight. Great live music, participatory tomfoolery, clever costumes, plentiful and food, stunning art installations. Tickets are steep, but you can't throw your money at a better cause. Performers include: an Artist Gameroom with Jon Brumit and Paul Zografakis! Live music by Gaucho, Lord Loves a Working Man and Katy Stephan! DJ set by Julio Morales of Club Unicornio! Info, directions etc: www.headlands.org
Also I am very proud and honored and a little scared to be one of Jon Brumit's privileged guest troublemakers at his Vendetta Retreat revenge clinic installation at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts on November 11. Please come visit us, where we will help you musically exorcise your grudges and cathartically rid yourself of excess vengeful feelings. Jon's
Finally, Halloween brings another installment of the ever-popular music and movies series, quiet films/loud bands. Here's the bill for the night:
quiet films/loud bands presents:
HALLOWEEN ‘06
live music + creepy films at 21 Grand, Oakland
Tuesday October 31, 2006
organized by Lisa Mezzacappa
Aaron Novik’s Crafty Apples play an episode of the anime serial, LAIN (2004) Lain, a weird, confusing, hypnotic experimental Japanese TV series, is about a teenage girl who slowly learns that she is a computer program in a Matrix-like reality. Crafty Apples is: Jason Levis, marimba and percussion / Dina Maccabee, viola / Sky Grealis, flute / Aaron Novik, bass clarinet
Slunky plays scenes from Masaki Kobayashi’s KWAI-DAN (1965) and The Brothers Quay’s STREET OF CROCODILES (1986) In the Quays’ Street of Crocodiles (1986), a museum keeper spits into the eyepiece of an ancient peep-show and sets the musty machine in motion, plunging the viewer into a nightmarish netherworld of bizarre puppet rituals among the dirt and grime. Kobayashi’s Kwaidan is a visually lavish collection of horror tales based on traditional Japanese ghost stories. SLUNKY is: Phillip Greenlief, reeds / Ava Mendoza, guitar / Lisa Mezzacappa, bass
Also: Konrad Steiner’s psychedelic video short DEVIL EGGED (2003), an anti-mob-mentality montage of famous San Francisco crowd scenes driven note for note insane by a Frank Zappa guitar solo. Gregg Biermann’s SPHERICAL COORDINATES (2005), in which a seemingly innocuous scene from Hitchcock’s Psycho is wrapped around the inside of a 3D sphere, distorting the image and original sound, and thus simulating the experience of moving your head along the screen as the film plays.
August 2006
Thank you for your patience while I have intermittently slaved away at/ruthlessly neglected this site. As of 12:37am on August 28, 2006, all of the audio now works. I will do my best to keep the calendar more up-to-date this fall.
duo B. is in the final stages of completing our debut CD, these things seem natural to us. Thanks to the stunning artwork of Deborah Aschheim and the ingenious design of Stephanie Lachowicz, we are positive at this point that at the very least, it will look really good. It has been a long and often surprising process crafting a record from improvised sessions based on months and months of working together. The CD release party coincides with our concert at the Meridian Gallery in San Francisco on Wednesday September 13.
This fall, Jon Brumit and I will do several test runs of our portable recording studio and improvising lab at the Laney College Sunday flea market. I will post those dates in the calendar once they're set - musician and non-musician friends are welcome to come hang out with us, jam in Jon's van, and make music with found objects and junk instruments.
Lastly, my musical shenanigans have found a new home at Studio 223 in East Oakland, home of the Milk Bar, where I share a great warehouse studio space with an illustrious crew of East Bay artists, including Mary Armentrout and Ian Winters.
April 2006
Welcome to my new website - I coded the whole thing by hand! Hence the delay.
This spring, through May, I am an artist in residence at the Headlands Center for the Arts in Marin, CA. Check the "In Progress" page under "Projects" for a sneak preview of some things I'm working on up here.
In other news, I am guest curating a music series at the Hammer Museum at UCLA this August. The theme is JAZZPOP, the series is free and outdoors and LA is a heck of a town, so come on down. I'll post the full bill once the booking's through.
Also, just got word that Oakland artist and troublemaker Jon Brumit and I are being funded by the City of Oakland to bring our Community Sound Project to the Laney College Flea Market this fall. We'll be setting up a super inviting public recording studio out the back of Jon's van, with guest musicians on hand to improvise with passersby.