December 2015
The Scope XVII
We don’t normally run a show this far into December, but we had the opportunity to do something with HardWorking Families and go about realising some of Dann Hignell’s text scores, so it seemed like an opportunity not to be missed.
Duncan Harrison
Duncan Harrison was originally slated for the middle slot, but as we had only three acts and were starting late he opted for the first. The score he was performing was this (page 115):
“A short reflection upon the fact
That those on the outside
Have as much right to be here as any of us that
Their voices carry through walls and
If they don’t they should
(I am not sure how you would put this to song but a good start
Might be to ask everyone to open a window)”
We didn’t know that at the time, but the realisation went something like this: Duncan had a portable cassette player on a table with a small stage type lamp next to it. He switched it on and it appeared to be a recording made downstairs in a bar, it was quite trebly and distorted. He started the tape and got up and ran around the room checking the windows and then turned the lights down and cleared off. We could hear noises coming from outside the door, so I was expecting him to come back. he didn’t after about 20 minutes during which we’d kind of worked out it was a recording from downstairs (punk, Saxon and suchlike through the distorted conversation) someone went downstairs for a drink.
“I don’t think he’s around”
Tom went and checked, “I can’t see him anywhere”
So at around 30 minutes we turned the lights back up and started setting up for Tom’ s set, but without the electrocreche, and we started chatting over it then at 45 minutes the tape finished “clunk” and everyone cheered.
It makes a lot more sense knowing which score he was performing, I don’t even think Dann Hignell did at the time – excellent levels of confusion.
Hardworking Families
Hardworking Families without Nan; unfortunately Nan shipped their Cello off to far-most Africa two days before the show and we couldn’t source a replacement in time. This meant Hardworking Families had to step in to cover the fray on their own. I’m sure there’s some kind of wider metaphor there, but I’m going to move on.
Anyway, it was Tom Bench with his new glittery guitar from the Train of Thought Emporium. And a nicely constructed set of Noises through the effects chain, some playing of cassettes into the pickups and the player rubbed on the strings, some things inserted in the strings and general muckaboutery at a reasonable volume for the most part before he stood up and started trying to get some feedback going.
There was some feeling that the cassette voices at the beginning was almost a continuation or reference back to Duncan’s set, but I’m not sure if that was intentional, or just me.
Dan Hignell Ensemble
Dan Hignell had his ensemble set up through the middle of the room facing the screen so they could see the scores. From left to right looking at the backs of their heads (i.e. towards the stage, if you like) were Dan Hignell on a lovely old portable organ, all brushed aluminium and slightly bent plastic sliders, Kev Nickells on Violin and sharing a French horn with John Guzek who played violin, too, then on the far side from me Barnabas Yianni on some electronic things.
They ran through about six of Dan’s scores with accompanying cards, the realisations varying from scratchy repeated violin figures, to the feeling of someone wrestling with a French horn on the beach. some pieces felt like the musicians were working against each other some as if everyone was in their own universe. The last piece was a bit special, it was quite a bit longer than all the others, Dan playing space organ drone figures, with very long violin slides from one player with the other providing some over the bridge wrenching and Yianni’s electronics running in the background bringing a repeated pip figures, with the piece ending on a slight crescendo with arpeggiating violin parts.
A good Scope to end the year, really filling out the ideas we had for it when we started doing it.
Starting the evening were Noteherder & McCloud, who based their set off some recordings of trains and then more notably Tube recordings as we got into the set. It was a slow start with quite a bit of tape hiss delayed and whined up by a bitcrusher into a distant alarm. Chris Parfitt’s soprano sax shouts jumped across that until a rolling, almost swinging bass sequence started up and he got into some really lyrical playing for about ten minutes until it all shredded out into noise and clanging rail screech and than toned down into breath hiss and gurgle.
map71, who have been one of the best things I’ve seen this year, and this was another good one. They took a little while to get right into it, but once they did, it was right there. Andy Pyne’s drumming and synths (a backing track rather than his old keyboard – I couldn’t see) were rock steady, as he takes some Jaki Liebezeit channelling tight beats. Lisa Jayne was a little more animated than sometimes, her left hand flicking as she held her book of spells in the right dexterously turning pages with her thumb. The highpoint came with some DNW buzzing synth, Andy on beaters, pattering out a steady toned rhythm on the toms (even the snare drum has the snare dropped for extra note) while Lisa Jayne intoned her deadpan words.
Matawan are all about the textures, the shimmer. I originally thought one of them had a keyboard on his table initially, but he seemed to have an unused guitar propped against the stage side wall there, while the chap in the middle sat stooped down guitar mostly across his lap as he muddled with his racks of effects at his feet. It was a slow drone build, layers modulating back and forth between the pair of players in what initially seemed an improvised set until you noticed that one of them was loading some pretty specific chords into three tiny Mooer loopers he had at his feet, not that when he played them back it sounded like strumming, but the triad of washing layers they produced as he faded from one to another gave clear indication of an compositional element unexpected in a drone environment.
Gus Garside started the evening with an introduction, and then a piece by James Tenney called “The Beast” which was a complex microtonal piece from a visual score, all bowed often two strings sounding, long notes , very technical and about 6 minutes long “it’s called ‘The Beast’ because it IS a beast”. I should coco.
The second act of the evening was Franck Barriac, over from France for the Himmel massed organs show at Cafe Oto. He was sitting at the back of the room with a quadrophonic setup, the usual Caroline PA behind us and two extra channels at the back, in front of us. Franc’s set was a soundscape piece based around urban field recordings and tones. It’s amazing how unused we are to this surrounding kind of performance, especially with the artist in front of us, sounds from behind (even after the introduction telling us it would happen) seem really disconcerting. Anyway a really nicely structured piece, partly pre arranged and partly improvised, I gather from talking to him.
Finally it was Futuro De Hierro from Spain. We utilised the extra speakers to boost up the sound – which was handy as it happened, as a few minutes into his set the main PA seemed to glitch out, although those of us sat at the back didn’t notice as we were immersed in the joyous racket lurking up behind us. A quick work around the cabling and it all seemed OK again, but Viktor seemed a little subdued. Still some excellent beats and bursts of noise, and some really interesting kit to look at. We must get him back for a full throttle set at The Green Door Store.
Back to a full strength roster tonight, and we got off to a good start with a set from Barn, with a laptop and controller plus some bits and pieces, his set seems to be in five sections, with a foil. The first reminds me somewhat of my airboat ride from last month, a nice gritty sound, but his properly generated. This breaks into pulses and thence into something that has washes of almost sea like noise, before the final section leads onto a cascade of electronic tones.
Quinta is accompanied by two other keyboard players, who also double up on saw and stylophone and laptop. This as you can imagine pushes the limits of the Caroline’s setup pretty effectively. They start with an unaccompanied vocal piece about Boudicca, before moving into a song with some Nyman-esque very rhythmic interlocking piano parts all three of them intricately locked . They then get stuck into the peripheral kit for an uncanny waltz before coming back to, I was going to say orthodox, but perhaps a more finely structured piece of tightly knuckled piano. A really good mix of modernist composition and sub five minutes pop song lengths.
Rick is down in Brighton for his first solo set as The Oneirologist, which is (I think) a live soundtrack project. The film is called something about moths and has two lights (from a boat, maybe) to which he makes some quiet noise or drones – its too fierce for a drone, but too quiet for noise – so work that out yourself. Strongly textured tones, and resonant knocks from séance next door. Overall, unsettling, I think.
And to round the evening off, Dan Powell plays his final collaboration of the series, this one with minimal impact. it was supposed to be acoustic, so he has his Bontempi reed organ mic’d up to a fuzzbox and delay, Steve minimal impact has his plastic harmonium from India, through a new Space Echo pedal he found somewhere and is rightly very pleased with. I found some old visuals by Karl so turn the projector round to play them over the duo while they hum and drone pleasingly.