Tate Carson is a composer and upright bassist from New Orleans, Louisiana. Before, I wandered as a diversion (2016), for clarinet and live electronics, won second prize in Musicworks’ 2016 electronic music composition contest. Listen to the full piece, streaming on this page. Here’s what Carson has to say about this beautiful composition: “This pieceContinue reading “Tate Carson’s Before, I wandered as a diversion”
Genre Archives
The Astral Excursions of John Mills-Cockell
The imagination of electronic composer John Mills-Cockell exists in a liminal space. His music, with its neon-pastoral glow, feels neither jarringly futuristic nor soothingly nostalgic. Nevertheless, as the very first Canadian owner of a Moog synthesizer (purchased the same day Wendy Carlos bought hers from creator Robert Moog in Trumansburg, New York), Mills-Cockell is rightlyContinue reading “The Astral Excursions of John Mills-Cockell”
Bret Parenteau widens the loop
When Bret Parenteau’s name is attached to a release or performance, those familiar with his music find themselves wondering what kind of intensity the Winnipeg artist is unleashing this time. His work ranges through harsh noise, urban field recordings, and looping synth sounds, but the only way to find out which spices are in theContinue reading “Bret Parenteau widens the loop”
Sarah Davachi flies into psychoacoustic space
One could say that Sarah Davachi’s drone-based music is all about meditative states, or texture, or duration. But more than anything else, it’s about balance—between the theoretical and the practical, the material and the cerebral, the antique and the avant-garde, the electronic and the purely acoustic. Barons Court (Students of Decay), Davachi’s first vinyl release,Continue reading “Sarah Davachi flies into psychoacoustic space”
All-Set! Editions: Essentially Not Jazz
Dapper Toronto imprint All-Set! Editions may be a newcomer to the subterranean ecosystem of experimental music distribution, but it already has a clearer sense of self than other more established labels. It’s spearheaded by a trio of composer-players, multi-instrumentalist Mike Smith, bassist Pete Johnston and pianist Ali Berkok. Its identity can’t easily be articulated inContinue reading “All-Set! Editions: Essentially Not Jazz”
Kid Koala, Featuring Emilíana Torrini. Music to Draw To: Satellite.
The first in a projected series of works in the label’s Music To Draw To series, Satellite is a bit of a surprise swerve for Kid Koala, a.k.a. Eric San, who’s renowned for making experimental hip-hop that features clever samples of vocal recordings and found sounds, and a virtuosic use of the turntable to bringContinue reading “Kid Koala, Featuring Emilíana Torrini. Music to Draw To: Satellite.”
Sixth Dither Extravaganza.
Despite its name, the guitar quartet Dither means business. The New York-based group made waves with the 2015 Tzadik release John Zorn’s Olympiad Vol 1: Dither Plays Zorn, with the foursome playing some of Zorn’s less-heard game pieces. But even before that, they were hosting an annual, daylong festival of spirited and eclectic music. TheContinue reading “Sixth Dither Extravaganza.”
Anne-F Jacques & Tim Olive. Tooth Car.
Creating music that’s like the soundtrack for a building-site documentary, sound artists Anne-F Jacques of Montreal and Kobe-based Canadian ex-pat Tim Olive use magnetic pickups and amplified rotating surfaces to generate industrial-style improvisations. It’s ironic that the work of players residing in two of the world’s most technologically sophisticated countries appears to symbolically reflect theContinue reading “Anne-F Jacques & Tim Olive. Tooth Car.”
Between Folklore and the Future: The Music of Heidi Chan
Heidi Chan began combining her passions for arranging, technology, and traditional instruments when her father gave her a demo version of the music software program Cakewalk. “Because it was a demo version, I couldn’t save anything,” she recalls. “So I had to leave the computer on for, like, months and months to keep working onContinue reading “Between Folklore and the Future: The Music of Heidi Chan”
Michael Red’s Low Indigo
Michael Red has been an in-demand DJ and producer since the 1990s, when he was a key instigator of Vancouver’s jungle and drum-and-bass scenes. He presented hugely popular underground events featuring beats you couldn’t hear elsewhere. He became a regular on Western Canada’s electronic-music festival scene, and still spends summers away from his Vancouver homeContinue reading “Michael Red’s Low Indigo”