Many thanks to David Brensilver, who did a great job writing the article!

excerpt 1 | excerpt 2

The Uninhabited score, on the other hand, has no “legend”, and only broad strokes in terms of instructions on how to read it.  The score comprises three pages, each with 12 drawings.  Each drawing is a sketch inspired by the parts of buildings people don’t live or work in (basements, boiler rooms, crawl spaces, etc), often in extreme close up, or from an unusual angle.  In several of the drawings, the depicted object is very clear (a faucet, a bare lightbulb, a beam, a valve, etc), but for the most part they are either so zoomed in or so spare that they become abstract lines and patterns of shading.  Here are the three pages (forgive the crappy iPhone pictures).  Click to embiggen:

The instructions to the performer are as follows:

Uninhabited can be played by between four and eight performers, on any instruments, with or without the 6-channel sound installation Moving Parts.  In most cases, the performers should be spread out from one another such that each occupies his or her own space in the performance area.  When playing with Moving Parts, amplification may be used where necessary to ensure balance. Performers should agree at the outset on a total duration (usually not less than 30 minutes).

The score comprises 3 pages, each containing twelve sketches.  Each sketch corresponds to one continuous stretch of improvisation, lasting anywhere from around 20 seconds to around 3 minutes, or longer. They may be played in any order, and each may be repeated any number of times. No performance need include every sketch. Following each, there should be a period of silence, as little as several seconds or as much as several minutes.

For each new improvisation, players will initiate one of the following: 1) a sustained tone, chord, or noise; 2) a repeating melodic figure, ostinato, or noise pattern; or, 3) a continuous texture which, though not a sustained or repeating sound, maintains an consistent character (eg, an improvisation using a single technique, or drawing from a finite set of gestures).  The character of the chosen sound may be informed by the sketch, or by the player’s momentary interest.  Generally speaking, players should avoid extremely loud playing, except for very short intervals.

Once a sustained, repeating, or continuous sound has been initiated, players should, in their mind’s eye, chart a course through the chosen sketch, moving in different directions, using its contours and shadings to color and shape their playing.  For example, one may choose to map darkness of shading to the loudness of a sound, or to the noisiness, tempo, articulation, spectral richness, etc., thereof (or any combination of these – a “macro”, if you will).  Sustained, continuous, and repeating sounds thus acquire motion.  This “movement” through the sketch is free but must be intentional, making an effort to really explore it musically. Players are encouraged to give preference to the exploration and development of their own ideas over ensemble considerations.  Each performer should aim above all to maintain his or her independence.

The piece was performed three times – 10/14, 10/21, and 11/5 – each time with my generative sound installation, Moving Parts (itself based largely on recordings of building noise).  The instrumentation varied from one show to the next.  The first performance had bass clarinet, cello, electric guitar, and drum set; the second had flute/alto flute, alto saxophone, trombone, cello, and electric guitar; and the third had tenor sax, violin, electric piano/toy piano, and drum set (a total of ten players lent their talents to this project, to whom I’m very grateful).

A bit about some of the philosophical underpinnings of the piece: two recent interests of mine are the juxtaposition of independent systems, and the transposition of generative composition from computer music to live, acoustic music (score as algorithm, player as processor).  In the case of Uninhabited, each player is an independent system – imagine several computers running the same program simultaneously with different starting variables (experience, taste, etc.), and different types of output (different instruments).  This is the basic model for the piece.

The analogy breaks down, though, because of the complexities of human experience and the limitations of human information processing (particularly the speed thereof). It wouldn’t make any sense to write a generative piece for humans which was truly faithful to the computer model.  The “processor” is unpredictable and impressionable, so the “algorithm” – the score – almost has to be interpretive and poetic rather than rule-oriented, except for certain basic rules.  There’s still an input-processor-output model, but each step of the process is relational rather than mathematical.

I was struck when listening to the three performances of Uninhabited by how “right” it sounded, despite how little the score prescribed.  The sounds were right, the textures were right, the proportions of textures were right – the piece sounded how I intended it to sound.  I asked several of the performers to reflect on their experience playing the piece, and on the score in particular, and got quite a range of responses.  Some wanted more information to work with, others described it (somewhat to my surprise) as “straight-forward”.  One criticism I received a few times had to do with my instruction to “give preference to the exploration and development of their own ideas over ensemble considerations.”  This was meant more as a nudge, something to keep in mind while playing, rather than as an absolute command, but I completely understand the difficulty of constantly trying to fight an instinct to react to other sounds in the room.  Perhaps in a future installation, I’d try to aim for greater isolation of the performers, say by miking their instruments, and sending the feeds directly to headphones, so that they can only hear themselves, or perhaps literally isolating them, putting them in different parts of the building, and piping their playing to a common area, where the sounds can mix.

One thing I was gratified by was that most players found the drawings interesting to improvise to.  Some found those that clearly represented objects more interesting to work with, while others found the more abstract textures more fruitful, but universally the players reported finding something interesting to work with in the score.  With 36 images, each improvisation lasting an average of around two minutes, substantial periods of rest, and the stipulation that drawings may be ignored or returned to several times, I think it’s okay that not every player be interested in every drawing – the idea is that they use the ones they are drawn to.

Here are a couple excerpts:

excerpt 1 (from performance #3, with Argeo Ascani, Mike McCurdy, Joshua Modney, Kathy Supove)

excerpt 2 (from performance #2, with Jen Baker, Jessie Marino, James Moore, Jessica Schmitz, and Alvin Scott)

A final performance of Uninhabited has been added for this coming Friday, 11/5, at 7pm.  As with the previous two performances, this one will accompany my six-channel sound installation, Moving Parts, and The Fourth Space, Cecilia Dougherty’s fantastic show of video art.

The performers for this final show at Participant are Joshua Modney on violin, Argeo Ascani on saxophone, Kathy Supove on piano, and Mike McCurdy on drum set.  Very excited to hear yet another combination of instruments tackle this score!  (a post with some pictures of and reflections on the score is forthcoming).

Endless thanks to Lia Gangitano, Participant’s founder and director, for allowing me so much freedom to experiment, and to Cecilia for inviting me to what has been a truly enriching collaboration. If you have not yet checked out her work, do so now:  http://www.ceciliadougherty.com.

If you can’t make it on Friday, The Fourth Space and Moving Parts are on view through this Sunday, November 7.

Participant is located at 253 E Houston St., between Norfolk and Suffolk.

I was thrilled to be part of this interview along with composer/sound artists Charles Lindsay and Annea Lockwood.  It was a particular thrill to be on the show with Annea, who is one of the masters of the soundmap form, and in part from whom I drew the inspiration to do this new work (In fact, she’s on to talk about her newest river work, Soundmap of the Housatonic River. Previously, she has mapped the Hudson and the Danube.)

Standing Water is a soundmap in that the recorded material marks locations along a particular route, but it differs from Annea’s work in two important ways: 1) I take slightly more liberty with the material.  Annea’s work is remarkable for how little she does to it – she uses great mics and finds amazing natural sounds.  Standing Water is largely faithful to the original recordings, but a couple of the movements are more edited, and 2) There’s an instrumentalist.  Eleonore Oppenheim is lending her incredible artistry on solo double bass, playing in counterpoint with the recordings.

Standing Water is going to be performed on Saturday, October 30, at 8pm, at White Box.  I curated this particular evening, entitled New York Soundscape, which will also feature works by Paula Matthusen, Miguel Frasconi, and Jennifer Stock.  Four very different types of work on the theme of water in New York City.

More info on New York Soundscape

More info on the complete Ear to the Earth festival

Before I take a little break, though, there are three more events this month, the first of which is tonight, Thursday, October 14, from 7-8pm. It’s the premiere of a new work, Uninhabited, a graphic score to accompany my generative sound installation, Moving Parts, running all month at Participant on the lower East side. Tonight’s show features four amazing and innovative musicians: Eileen Mack (bass clarinet), Jessie Marino (cello), James Moore (electric guitar), and Mike McCurdy (drums). As the installation runs and the players play, you’re invited to walk around the gallery and check out The Fourth Space, a show of video art
by Cecilia Dougherty.

Next Thursday, October 21, we’ll do Uninhabited again with a slightly different lineup.

Finishing out the month, on October 30th, is the premiere of another new
work, Standing Water: A Soundmap of the Gowanus Canal, featuring the incomparable bassist Eleonore Oppenheim. More information on this one coming soon.

Moving Parts, a six-channel generative sound installation based on the rhythms and resonances of the built environment.

being presented with The Fourth Space, a video installation by Cecilia Dougherty

October 3 – November 7, at Participant in New York City’s Lower East Side.
Opening reception October 3, 7-9pm.
Gallery hours: Wednesday – Sunday, 12-7pm

Live musical performances in concert with the installations on Thursdays, October 14 and 21, at 7pm, featuring Eileen Mack (clarinet), Jessie Marino (cello), James Moore (guitar), and Mike McCurdy (percussion).

More information below.