I’m creating YouTube samplers of some of the more recent items in my discography, and I’ve started by uploading a trailer for ‘io 0.0.1 beta++’ (SLAMCD 531) [more info on the recording…].

On the stage: two men, a woman, and an artifact, a freestanding mélange of industrial, military, and domestic hardware. The humans hold graceful, polished objects, but the domed assemblage stands alone. And while the woman and men make sound (vibrate the air) holding and fingering the graceful objects, the artifact, named io 0.0.1 beta++, makes sounds without being touched at all. io and the humans improvise together, listening to each other, responding to each other’s musical gestures.

Sara Roberts (from the liner notes)

Music by Han-earl Park, Bruce Coates and Franziska Schroeder.
Images © 2010 Han-earl Park, and © 2010 Stephanie Hough.
Video collage © 2014 Han-earl Park. ℗ 2011 SLAM Productions.

‘io 0.0.1 beta++’ (SLAMCD 531) is available from SLAM Productions. [Details…]

personnel: io 0.0.1 beta++ (itself), Han-earl Park (guitar), Bruce Coates (alto and sopranino saxophones) and Franziska Schroeder (soprano saxophone).

© 2011 Han-earl Park.
℗ 2011 SLAM Productions.

io 0.0.1 beta++, Bruce Coates and Franziska Schroeder (Blackrock Castle Observatory, Cork, May 26, 2010). Photo © 2010 Stephanie Hough.

Seeking performance opportunities; particularly in Europe, 2014: the cyborg ensemble of interactive, semi-autonomous, technological artifact and machine musician and improviser io 0.0.1 beta++ with human musicians Han-earl Park, Bruce Coates and Franziska Schroeder.

See performance proposal for further information (availability, technical requirements, performers’ biographies, etc.).

overview

This quartet (or faux-quartet, if you prefer) performs demanding free improvisation calling on a range of extended techniques. Pieces of dismantled gestures, destabilizing timbres, and impressive synergy.

François Couture (Monsieur Délire)

An idea that would be pleasing to the Futurists of a century ago, a total hymn to modernity…. The completely improvised session requires a lot of attention from the listener, to be fully repaid by that which is a successful experiment.

Vittorio (MusicZoom)

We watch and listen carefully because we know we’re seeing a kind of manifesto in action. What is an automaton? A sketch, a material characterization of the ideas the inventor and the inventor’s culture have about some aspect of life, and how it could be. io and its kind are alternate beings born of ideas, decisions and choices. It is because io stands alone, an automaton, that the performance recorded on this CD not only is music, but is about music.

Sara Roberts (from the liner notes to SLAMCD 531)

An extraordinary meeting between human and machine improvisers. Featuring the machine musician io 0.0.1 beta++ with guitarist Han-earl Park and saxophonists Bruce Coates and Franziska Schroeder, the performance is part critique and part playful exploration, both a boundary-breaking demonstration of socio-musical technologies and an ironic sci-fi parody.

Constructed by Han-earl Park, io 0.0.1 beta++ is a modern-day musical automaton. It is not an instrument to be played but a non-human artificial musician that performs alongside its human counterparts. io 0.0.1 beta++ representing a personal-political investigation of technology, interaction, improvisation and musicality. It whimsically evokes a 1950s B-movie robot—seemingly jerry-rigged, constructed from ad-hoc components including plumbing, kitchenware, speakers and missile switches—celebrating the material and corporeal.

The performances with this artificial musician highlights society’s entanglement with technology, demonstrates alternative modes of interfacing the musical and the technological, and illuminates the creative and improvisative processes in music. The performance is a radical and playful engagement with powerful and problematic dreams (and nightmares) of the artificial; a dream as old as the anthropology of robots.

The construction of io 0.0.1 beta++ has been made possible by the generous support of the Arts Council of Ireland.

The CD ‘io 0.0.1 beta++’ (SLAMCD 531) was released by SLAM Productions in August 2011.

further information

* Additional audio recordings and documentation available on request.

[Full performance proposal…]

updates

11–08–12: this is a repost of a previous article: change of availability from 2013 to 2014.

io 0.0.1 beta++, Bruce Coates and Franziska Schroeder (Blackrock Castle Observatory, Cork, May 26, 2010). Photo © 2010 Stephanie Hough.

Seeking performance opportunities; particularly in Europe 2014: the cyborg ensemble of interactive, semi-autonomous, technological artifact and machine musician and improviser io 0.0.1 beta++ with human musicians Han-earl Park, Bruce Coates and Franziska Schroeder.

See performance proposal for further information (availability, technical requirements, performers’ biographies, etc.).

overview

This quartet (or faux-quartet, if you prefer) performs demanding free improvisation calling on a range of extended techniques. Pieces of dismantled gestures, destabilizing timbres, and impressive synergy.

François Couture (Monsieur Délire)

An idea that would be pleasing to the Futurists of a century ago, a total hymn to modernity…. The completely improvised session requires a lot of attention from the listener, to be fully repaid by that which is a successful experiment.

Vittorio (MusicZoom)

We watch and listen carefully because we know we’re seeing a kind of manifesto in action. What is an automaton? A sketch, a material characterization of the ideas the inventor and the inventor’s culture have about some aspect of life, and how it could be. io and its kind are alternate beings born of ideas, decisions and choices. It is because io stands alone, an automaton, that the performance recorded on this CD not only is music, but is about music.

Sara Roberts (from the liner notes to SLAMCD 531)

An extraordinary meeting between human and machine improvisers. Featuring the machine musician io 0.0.1 beta++ with guitarist Han-earl Park and saxophonists Bruce Coates and Franziska Schroeder, the performance is part critique and part playful exploration, both a boundary-breaking demonstration of socio-musical technologies and an ironic sci-fi parody.

Constructed by Han-earl Park, io 0.0.1 beta++ is a modern-day musical automaton. It is not an instrument to be played but a non-human artificial musician that performs alongside its human counterparts. io 0.0.1 beta++ representing a personal-political investigation of technology, interaction, improvisation and musicality. It whimsically evokes a 1950s B-movie robot—seemingly jerry-rigged, constructed from ad-hoc components including plumbing, kitchenware, speakers and missile switches—celebrating the material and corporeal.

The performances with this artificial musician highlights society’s entanglement with technology, demonstrates alternative modes of interfacing the musical and the technological, and illuminates the creative and improvisative processes in music. The performance is a radical and playful engagement with powerful and problematic dreams (and nightmares) of the artificial; a dream as old as the anthropology of robots.

The construction of io 0.0.1 beta++ has been made possible by the generous support of the Arts Council of Ireland.

The CD ‘io 0.0.1 beta++’ (SLAMCD 531) was released by SLAM Productions in August 2011.

further information

* Additional audio recordings and documentation available on request.

[Full performance proposal…]

updates

11–08–12: change of availability from 2013 to 2014. [More info…]

Il titolo da romanzo o di sigla di messaggio segreto è il nome della macchina sparamusica/rumori che fa bella mostra di sè sul palco e che senza alcun intervento dei musicisti intorno tira giù il suo catalogo di suoni con cui gli altri si trovano a confrontarsi. Un´idea che sarebbe piaciuta ai futuristi di omai un secolo fa, un inno totale alla modernità. Altro che strumenti acustici!

I tre musicisti coinvolti insieme alla macchina sono Han-earl Park alla chitarra, Bruce Coates al sax alto e sopranino e Franziska Schroeder al sax soprano. Non hanno nessuna paura per il confronto e così si avventano con passione sulla proposta dell´oggetto inanimato.

La session completamente improvvisata richiede molta attenzione da parte dell´ascoltatore, ripagata completamente da quello che è un esperimento riuscito. Non siamo qui in presenza di programmi che danno un risultato che il compositore/programmatore si aspetta già bensì di una macchina lasciata in balia di se stessa a proporre, rispondere, per quel che è la sua comprensione, rilanciare, su cui il trio dei musicisti umani crea interazione all´istante, improvvisazioni che a tratti acquistano atmosfere molto forti.

I tre non stanno solo a scoprire le possibilità intrinseche ai loro strumenti al di fuori delle tecniche ortodosse. Stanno anche ad esplorare, a farsi prendere dalle possibilità intrinseche al suono in quanto tale ed a volte sembra di ascoltare la lezione di uno Steve Lacy. È cosí che il tutto acquista una dimensione più terrestre e l´incontro/scontro con la macchina improvvisante regala paesaggi sonori inconsueti e densi di idee. [Original article…]

Translation:

The title of the romance or cypher of the secret message is the name of the sparamusica/noise machine that makes a fine show of itself on stage and without any intervention from musicians around, draws from its catalog of sounds with which the others find themselves confronted. An idea that would be pleasing to the Futurists of a century ago, a total hymn to modernity. Nothing but acoustic instruments!

The three musicians involved with the machine are Han-earl Park on guitar, Bruce Coates on alto and sopranino, and Franziska Schroeder on soprano sax. They have no fear for the confrontation, and they throw themselves with passion on the ideas from the inanimate object.

The completely improvised session requires a lot of attention from the listener, to be fully repaid by that which is a successful experiment. Here we are not in the presence of programs that give a result that the composer/programmer expects but of a machine left to propose, to answer without any help, for what it is its understanding, raise the stakes, on which the trio of human musicians create instant interactions, improvisations that at times acquires a very intense atmosphere.

The three do not only discover the intrinsic possibilities of their instruments outside orthodox techniques. They also explore, make themselves take from the intrinsic possibilities of the sound, and sometimes seems like listening to a lesson by Steve Lacy. So the whole acquires a more earthly dimension and the encounter/clash with the improvising machine presents unusual soundscapes full of ideas.

[More info on the recording…] [All reviews…]

‘io 0.0.1 beta++’ (SLAMCD 531) is available from SLAM Productions. [Details…]

personnel: io 0.0.1 beta++ (itself), Han-earl Park (guitar), Bruce Coates (alto and sopranino saxophones) and Franziska Schroeder (soprano saxophone).

© 2011 Han-earl Park.
℗ 2011 SLAM Productions.