Sound Projector Review of Acoustic Textures

missed this one when it first appeared some nice words about the Acoustic Textures CDr.

“Hidden gem of the week: the Manchester improvising guitarist David Birchall, whose one-take directly-recorded improvisations are splendidly presented on his Acoustic Textures (BLACK CAT PRESS 002) collection. Birchall is of the school of those who insert objects into acoustic instruments, building on the prepared piano notion, but his technique is to play the inserted objects as much as he plays the guitar, allowing the soundboard to act as a natural amplifier for his multiple – erm – interpolations…what I enjoy is the spirited bounce and snap of his playing attack, suggesting strongly he’s not one of these self-satisfied aesthetes who invite us to admire the sumptuous resonances of their vibrating bowls or shimmering saucepans used as percussion. He does seem to be more about the physical sound he creates, rather than a muso improviser indulging their over-crafted technique. Visual representations of the objects used in this performance are provided in the mini art booklet, where Birchall has co-opted Max Ernst’s frottage technique to generate strong monochrome images. Excellent. (23/08/2012)”

http://www.thesoundprojector.com/2013/05/25/play-as-parable/

new sounds with Sam Andreae & Andrew Cheetham

Been doing some great playing in last few months with Sam Andreae and this has started developing into a trio with Andrew Cheetham. It’s been a really great meeting point for us all to play, we all have approached the music from very different points of view but seem to have arrived at a point of developing some kind of mutual language. Gigs and recordings to follow. A taste here meanwhile…

new Levenshulme Bicycle Orchestra stuff

Been doing some really exciting work the last month or two designing new bike instruments with Huw. He’s made a little teasing video during his building… some pictures to follow.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4vdP0I0DQak

slowly we have been finding new ways to play and the new piece which works much more like a huge amplified sculpture than the last pieces. Getting some music we’re really pleased with now.

You can hear them as they appear here

https://soundcloud.com/lev-bike-orchestra

 

and there’s more infos and the group here http://levenshulmebicycleorchestra.wordpress.com/

Highgate Cementery

hg6hg5Last Friday afternoon I had some free time  between two moving and fun evenings watching the Instant Composers Pool at the Vortex so I took a trip up to Highgate cemetery. This came to be as part of a long considered mission to see where Karl Marx is buried. Having failed the last time I was  in London to make it even though I fully intended to get there it seemed like too good a chance to miss. My previous date with it having been given over to the Horniman Museum’s instrument collection in Forest Hill. I took the tube to Archway then walked up the hill past school kids and people getting on and off buses with granny trolleys. Managed to get pleasantly lost and walk pretty much all the way round the perimeter of the graveyard before finding the entrance. The cemetery is surrounded by incredible houses which must date from when Highgate was an outlying district of the city; the area around the graveyard has the real feel of a small hamlet enveloped by London. Once inside it is a strange little world all to itself; a small universe managed by volunteers making decisions by committee. Its easy to move about on the main paths which are paved but all the smaller ones resemble muddy country tracks moving between some wonderful old trees. Graves with roots wrapping round them. It’s a great place. Marx’s headstone is of course something of a social realist nightmare a huge concrete plinth with a sculpture of his head atop. It’s not the original headstone, which was apparently much more modest; the current one was raised by subscription by The Communist Party Of Great Britain in 1954. I spent a couple of pleasant moments there thinking.

hg4Around me two Spanish couples and a group of middle aged German men I imagine to be a Trade Unionists holiday outing from the Ruhr Valley are taking pictures. I walk down the hill stopping off to draw birdsong at Patrick Caulfield’s self designed “DEAD” memorial, Douglas Adams and at a few other points on the many benches dotted about. The day before I’d picked up a really interesting looking double CD of British birdsong published by the British Library and CD by Ostad Elai from Honest Johns in Ladbroke Grove. More on to come no doubt.