3 August 2012

LIMB: A new music concert

| johnboy
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This in from Yvonne:

Limb is an extension of the body. LIMB is a concert that will open your mind.

Percussionist Yvonne Lam (and drummer with Canberra experimental rock band Mornings) has programmed a concert of new music from some of Australia’s most exciting composers.

The concert aims to free ‘classical’ contemporary music from its conservatism. Too often music of this genre is considered lofty, intimidating, and part of the realms of high art. LIMB seeks to remove these barriers, and demonstrate the wondrous sonic possibilities of contemporary music to an everyday audience.

The highlight of the concert is the premiere of Reset for percussion duo and field recording, composed by Austin Buckett (Pollen Trio, Kasha), and commissioned by Yvonne Lam. In Reset, the percussionists play with clockwork precision to the demands of a click track. The result is a performance apathy which challenges the notions of emotional live performance. Episodes of shrill glass bottle sounds and spontaneous bass drum explosions are balanced with moments of hushed, meditative reverie.

The cornerstone of the piece is the use of close-miked snare drums. The drums are choreographically brushed with sandpaper, emitting a white-noise effect which is fed through a quadrphonic amplifier set-up arranged around the performance venue. Each listener has a unique experience of the resulting static noise.

The program also features two percussion pieces from Australian composers. Mark Pollard’s The Heavenly Muzak Machine features foru players surrounding a single vibraphone, using bows, fingers, and their voices to create mini-tapestries of music of the divine. Andrian Pertout’s Exposiciones, glockenspiel and tape are used to mimic micro-tonal tuning systems on a regular acoustic instruments, strung together with breakneck rhythmic complexity.

Opening the night is Pollen Trio, an experimental ensemble featuring Austin Buckett (piano, electronics), Evan Dorrian (drums) and Miroslav Bukovsky (trumpet, percssion, electronics). After a short break from live performances, the trio is back touring off their November 2011 release, Roll Slow. This full-length album demonstrates the band’s deepening interest in combining improvisation with loosened song structures and intervening electronics.

This is a night of refreshing and challenging music that is not to be missed.

Band Room, ANU School of Music
$5 concession/ $15 adults

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