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Re: Paul Lansky pulls the plug

by Mark Pasquesi :: Rate this Message:

dear gentlemen,

I'm lonely at times, especially in Calvinist banking country, for a willingness to exchange while maintaining difference. Thanks so much for sharing the beginnings of this exchange - but please don't stop!!

What I'd like to hear:
1) I'd love to hear more of your ideas on composition, and structures: The name references such as Bach, or Beethoven, mean less to me than the details of their work to which you are referring.

2) Given that we are on the SC list, these aspects of computer assisted performing-composing come to mind, whether for audio or audio-visual work:
Pattern composing versus/integrated with linear composition. Live space compositions versus pre-defined instrument. Interactive-investigative versus interactive-trigger only. Evoluative/open-ended versus defined end.

I for one find that composing/mixing/developing max, pd, sc, logic, or protools changes my output, my thinking - that each instrumental 'universe' has it's inherent limits and formatting.

3) Where to perform?
First Space must be available first (or used) so that sound can be diffused:
Available Space is site specific- (city and politically specific)....

Where I live:
As an active member of Geneva's art community, we are losing most of our independent spaces - spaces that could define and create culture without the typical controls of clubs, bars, and high-rent concert halls.(At least 20% of the city's cultural budget goes to the opera hall and grand theatre)

Unlike my hometown of Chicago, the only spaces open to computer-based or alternative/experimental music were in squat spaces - at least since the 80's (except for techno and pop which had already demonstrated it's success elsewhere). Though we are negotiating with the city for studios, we are having difficulty finding fixed performance spaces for low/no rent, which means:
1) that many alternative groups/artists that were able to come through, and have a guarantee of a performing wage plus travel assistance, has become much more limited.
Thus artists have had to have a defined audience that will definitely attend to be invited, or a defined audience pool, with funding, before being invited. This has already been the case, since Geneva has only 3 alternative spaces with regular concerts left, all of whom are hassled at times by neighbors or the police.
Chicago, in contrast, has at least 9 commercial bars which offered 3 bands for 7 bucks several times a weeks- which allowed an enormous range for experimenting for both audiences and artists.
However, for electro-acoustic work in a serious atmosphere -
Geneva has Cave 12, a relatively well-known electro_acoustic lieu which has lost it's space, and Archipel (the festival).

2) housing for visiting artists has also been reduced.
3) even bars open to alternative compositions have been harassed by police for noise and sound.

Current solutions:
1) political action and pressure (composing political space in oder to invite new art)
2) festival participation (Archipel, Bellouard)
3) traditional art spaces opening more to sound - private galleries, museums,
4) Cave 12, our lighthouse of alterative (no, not brit-pop alterno) music, now has a regularised relationship with 2 concert spaces (all subsidized, limiting rental costs, maximizing payment to composers/artists)

I'd be interested to hear how various sites for varied musics are being created/limited in your cities, and what strategies your communities are using to expand these.

Sincerely,

Mark Pasquesi
Geneva

--- On Tue, 8/5/08, Donald Craig <rhomboid@...> wrote:

From: Donald Craig <rhomboid@...>
Subject: Re: [sc-users] Paul Lansky pulls the plug
To: sc-users@...
Date: Tuesday, August 5, 2008, 7:03 PM

I had forgotten how much fun it is to have a discussion with someone  
with such a different viewpoint.
I think we are going to wind up agreeing to disagree.

> I hate this attitude. My position has absolutely nothing to do with
> capitulating to an audience's limited conception of what good music is
> (or can be).
>
> I'm at work now and I don't have time to thrash it out further at
the
> moment. I'll say for now that I suspect "giving them what they
think
> they want" has a bit of the smell of the straw man about it.

Straw man?
 Possibly, but I was thinking of Adorno's "Culture
Industry"  
and making a general
observation, not one specifically about your practice.

(Let me add here, that I don't claim to be free of the negative  
impacts and influences of the culture industry. My
high horse, such as it is, is really just a brightly painted rocking  
horse.)

>> My original post was prompted by some mild irritation at the  
>> implicit notion that the 'Academy' is inauthentic...
>
> Often it is, but sometimes it's absolutely the real thing. I've
heard
> great stuff in concert halls -- including acousmatic stuff like Trevor
> Wishart's Vox-5 in quad (scared the crap out of me) and Lansky's
Ride
> (a wide-ranging journey).

Throw in my general irritation with the whole notion of authenticity,  
which is so slippery and amorphous, and just
an aggravation to deal with, if one is honest about
 it.


>> , that one measures authenticity by the number of people who show up.
>
> Whoa, there. I *never* said that. I think you are reading something
> into my post that isn't there.

Again, this is not directed at you specifically. However, a social  
activity does require people to show up, no?
If only one person shows, is this sufficient? Is the music just as  
valuable, or less, or more?

>
> I realize that what I posted is utopian in the truest sense of the
> word - it can never happen! - but I find it valuable to get myself out
> of some easy habits of mind. Scott (scacinto)'s criticism is right on
> target, but even there some assumptions remain - that the point is for
> the audience to appreciate *my* care in preparing the work, that they
> should appreciate it all from start to finish (because it's *mine* and
> if they hear only part of it, it's
 somehow an insult to *me*), that
> *my* work should be the central focus - *my* *my* *my*. I think there
> is value in questioning those assumptions. Whether the result of that
> questioning is purely free of ego or not... I don't really care. But
> part of what artists do is to imagine something that doesn't exist
> yet, and I don't want to limit that imagination to the sonic product.

Okay, so now who's building straw men? I don't know any composers who
feel this way. (Admittedly, I can't see into their heart of hearts!) I  
agree with
the real points here. I think we both have utopian notions but differ  
on what
it should look like.  Yours somehow reminds me of American Idol (yeesh!)
and mine is probably the well-heeled, holding a snifter of brandy, and  
pissing
and moaning about the decay of civilization!

I don't know that there are any points to actually respond to in this 
 
post. We may have reached that
point of agreeable disagreement.

Don



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« Return to Thread: Paul Lansky pulls the plug