The Key of Z
June 2, 2004 - June 30, 2004
June 2
A film and performance festival on Wednesdays in June
Sponsored by Amoeba Music
Join us as we explore the sometimes eccentric, but always ecstatic, ventures of composers and musicians who embrace the odder edges of sonic pleasure.
It was the "tyranny of the twelve-tone scale" that led rebel composer Harry Partch to construct the Surrogate Kithara, Marimba Eroica, Chromolodeon, and Cloud-Chamber Bowls, creating alternatives in tone and timbre. Partch's instruments were fantastical, he said, not by design but by "philosophic purpose." This purposeful impulse has found exquisite expression in a broad community of instrument builders who seek sound possibilities clearly outside of traditional acoustic experience. This can be anything aural, from the PVC pipes turned into propulsive percussion by From Scratch, to the slender glass keys of the Baschets' Cristal; from Ellen Fullman's Long Stringed Instrument, a multitonal drone device 100 feet in length, to clothes-drying racks, miked then struck with chopsticks by The Cleaning Women. While recorded portraits and performance are at the center of The Key of Z, each evening will be accented with live presentations by some of the Bay Area's most delirious sound practitioners.
Curated by Steve Seid
Wednesday, June 2, 2004
7:30 a.m. From Scratch: Pacific 3, 2, 1, Zero and Drum/Sing
Live Performance by Tom Nunn. Percussive sounds played with apocalyptic fervor, and quieter invented stringed and pronged instruments like the Zitherum, are the province of New Zealand's From Scratch. Gregor Nicholas has beautifully rendered their music on film.
Wednesday, June 9, 2004
7:30 p.m. Baschet: The Transfiguration of Daily Life
Live Performance by Peter Whitehead. Eric Marin in Person. Discover the whimsical sound structures and "extraterrestrial" sonorities of the Baschets, sculptors and engineers turned instrument makers, in Eric Marin's documentary. With shorts Stephen Scott: Entrada, Trimpin: Selected Works, and Earwig.
Wednesday, June 16, 2004
7:30 p.m. Harry Partch: Delusion of the Fury
Live Performance by Mobius Operandi. A program devoted to the American maverick Harry Partch, inventor of fanciful instruments and creator of a "total theater" through his integration of dance, stagecraft, and ritual. With short Suspended Music.
Wednesday, June 23, 2004
7:30 p.m. Francis Dhomont: My Cinema for the Ears
Live Performance by Cheryl E. Leonard. A salute to Francis Dhomont, maestro of musique concrète, where naturally occurring sounds are severed from their origins through manifold manipulations. With shorts Bolero and Shoot the Player Piano.
Wednesday, June 30, 2004
7:30 p.m. The Cleaning Women: Cleaning Up!
Live Performance by Jon Brumit. Music videos and riotous live footage showcase Finland's The Cleaning Women, whose pulsing techno sound is made from household objects. With shorts Ear to the Ground and Record Players.
Amoeba Music in Berkeley and San Francisco has generously sponsored the live performances included in each evening's program; special thanks to Marc Weinstein and Dean Santomieri. We wish to acknowledge Other Minds, especially James Newman and Charles Amirkhanian, for support of this music series. Special thanks to the New Zealand Film Archive for the loan of 35mm films featuring From Scratch, and to Bart Hopkins of EMI.
