musiXplore

MusiXplore is proud to present our second season. We have a great lineup of musicians this year, covering the range of free jazz, new classical and electronic styles and representing every place from the Pine Barrens in the south to the Hudson Valley in the north.

In September, we’ll host Terrence McManus, a free jazz master from Jersey City. Terrence usually plays in the city with a who’s who of experimental music, but we’re luring him back out to Jersey to show us how it’s done.

Ben Neill will be performing in October. Ben invented the Mutantrumpet, a fascinating hybrid of acoustic and electronic sound-making. Ben has a great style combining avant melodies with electronic beats, you’re gonna love it!

November’s guest ensemble is Beta Test Music. This central Jersey/Philly group orchestrates unorthodox musical material such as video game music into a unique chamber music performances.

Hailing from New Paltz, composer Bob Lukomski will grace our stage in January. Not only does Bob co-ordinate the Coterminus Collective, a group of Hudson Valley experimental musicians, he runs the Earwaker performance space and teaches at SUNY New Paltz.

We are honored to be able to present renowned percussionist Peter Jarvis in concert in February. Peter Jarvis is winning acclaim as a movie and television composer. He teaches at William Paterson University and Connecticut College.

In March, our special treat is New Jersey composer Diane Moser. Diane is founder and leader of the Composer’s Big Band that performs regularly at Trumpets in Montclair.

Finally, to end the season on a high note, we are bringing At Work (Todd Steponick) all the way from the Pine Barrens. Todd also runs Batona Records, south Jersey’s best-known record label. This will be an afternoon of spooky electronica combined with danceable beats.

We picked the right day for a celebration of the start of summer: hot and sunny with a strong chance of music! We enjoyed performance by Scott Patire, Symmetry (Jose Murcia), ArtCrime, Sparse and Nicolas Melmann, who came all the way from Argentina to perform for us.

It was a full house by the end of the evening. Thank you to everyone who dropped by, to all the musicians who performed their unique forms of music and especially our gracious hosts, the Ivanhoe Artist’s Mosaic, who run the Ivanhoe Wheelhouse and make it available to cutting edge arts programs like musiXplore. We couldn’t do it without you!

Here is the piece with which Nicolas wrapped up the evening, a wistful paean to the end of spring:

There is plenty of other video of this day on Youtube: Scott Patire’s Something Just Don’t Seem the Same, The Drones and a third piece, Symmetry’s techno revery and Nicolas Melmann’s pieces number one and number two.

Our special Friday night mini festival celebrates the longest day of the year with free experimental and electronic music from 6pm to 10pm on June 21. We are presenting musicians from around our area plus a special appearance by Nicolas Melmann who is on tour from Argentina.

This presentation is our contribution to the international Fête de la Musique festival. In 450 cities around the world, musicians will be playing free outdoor music on the same day. Click here to read the posting of our event in French.

We hope you’ll drop by the Ivanhoe Wheelhouse at 4 Spruce Street in the historic district of Paterson and listen for a while!

June 21 is a world-wide day of free music that started in France in the 1980s. There they call it Fête de la Musique, here we call it Make Music New Jersey, but it’s the same celebration of music on the longest day of the year.

musiXplore participates this year with an evening of free music at the Ivanhoe Wheelhouse. Starting at 6pm, we feature Symmetry with JEM

At 6:50, next up is Scott Patire. Scott has been a pro musician in New Jersey for many years. This set will opens your ears to some of the more experimental sounds he has been cooking up.

Then at 7:40pm, we have a special treat: Nicolas Melmann has journeyed all the way from Argentina to make music with us. Nicolas has opened for great electronic musicians such as Alva Noto and Ryuchi Sakamaoto. His sound and light show is not to be missed.

musiXplore perennial favorites ArtCrime are onstage at 8:30. They will grace us with their take on Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring, among other pieces.

Winding up the evening will be a performance by a new ensemble Sparse, composed of New Jersey musicians Dave Barry (violin), Richard Hruska (percussion), Paul Santucci (keys) and Gianni Intili (synth & Kaossilator). Their set will start around 9:20pm.

This will be a relaxed evening with plenty of time to meet the musicians. Come on down and hang with us!

From the April 21 concert, Pyxl8r (Ken Palmer) performs one of his untitled space music meditations.

You can view other performance from this concert: Piece #1, Piece #2, Piece #4 and Piece #5.

On the same date, Michael Sperone also performed three pieces that are on YouTube: Piece #1, Piece #2 and Piece #3.

Due to a sudden work emergency, Mike Hunter is not able to play this Sunday. Ken Palmer, his partner in the duo Electronic Memory, will play solo as Pyxl8r. Here is one of Ken’s pieces:

Michael Sperone will still open with a set of his processed percussion.

Guitarist Peter Biedermann will perform with keyboard player Anthony LaMort. They are 2/3 of the New Jersey trio Serious Fun, but when performing as a duo they are Amalgamation.

Peter has influenced a couple of generations of NJ experimental musicians, including our November performers, Monkeyworks. He has led bands as diverse as Ping, White Light and Serious Fun. He has come full circle from the realm of electronic music back to acoustic guitar and is now using iPad apps for looping and sound enhancement. Here is Peter playing one of his solo guitar pieces:

Anthony Mark LaMort is an organist and harpsichord player, though he does also play piano. He does not sell his music because he does not believe it to be a product. However, he makes many of his pieces freely available on his web sites. Take a listen here for samples of his improvisations.

Opening for Peter and Anthony is Kinglog (Max Schoenbaum). Max is also part of the Makoshine Collective, a group of musicians from New Jersey, New York and Connecticut who stage concerts together. Max has a variety of his pieces available on SoundCloud, so you can get an idea of what his work sounds like.

Don’t forget, we are putting on two shows this month: Electronic Memory on April 21 and this show with Peter, Anthony and Max on April 28. We hope to see you at both!

Electronic Memory is a duo composed of Mike Hunter on looped guitar/synth and Ken Palmer on synthesizer. Mike and Ken have performed at the Electro-Music Festival, the New Jersey Festival of Electronic Arts and the Event Horizon concert series, among others. They’ll bring us their mind-expanding style of ambient space music.

Ken Palmer and Mike Hunter in the WPRB studios.

Mike Hunter hosts a weekly program of ambient and space music on WPRB in Princeton NJ. Find out more about it here. His workaday title is “Principal Technical Architect – Cloud Realization”, which has to be the coolest job name ever. He also performs solo under the moniker “Ombient”.

Ken Palmer is a graphic artist and Photoshop wiz during the daylight hours, but after dark he morphs into a synth genius. One of his mods has been featured in Keyboard magazine and he performs as a soloist “Pyxl8r”. He also runs a concert series in the Trenton area called Cosmic Coffeehouse. Some of his pieces are available for audition here.

Percussionist Michael Sperone

Opening the show will be percussionist Michael Sperone. Michael is a published composer and a graduate from William Paterson University. He has some fascinating work that is processed through Max/MSP software to give cymbals a sound from another world. You can listen to more of his work here.

From the March 17 concert, If, Bwana (Al Margolis) performs “Many Many Flutes”, accompanied by John Korchok on wind synthesizer.

You can view other performance from this concert: Fork and Waves, Frogfield and Massed Roses.

If, Bwana is the performance name for experimental music legend Al Margolis. Al has been an active composer, player and distributor of experimental music since the 80s. If, Bwana is an acronym for “It’s Funny, But We Are Not Amused”.

Al began when the main source of new music was cassette tapes, and his Sound of the Pig label sold thousands of pieces of music to avant listeners world-wide. Now his output is on CD and his label is Pogus Productions.

The music that he makes is evocative, with layers of voices and sounds that sound like the past and the future all at the same time. You can hear some samples here.

Recently, he has curated performers for The Stone in New York. He tours regularly in Europe to a very appreciative audience. You can read interviews with him by Paris Transatlantic and The Wire, two of the best journals in the world of new music. We are so fortunate to be able have him perform for us at musiXplore.

There will be an opening set by ArtCrime.