Luggage Store under the belt

After repeating Ngoma Lungundu - with some basic revisions - last night at the Music By the Eyeful opener, Luggage Store, San Francisco, I was tagged by Jimmy Howe for an on-street interview. He's got a great Blog, check it out at theatreoftheblind.net. You can also hear Keith Evans talk about his compelling live-analogue-video-sonic collab with Dylan Bolles. It was a great evening, well-attended, even if the general audience seemed a little at sea. It was a pretty esoteric exposition, come to think of it.

Thanks to Suki O'Kane, as usual doing an outstanding job of curating, hosting, introducing and generally Illuminating (sic) all our lives!



One thing not mentioned in the inner-view, Ngoma (as well as Thirsty Sword Pt.1) are really uncharacteristic works for me. Kadet Kuhne, who was in attendance last night (thanks for coming KK!) immediately noticed it and commented - "this is much different than anything you've done!" which is completely true. There are creative issues I'm still wrestling with, the first is - I have noticed that people who hear Ngoma without seeing the video have a much stronger response to it than those who have seen it mediated by the video. If the video is compromising the work, I'm inclined to axe the video for future performances; on the other hand, the video wouldn't go wasted because I am trying to collaborate with my friend Francesca Penzani, choreographer, to expand the piece into a dance work. The video would then become part of a complete performative construction.

I'm not worried about Thirsty Sword Pt.1 because any of my creative issues with that work will be addressed in Thirsty Sword Pt.2.

I will be recording Thirsty Sword Pt.1 tonight at the Maybeck recital hall (where I'm performing it tomorrow night) on the Yamaha 7.5' grand. The finished recording will be released with Ngoma sometime in early 2009, probably January. Watch my various websites for details on that.

Again, I have to thank Suki and also a big shout to Ivo Medek who was such a fantastic host at the Janacek Academie.
Cha