San Francisco Classical Voice

In the spirit of Nike (the Greek goddess of victory, as well as the shoe company), the swoosh is still an operating principle in the world of electroacoustic music, at least as presented by the reincarnation of the San Francisco Tape Music Center in a marathon three-hour concert last Saturday night at 557 Howard Street.

The "microFestival (musique Acousmatique ["Rendered on Tape"])" offered arcs and swooshes of natural and altered found sounds (musique concrète) and purely electronic sounds that ranged from delicate trickles to ear-deafening explosions. The intimacy of the venue and quadraphonic speakers helped to create a dark, surround-sound womb for the full and enthusiastic crowd.

Scotland's Robert Dow evoked a Season of Mist in rainy waves and coastal drones of Bach-ish cello, industrial locomotives, and pile drivers -- all adding up to a surprisingly lovely and varied world. Jean-Claude Risset's Invisible Irene brought haunting Varèsian French voices to life in gorgeous, reverberating, almost-minimalist counterpoint.

The works of Four English composers were presented: Matthew Adkins' rhythmically surreal Melt, Adrian Moore's microtonally/medievally pianistic SuperStrings, Jonty Harrison's childishly playful Unsound Objects, and Jo Thomas' uncannily beautiful Dark Noise.

Two other foreigners to the Bay Area were represented: Elainie Lilliosa (from Texas) and Hideko Kawamoto (from Japan). Lilliosa's piece, Arturo, conjured up ominous mysticism. Kawamoto's Night Ascends from the Ear Like a Butterfly offered us ornithological missives and missiles.

From Bay Area composers came three works: Maggie Payne's windy-space, Ligetian Apparent Horizon, David Slusser's quick and powerful Kubrick, and the sonorous bowls and bounces of Joseph Anderson's Kyai Pranaja. It was an evening of challenging and engaging music.

(Mark Alburger is a San Francisco Bay Area composer and publisher and editor of Twenty-First Century Music.)

©2000 Mark Alburger, all rights reserved