Wendy Reid's Ambient Bird with sfSOUND and the Bird Ensemble returns again to Live Oak Park on the Fall Equinox.
Live Oak Park is located at 1301 Shattuck Ave in Berkeley. The precise location of the performance will be just north of the recreation/theatre building, near the creek under the trees. There is no formal seating: stand and watch or wander, sit on the grass, ground, steps, distant picnic tables or bring your own chair/blanket. At 6:15pm (preceding the performance), there will be an introduction of the musicians and their instruments.
WENDY REID'S AMBIENT BIRD - Live Oak 2023
sfSound members join WENDY REID and THE BIRD ENSEMBLE in a special fall equinox outdoor performance of WENDY REID'S Ambient Bird - Live Oak 2023
M U S I C I A N S
Lulu, african grey parrot
Wendy Reid, violin
Krys Bobrowski, glisglas
Ron Heglin. tuba
Brenda Hutchinson, long tube
Aurora Josephson, voice
David Samas, percussion
Kanoko Nishi-Smith, koto
Brendan Lai-Tong, trombone
John Ingle, saxophone
Matt Ingalls, clarinet
Diane Grubbe, flute
Ambient Bird - Live Oak 2023 is a 44-minute interspecies sonic landscape/ambient environment which reflects a philosophy of connecting with all living creatures and the environment. The ensemble includes experimental musicians of various and combined approaches: traditional, improvisational, acoustic/electronic /ambient, human/non-human, working with silence.
The structure of this work can be described as a musical process which attempts to reflect nature’s manner of operations: sonic fragments of an African grey parrot (Lulu) create a spatially notated score to be interpreted and performed by the musicians within the ambient environment. Contextual in nature, the work allows performers to act according to unpredictable conditions and variables which arise within the musical continuity. In performance, an attempt is made at a spontaneous unforced growing of sound and silence in which emphasis is placed on formation rather than pre-established form, as in the building and shaping of cell-like units in living processes.
This site-specific piece, as with the first incantation of ambient bird entitled ambient bird 433, pays homage to John Cage’s composition 4’33” (1952).
Over the past 30 years, WENDY REID has composed an ongoing set of musical processes based on nature, Tree Pieces, ranging from electro-acoustic chamber compositions to larger works for chamber orchestra and open ensembles in site-specific environments.
The processes attempt to reflect the inter-connection of all things (including ourselves) in nature. In performance, an attempt is made at a spontaneous unforced and unblocked growing of sound and silence in which emphasis is placed on formation rather than pre-established form, as in the building and shaping of cell-like units in living processes.
The Tree Pieces have been performed and broadcast throughout the United States, Europe and Asia by the Abel-Steinberg-Winant Trio, the San Francisco Contemporary Music Players, the Kronos Quartet, Other Minds 19, Interpretations, Mills Performing Group, Mills Contemporary Performance Ensemble (Steed Cowart), New Music Works Ensemble (Phil Collins), San Francisco String Quartet (Nathan Rubin), Ensemble Klee, Ruffled Feathers, Brassiosaurus, Tree Ensemble, sfSound and the bird ensemble, and others.
Reid produced the new music series ‘New Music with Birds, Frogs and Other Creatures’ sponsored by the Natural Sciences Department of the Oakland Museum and the San Francisco Art Institute. Since 1990, she has taught music composition at Mills College and violin at Holy Names University PMD. She currently teaches at her studio in Berkeley.