Category: library experimental

Library Experimental with Visda Goudarzi – June 29, 2024

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Library Experimental is an ongoing series focusing on Chicago’s experimental musicians. It is happening at the Chicago Public Library in Jefferson Park on Saturday, June 29 at 3.30pm.

Early! Free! All ages!

The upcoming show features Visda Goudarzi.

Do note the start time of 3.30pm. This is when Visda will begin her performance that is open to the public.

Before her performance Visda will lead a free, hands-on workshop for young people, ages 10-13, where they will learn about sound synthesis basics, and how to create and modify sound. Registration through the library is required for this portion of the event. The workshop begins at 2pm. Space is limited.

If you know an interested young person you can register them through the library’s website here: https://chipublib.bibliocommons.com/events/665f2e4249b0970ff4891bf9

Jefferson Park library is located at 5363 W Lawrence. Convenient to both bus and blue line. https://www.chipublib.org/locations/38/

Visda Goudarzi is a computer musician working at the intersection of audio and human-computer interaction. Her research interests include sound and music computing, live coding, data sonification, sound synthesis, and the application of new media in art. She designs and performs using interactive and participatory sonic interfaces. Her sonic works include live electronic performances, live coding and data driven sound. She is an Associate Professor and Associate Chair of Audio Arts and Acoustics at Columbia College Chicago.

https://www.colum.edu/academics/faculty/detail/visda-goudarzi.html

Library Experimental with Janna Lee and Christopher Riggs/Kieran Daly – April 27, 2024

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Library Experimental is an ongoing series focusing on Chicago’s experimental musicians. It is happening at the Chicago Public Library in Jefferson Park on Saturday, April 27 at 2pm, and features Janna Lee and Christopher Riggs / Kieran Daly!

Early! Free! Kid friendly! If the kids are patient!

Jefferson Park library is located at 5363 W Lawrence. Convenient to both bus and blue line. https://www.chipublib.org/locations/38/

Janna Lee is a Chicago artist who uses her voice to explore various facets of herself, and blurs the line between angel and demon. In addition to being the vocalist of Snek Trio and Obsequies, her solo work combines harsh noise and haunting vocals into a maelstrom that confronts the dark side of humanity. Her versatility has garnered a diverse range of collaborations, including Bob Genghis Khan, Galaxxu, Unmanned Ship, Ben Zucker, and Scarlet Diva.

https://jannaleemusic.bandcamp.com/

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Photo Credit: Erin Workman

Kieran Daly is a composer and guitarist with concentrations in electroacoustic and improvised music. Some of his prolific work has been featured by the Chicago Reader, Flea, Hibari, Issue Project Room, Lateral Addition, Madacy Jazz, Pitchfork, Triple Canopy, and Wire Magazine.

Photo Credit: Gonzalo Guzman for Chicago Reader

Christopher Riggs is an autistic person who plays experimental music on the electric guitar. Without the use of processing or FX, they squeeze sounds from their guitar the Chicago Reader has called “brutalist, abstract, cold”.

https://www.christophertriggs.com/

Library Experimental with Reversed Bear Trap and Sun Picture – March 16, 2024

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Library Experimental is an ongoing series focusing on Chicago’s experimental musicians. It is happening at the Chicago Public Library in Jefferson Park on Saturday, March 16 from 2-4pm, and features Reversed Bear Trap and Sun Picture!

Early! Free! Kid friendly! If the kids are patient!

Jefferson Park library is located at 5363 W Lawrence. Convenient to both bus and blue line. https://www.chipublib.org/locations/38/

Reversed Bear Trap is the musical side project of English PhD student Krista Muratore aka Krista Bloom. Krista Muratore is also a video artist, writer and general hooligan.

https://reversedbeartrap.bandcamp.com/

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Sun Picture is the instrumental home studio project of Venezuelan-American musician Carlos Lowenstein.

Using everything from modular synths to live instruments, Sun Picture blends elements of ambient, dub, spiritual jazz, and Latin-American beats. This mix is approached with a restraint suggestive of krautrock’s detached stance.

https://sunpicture.bandcamp.com/

Library Experimental with Hali Palombo and Meredith Haines – October 28, 2023

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Library Experimental is an ongoing series focusing on Chicago’s experimental musicians. It is happening at the Chicago Public Library in Jefferson Park on Saturday, October 28 from 2-4pm, and features Hali Palombo and Meredith Haines!

Early! Free! Kid friendly! If the kids are patient!

Jefferson Park library is located at 5363 W Lawrence. Convenient to both bus and blue line. https://www.chipublib.org/locations/38/

Hali Palombo is an avid practitioner of “plunderphonics”: sampling existing musical/aural works and intertwining them into something brand new, whether it’s shortwave radio and CB radio samples, wax cylinder audio, and field recordings taken from Midwestern points of interest. Through her music and art, she aims to make the perceived ordinary hypnotic, haunting and memorable.

www.halipalombo.com

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Meredith Haines is a multidisciplinary artist and educator working with sound, installation, performance, and video. Her work engages the political capacities of sound, and explores noise as a method of social resistance. She has performed and exhibited work all over the country at venues such as No Nation, High Concept Labs, New Boone Gallery, AS220, Space 1026, and the DUMBO Dance Festival.

After earning a BFA in dance and choreography at Temple University and working as a musician in Philadelphia for over a decade, Meredith’s work led her to Chicago in 2019 to earn her Master’s in Sound Arts and Industries at Northwestern University on a merit scholarship. She is a current Fellow Artist-in-Residence at High Concept Labs in Chicago, Illinois, and also performs under the moniker, MAIR

www.meredithfranceshaines.com

Library Experimental with Amanda Kraus and Helena Ford – April 23, 2023

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Library Experimental is an ongoing series focusing on Chicago’s experimental musicians. It is happening at the Chicago Public Library in Jefferson Park on Sunday, April 23 from 2-4pm.

Early! Free! Kid friendly! If the kids are patient!

The first show after a pandemically long hiatus features Amanda Kraus and Helena Ford.

Jefferson Park library is located at 5363 W Lawrence. Convenient to both bus and blue line. https://www.chipublib.org/locations/38/

Amanda Kraus photo by Daniel Kraus.

photo by Daniel Kraus

Amanda Kraus is a local educator/percussionist. She can be found online at amandakraus.org/music.

Previous work in various ensembles:
Arc Pair (ongoing)
March 25, 2020 ESS Quarantine Concert
Previous Jefferson Park EXP performance Nov 1, 2020
Boob Sweat (2017)
PLAN Quartet (2019)

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Helena Ford (Chicago, IL) is a Chicago experimental musician. Her practice focuses on drone and durational performances, incorporating elements of musique concrete, minimalism, and free improvisation. Her primary instruments include no-input mixing board, baritone guitar, and synthesizers.

https://helenaford.bandcamp.com/

Jefferson Park EXP with Rachel Devorah and Kimberly Sutton – December 13, 2pm

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In lieu of free live shows at the neighborhood library, we’re doing free live shows via twitch! The next show is on Sunday December 13 at 2pm (CST/UTC-06), join us!

https://www.twitch.tv/jeffersonparkexp

Kimberly A. Sutton is a sound artist, cellist, and sound designer living in Chicago, Illinois. Her installations and sound design work explore the connections between the physical properties of sound and the cultural signifiers of its content. As a cellist her practice is improvisatory and explores the possibilities of expression and reflection through sound and the immediacy of a meditational connection to her instrument.

Recent installations have been shown at ArtPrize in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and the Chicago Home Theater Festival. She has performed at Experimental Sound Studio, the Hideout and the Empty Bottle in Chicago, Yoshi’s in Oakland, Detroit Contemporary, and the Technosonics Festival at the University of Virginia. She has a BA in Political Science and Music from the University of Chicago and an MFA in Electronic Music and Recorded Media from Mills College.

http://kimberlyasutton.com/

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Rachel Devorah is a sonic artist and feminist technologist. Her work seeks to reveal and reframe habits of autoecholocation (situating one’s self with/in sound/space).

She is an Assistant Professor of Electronic Production and Design/Creative Coding at the Berklee College of Music. She studied sound, technology, and gender at the City University of New York (Queens College); San José State University; Mills College; and the University of Virginia. Her work has received support from the Adrian Piper Research Archive Foundation (Berlin), EMS (Stockholm), GRM (Paris), the Jefferson Scholars Foundation [U.S.], MassMoCA [U.S.], MoKS [Estonia], the New Museum (New York), New Music USA, røst [Norway], and STEIM (Amsterdam). Her installation revontulet won the Ruth Anderson Prize from the International Alliance of Women in Music.

http://racheldevorah.studio/

library experimental – december 2019

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Library Experimental is an ongoing series focusing on Chicago’s experimental musicians. It is happening at the Chicago Public Library in Jefferson Park on Saturday, December 21 from 2-4pm.

Early! Free! Kid friendly! If the kids are patient!

The first show after a long hiatus features William Riley Leitch; and Our Lisbon Office (Tricia Park, Mark Booth, Nathanael Jones).

Jefferson Park library is located at 5363 W Lawrence. Convenient to both bus and blue line. https://www.chipublib.org/locations/38/

William Riley Leitch is a Chicago area trombonist. Riley has performed at the Nief Norf Festival, soundSCAPE Festival, and the Lucerne Festival Academy where he studied with members of Ensemble Intercontemporain and Ensemble Modern. Riley has premiered over 20 new works for solo trombone, chamber ensemble, and orchestra at events and venues such as Ear Taxi Festival and Red Note New Music Festival.

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Our Lisbon Office is an improvisational ensemble comprised of Tricia Park (violin), Mark Booth (electronics), and Nathanael Jones (electronics/keyboard). For Library Experimental at the Jefferson Park Library the trio will perform improvisations initiated by a selection of abstract prose instructions.

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library experimental – july 7, 2018

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Library Experimental is an ongoing series focusing on Chicago’s experimental musicians. It is happening at the Chicago Public Library in Jefferson Park on Saturday, July 7 from 2-4pm.

Early! Free! Kid friendly! If the kids are patient!

The final show of the 2018 season features Christopher Riggs; and Will Soderberg / Enid Smith.

Jefferson Park library is located at 5363 W Lawrence. Convenient to both bus and blue line. https://www.chipublib.org/locations/38/

Christopher Riggs is a teacher who also plays experimental music on the electric guitar.

Using springs, magnets, pieces of metal, dowels, and violin bows, he makes his instrument sound like underwater pterodactyls, cellos from space, the inside of a trash compactor, alien insects, malfunctioning mp3 files, or washing machines filled with marbles. He achieves these unguitar-like sounds without the aid of processing or effects.

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Enid Smith earned her BFA in contemporary dance from the North Carolina School of the Arts. In New York City, she performed with Ivy Baldwin Dance, The Merce Cunningham Repertory Understudy Group, Anita Cheng Dance, and MAC Cosmetics among others. Since moving to the Chicago area in 2007, she has presented her own work under the name enidsmithdance, collaborated with The North Shore Choral Society and the artists of Articular Facet, and worked extensively with The Evanston Dance Ensemble and ede2. Most recently Enid has performed with Khecari and as a guest artist with Lucky Plush Productions. She currently teaches advanced modern at Dovetail Studios and Dance Center Evanston and maintains a massage therapy practice.

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Will Soderberg’s first recorder was a Kenner ‘Say It Play It’ which he received for Christmas in 1969. He likes to record sounds and videos and then change them using: ipads, computers, discarded electronics, found objects, abandoned ios apps & devices, obsolete software, etc. He attempts to manipulate and recombine sources to provoke new contexts by placing them in unfamiliar, often imaginary settings. He likes to perform with musicians & dancers of all ages.

library experimental – five lullabies by lykanthea!

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By turns gentle, frightening, and humorous, the lullaby becomes a subject of experimentation for Lykanthea’s Lakshmi Ramgopal. In a dreamy evening performance of traditional Tamil songs and her own original pieces, Five Lullabies by Lykanthea explores the genre as a conduit for handing down knowledge, and with it, childhood, loss, and sleep. She will be accompanied by cellist Lia Kohl.

Library Experimental is an ongoing series focusing on Chicago’s experimental musicians. It is happening at the Chicago Public Library in Jefferson Park on Thursday, July 5 from 7-7.30pm.

The fifth installment of the 2018 season features is split into two performances. The first of which will be a special evening event featuring Lykanthea! The show will begin promptly at 7pm, so please arrive a little before then.

Free! Kid friendly! If the kids are patient!

Jefferson Park library is located at 5363 W Lawrence. Convenient to both bus and blue line. https://www.chipublib.org/locations/38/

Artist info:

Lykanthea

Over the last four years, the work of Lykanthea’s Lakshmi Ramgopal has transformed from explorations of electro-ambient pop idioms into expansive performances and installations. Her debut EP Migration garnered praise from Noisey, Chicago Tribune, and Public Radio International’s The World for its alchemy of synths, catchy melodies, and Carnatic improvisatory techniques. The record led to a European tour, Leipzig’s Wave-Gotik Treffen, and an opening performance for the 50th anniversary celebrations of Chicago’s Museum of Contemporary Art, where she shared a bill with Billy Corgan, Lupe Fiasco, and Jamila Woods. Amid all this, while completing her PhD, she teamed up with Paula Matthusen to create Prex Gemina, a sound installation for the American Academy in Rome’s show Cinque Mostre.

Since the death of her grandmother and birth of her niece last year, Ramgopal has turned her attention to atavistic questions of motherhood and personal legacy. Her sound installation Maalai, which appears this summer the Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art, explores the histories of women in her family and the contemporary practice of Hinduism in domestic spaces using real and fabricated audiovisual records. With A Half-Light Chorus, which Experimental Sound Studio commissioned this year for its Florasonic series, she considers memory and kinship with an installation in Chicago’s Lincoln Park Conservatory featuring vocalists imitating the calls of birds from India and Sanskrit literature. This new body of work joins multidisciplinary ensemble shows that herald a shift in Ramgopal’s storytelling—one that eschews cold electronics and embraces the warmth of the sruti box, unprocessed vocals, and performance art and dance.

These journeys find a home in Ramgopal’s follow-up to Migration, which is due later this year. A study in the search for renewal after loss, hope mingles with despair in her new record. In Lykanthea lies the eternal possibility of transformation and rebirth.

http://lykanthea.com
http://twitter.com/lykanthea
http://instagram.com/lykanthea
http://facebook.com/lykanthea

library experimental – june 2018

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Library Experimental is an ongoing series focusing on Chicago’s experimental musicians. It is happening at the Chicago Public Library in Jefferson Park on Saturday, June 9, from 2-4pm.

Early! Free! Kid friendly! If the kids are patient!

The fourth installment of the 2018 season features Lindsey French / Willy Smart; Sarah J. Ritch; and Morgan Krauss!

Jefferson Park library is located at 5363 W Lawrence. Convenient to both bus and blue line. https://www.chipublib.org/locations/38/

artist info:

Lindsey French / Willy Smart

Lindsey french is an artist whose work engages in gestures of sensual and mediated communication with landscapes and the nonhuman. Her projects materialize as texts written in collaboration with trees, scent transmissions, and performative lectures. She currently teaches at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in the Departments of Art and Technology Studies and Contemporary Practices.

Stemming from Anna Tsing’s idea of contamination as collaboration, Willy Smart and Lindsey french offer a space for listening to the landscape. Field recordings of contaminated landscapes, live local environmental input, and human error suggest modes for rereading and hearing Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring.

Sarah Ritch

Along with classical training in cello and piano, Sarah Ritch has also played guitar and bass in several punk and metal bands prior to her academic music studies. Ms. Ritch holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Music, a Post-Baccalaureate Certificate in Studio Arts from SAIC’s Sound department, and a Master’s Degree in Computer Science. Sarah studied cello performance at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas with Moonlight Tran and Dr. Andrew Smith, and with Barbara Haffner at the Chicago College of Performing Arts.

Sarah Ritch’s work ranges from improvisational noise to tonal notated music to musical studies on algorithmic expression. She has been the composer-in-residence for Chicago classical ensembles the Millennium Chamber Players and the Anaphora Ensemble. Ms. Ritch is an advocate for education in the arts and technology, having taught Music Theory, Composition, and Cello at the Southport Performing Arts Conservatory, and serving as Director of Technology and Professor of The History and Science of Sound
for the College of Architecture, Design, and the Arts at UIC.

Morgan Krauss

Morgan Krauss (b. 1985) is a composer currently living in Chicago. She received her Bachelor of Music in Composition at Columbia College Chicago in the winter of 2012. She is now continuing her studies in Music Composition as a Doctoral student at Northwestern University.

Krauss’ ambitions in her works are to produce tactile explorations based on ones physical awareness and elements of allurement. Her music is focused on the latent instability of seemingly fixed gestures where the interaction between the performer and the score creates yet a third entity, often guided by improvisation and the clashing of emotional opposites.