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Clairaudient Stephen Hastings-King Brett Ian Balogh Christopher Stepler D vs. S Andria Bibiloni Bianca Bibiloni Jay Havighurst Underwater Airport Peter Spellman Russell Lane Jim Whisenant Lynda Stephens Marc Lisle Ed Blomquist White Box Project Michael Jahoda DeAnna Pellecchia Mary McCarthy Ayesha Fuentes grew up on Whidbey Island, WA, where she graduated from high school in 1999. She earned a BA from Williams College in 2003 and has studied additionally in France, Scotland, Morocco, and Hong Kong. She will be a first-year MA student at Tufts University in Boston this fall and is training to be a painting conservator. Clairaudient is a sound performance collective that specializes in long-form improvisational pieces. The members are: Stephen Hastings-King (prepared piano) and Brett Ian Balogh (radio, synthesizers and assorted electronics). Clairaudient uses innovative technical and sonic approaches to generate soundscapes. The pieces are organized around constraints, which range from overall narratives to specific procedures, having specific structures that develop organically through the interplay of the performers and the environment. Stephen is a pianist and a 1999 PhD in Modern European History from Cornell. He is a Fall 2007 Artist in Residence at the Experimental Sound Studio in Chicago. Brett Ian Balogh was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in 1972. He received his BA in Biology from the University of Pennsylvania in 1999 and his MFA from the Department of Art and Technology Studies at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2007. Brett is currently an instructor at SAIC, teaching courses in both electronics and digital fabrication. As an artist, Brett works at the intersections of objects, sounds and spaces. His work involves the creation of instruments and systems from both new and obsolete technologies, aimed at elucidating hidden relationships between ourselves and the world we inhabit. Christopher Stepler is a senior in the printmaking department at the Montserrat College of Art in Beverly, MA. His work is informed by his lifelong involvement with the ocean and his acquaintance with its histories and myths. D vs. S is a presentation of two opposing types of motion, deterministic and stochaic as they appear visually, in nature, and audibly through generated tones. The piece utilizes film clips of both types of motion, naturally occurring in Puerto Rico and New York. The rates of motion have been increased and decreased in order to magnify the specific types of motion. The auditory component consists of tones generated by voice, field recordings, and guitar whose rates are controlled by changing the parameters of reverb and delay. Throughout the piece, there are points where the visual deterministic, or predictable, motion synchronizes with the auditory. The same is true of stochaic, or random, unpredictable motion. Contrastingly, there are spaces in between where opposing types of visual and auditory motion occur. In this way, tension is created and released. Andria Bibiloni is a native New York artist who is currently based in Philadelphia. She earned her BA in Fine Arts from the University of Pennsylvania and received a Future Faculty Fellowship toward her MFA at Temple University's Tyler School of Art. In 2008 she was awarded a Joan Mitchell MFA Grant for her work in installation and sculpture. Her work has been exhibited at Labor K1 in Berlin, Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, Projects Gallery in Philadelphia, the Ice Box in Philadelphia, and the CUE Art Foundation in New York. Andria currently teaches at the Tyler School of Art in Philadelphia. Bianca Bibiloni has performed in the US, Europe and UK under the moniker Ala Muerte. Bibiloni alternates between solo performances and playing with larger ensembles, which have included Brian Daniloski (Darsombra), Oliver Barrett and Max Bondi (Bleeding Heart Narrative), and Don Mclean (Action Beat) among others. Ala Muerte was featured at SpainÕs Triku Fest in 2008, the Archetime Arts Conference in June 2009 (NY), and the New York Eye and Ear Festival in July. Bianca has also toured the US, UK and Europe as a guitarist for Destructo Swarmbots (NYC) and Action Beat (UK). Her sound collage work was on display as part of Andria BibiloniÕs ÒBlaster BikeÓ multi-media sculpture in 2008 and her ÒShred BlasterÓ piece at the Joan Mitchell MFA Awards Recipients Exhibition at the Cue Art Foundation (NYC) in 2009. Jay Havighurst, a 1980 graduate from the Studio for Interrelated Media and Sculpture at Massachusetts College of Art, studied composition with Paul Earls. Havighurst creates large sound sculpture as well as small musical instruments of his own design. He has shown his large-scale sound sculptures at the DeCordova Museum's New Directions in Sound Environments, 1980. Havighurst composed a sound score, Ancient Ocean, for dance choreographer Nancy Compton at Mobius Theater in Boston. Co-founder of the Boston Improv Group, Havighurst performed with the group in 1984 at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Havighurst composed sound installations with Mike Joly, an acoustic/electronic sound artist, in 1988 at the Gallery at the Piano Factory, Boston and in 1992 at Mobius Theater. The book, Making Musical Instruments by Hand, was authored by Havighurst in 1998. Havighurst's most recent sound sculpture installation and performance, Sound Corridor, was shown in September 2008 at Maudslay State Park. In 2009, Havighurst performed locally in Free Range Experiment at Blackburn Performing Arts in a dance/music improv with Sarah Slifer. Underwater Airport is an improvising multimedia ensemble combining music and projected visuals for the purpose of creating spontaneous portals into alternate space-time dimensions. U/A extends its antennae into the aether, pulling in transmissions from the Great Beyond. Drawing inspiration from such diverse sources as shamanic trance music, 1960's free jazz and psychedelia, ambient electronica, and world beat, the band's six members have practiced individual and collective improvisation in diverse settings far longer than they can remember. Propelled by the double drumming mind-meld of Peter Spellman and Russell Lane, piloted by the bass and Chapman Stick grooves of Jim Whisenant, set adrift by the floating guitar and synth loops of Ed Blomquist, carried aloft by the sax and electronic winds of Lynda Stephens, and enlightened by the projected visuals and wind synth of Marc Lisle, the Ambient Folk Jazz of Underwater Airport creates the ultimate launch site for departure to mystical heights and depths... Peter Spellman Ð Drums, Percussion Peter Spellman found his way into music as a guitarist in various NY bands and then switched to drums after seeing the Police perform in the late 1970s. Since then heÕs performed and recorded with reggae outfit, The Mighty Charge, world music ensemble Friend Planet, and now with the Underwater Airport crew. HeÕs scored films for the National Science Foundation, composed video games for Massachusetts General Hospital, and coaches music entrepreneurs as Director of Career Development at Berklee College of Music. With the poet Carlyle, Peter believes the deeper we see into nature, the more we realize that all is ultimately music. Find him at mbsolutions.com. Russell Lane Ð Drums, Percussion Inspired by some ill-fated combination of the Monkees television show and his big sister's American Bandstand addiction, Russell Lane began playing drums at the age of 10. After an undergraduate career studying and performing the classical art music of the 20th Century, Lane returned to his first love, the American drum set, and has never looked back. A lifelong student of music and drumming, Lane has been a constant presence in the musical community of Boston's north shore for the last 25 years. He has been known to make wild-eyed claims about rhythm being the path back to mankind's original, archaic consciousness, but mostly he just likes playing time with deep roots and a big, fat, wide one. Jim Whisenant - Bass, Stick, Percussion Jim's been playing bass and bass-like instruments for longer than he can remember, which says something to either his dedication or his memory. He remembers listening to The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, and Johnny Winter, then migrating through the English prog-rock catalog a little while later with local Wisconsin bands. Still later, at Berklee, he learned about Miles, and Coltrane, with equal interest in their legendary bass players. Not content to just play his instruments, he's also made some of them. Lynda Stephens Ð Soprano and Alto Sax, Electronic Wind Instrument Lynda Stephens is a multi-instrumentalist whose quest for variant soundscapes has led her through many bands and ensembles to her current runway in the Underwater Airport. She began playing piano at 5 and added clarinet, bass clarinet and picked up her true love, the Saxophone, in High School. She received a degree in Piano Technology at The New England School of Music specializing in Steinway Pianos, and then went into Music Production receiving a B.S. in Telecommunications Production from Syracuse University. While playing out in several diverse bands in the Boston area she briefly worked as a Recording Engineer. Embracing technology has been a passion and the electric wind instrument fuels her search for new sounds, while the soul of her playing still comes from her Soprano and Alto Sax. Marc Lisle Ð Video Projection, Electronic Wind Instrument, Percussion Marc Lisle earned a BFA in painting at the University of Florida before computers were installed in the College of Fine Arts, and after 10 years of post-graduate desktop publishing experience, he taught a variety of computer graphics courses at The Boston Architectural College and Pine Manor College from 1996Ð2004. Lisle began experimenting with digital video and VJ presentation software in 2004, and has provided live projected video mixes for performances of The Free Range Experiment at the Berklee College of Music in Boston, and the collaborative dance & prepared piano performance, 2T Shadow Worlds (with Sarah Slifer & Stephen Hastings-King) at the Tank Space in New York City. He has also begun exploring the layering of sound textures with electric wind instruments such as the Akai 4000, as well as his iPhone's ocarina app. Ed Blomquist Ð Guitars, Synths, Laptop, Loops, Flutes, Percussion, Voice Ed approaches the guitar as a hybrid between a meditation cushion and an interstellar kayak. He also enjoys making noises with other acoustic and electronic devices. White Box Project: The White Box Project is a new performance-based initiative spearheaded by dancer and choreographer Michael Jahoda that focuses on artistic research and collaboration, and comes to life in a series of site-specific performance-events being held in galleries, lounges, gardens and other offbeat locations in Boston and Cambridge throughout 2009. Michael Jahoda is a teacher, performer and choreographer from Schenectady, New York, currently living in Boston. In 1987 he received a scholarship to the Alvin Ailey American Dance Center in NYC and later joined The Alvin Ailey Repertory Ensemble. From 1988-1995 he was a principle dancer with Jennifer Muller/The Works in NYC. Michael lived in the Netherlands for 10 years, teaching and dancing extensively throughout Europe. He continues to teach at De Rotterdamse Dansacademie in Rotterdam and Henny Jurriens Stichting, Amsterdam. In 2001, together with Finnish video artist Pasi Granqvist he started "the Phillip Project" Ð a series of interrelated multi-media episodes, which to this day, he continues to develop from different venues around the world. In 2005 Michael moved back to the States. In Boston, he is a guest faculty member at Boston University and the founder of the "white box project", a new performing arts initiative that focuses on artistic research and collaborations producing a series of site-specific improvised performance-events. DeAnna Pellecchia DeAnna Pellecchia is a dancer, athlete, aerialist, actress, and choreographer committed to collaboratively creating multi-sensory works of live art. Her mission as an artist is to expand the perception of ÔdanceÕ as an accessible art form by engaging audiences of all kinds. Ms. Pellecchia is co-choreographer of Kairos Dance Theater with Ingrid Schatz. She has been a principal dancer with internationally acclaimed Paula Josa-Jones/Performance Works since 2000. She also dances with Kinodance Company and Anikai Dance Company. Mary McCarthy Over the past decade Mary McCarthy has danced and created dance in the New England area for audiences large and small, in arenas open and closed. She delights in site specific work and has as performed with numerous Boston based companies including: Kelley Donovan & Dancers, Danny Swain Dancers, Bennett Dance Company, and currently Michael JahodaÕs Whitebox Project and Nicole PierceÕs Egoart, Inc. |