Saturday, July 28th 2012
119 Gallery, Lowell
BLUE SAUSAGE INFANT (Washington, DC)
VIOLET (Washington, DC)
Called »the godfather of american noise« by Ukrainian MTV, Jeff Surak is a veteran experimenter from Washington DC.
Since his early recordings under the name -1348-, Surak established himself in the international hometaper underground network of the 1980s, releasing tapes on the his own Watergate Tapes, imprint, along with such artists as Controlled Bleeding, F/i, and Kapotte Muziek; and collaborating with icons like Zan Hoffman, Crawling with Tarts, and John Hudak. At the same time Surak performed with the notorious DC area industrial band New Carrollton.
The 1990s found Surak living and performing in Russia. There he formed the group Sovmestnoye Predpriyatiye which created site specific works using found materials and sounds.
At the turn of the millenium Surak created a new duo, V. which quickly blew out of the its initial framework of free improv into a unit that pushed the limits of composition, constantly reinventing itself with each recording and performance. After 11 albums in 2 years, the duo disbanded, leaving Surak to further continue explorations under his solo project called Violet. Found objects, microcassettes, damaged cds, prepared acoustic instruments, and old record players outfitted with foil are the tools of choice. Violet has collaborated with Alexei Borisov, Frans De Waard, Betrand Denzler, Michael Gendreau, Andrey Kiritchenko, Kotra, Francisco Lopez, Andreas Tilliander and many others. Since 2002 Violet has released numerous recordings in a variety of formats and has performed across the USA and Europe.
Surak also directs the annual Sonic Circuits Festival in Washington DC, presenting such artists as Faust, Merzbow, Fennesz, Magma, Jandek, Phill Niblock, Wolf Eyes, Evan Parker, Matmos, Fckn Bstrds, Andrea Parkins, Elliott Sharp and hundreds of others.
Official site: www.zeromoon.com/violet
JUNKO FUJIWARA (Haverill, MA) / ANDREW NEUMANN (Boston, MA)
Junko Fujiwara Simons is both a creative musician/improviser and an active classical player performing in varying venues and capacities throughout New England and the Midwest. She is a member of the classical chamber group Kalliope Piano Trio, a Boston-based free jazz/improvisation group called BOLT, an improvisational group based out of Milwaukee called Evocation Trio, and is a semi-regular performer with the Metal & Glass Ensemble (a Boston-based group, which plays acoustic, microtonal music). Ms. Simons holds adjunct cello faculty positions at Boston College (where she also coaches chamber groups and directs the cello ensemble), Governor’s Academy, Masconomet School in Topsfield, Ipswich Public Schools, and also maintains a studio of private students. She also enjoys her affiliation with the Northeast Massachusetts Youth Orchestra (formerly NYSO), where she coaches cello sectionals and chamber groups. Ms. Simons has a Master of Music degree from Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, and a Bachelor of Music degree from Lawrence University in Appleton, Wisconsin. Junko can be heard on Joe Morris’s recording Camera (2010) and has some more recording releases pending.
Andrew Neumann is a Boston-based artist who works in a variety of media, including sculpture, film and video installation, and electronic/interactive music. In 2004 he received a Guggenheim Fellowship. He has recently had one-person shows at bitforms Gallery in Seoul, the DeCordova Museum , bitforms Gallery, NYC, and numerous shows for the Boston Cyberarts Festival. His videos have been shown on PBS, The Worldwide Video Festival, Artist Space, and elsewhere. He was an Artist in Residence at the iEAR Studio at RPI, and has had residencies at The MacDowell Colony, YADDO, Ucross Foundation, Steim, Atlantic Center for the Arts, Art/OMI, and the Experimental Television Center.
GAY SHAPES (Worcester, MA)
GAY SHAPES is Joe Bastardo, Mickey O’Hara and Abdul Shezai. Outstanding experimental / noise trio from Worcester! Check the links!
http://gayshapes.bandcamp.com/
http://secretrow.com/gayshapes