2022
December 21 2022
thee Doug Van Nort Electro-Acoustic Orchestra: ‘live’ for the winter solstice 2022
Tom Bickley: EWI + synthesis
Viv Corringham: voice+electronics
Bjorn Eriksson: analog electronics
Rory Hoy: bass+electronics
Kieran Maraj: digital electronics
Doug Van Nort: composition/gestures
December 2022
Accolade West First Floor Atrium (directly in front of the currently-non-working waterfall)
A piece exploring improvisational conversation with a text-based agent, spoken word and gesture-based machine learning mappings, translating language into midi-based musical sequences
A guitar-centred interactive system which extracts audio features and maps this into an integrated synthesis/guitar hybrid that reacts to, loops and builds upon melodic materials
A performance exploring the possibilities of complex tablet-based gestures shaping simple FM synthesis, with visual expression of spectro-temporal evolutions of sound.
A piece which explores the intersection of gestural control, glitchy pulses, deep bass and sequenced, lo-fi ambient layers.
Van Nort – conducting
Alexandro Di Nunzio – Procedural Lights
November 2022
October 5th, 2022
12:45 pm
The Doug Van Nort Electro-Acoustic Orchestra presents a keynote performance for the exhibition/symposium Sensoria: The Arts and Science of Our Senses curated by Nina Czegledy and Joel Ong, with partnering organizations Sensorium: Centre for Digital Art and Technology at the School of the Arts, Media, Performance and Design at York University, and the LAZNIA Centre for Contemporary Arts in Gdansk, Poland.
There are are two distinct realities for this performance: in the lab, and in virtual streaming space, which will be presented at the Gdansk site and can be viewed by anyone online.
Link for stream:
***This performance will be held live at the DisPerSions Lab and audience will be invited in to capacity, following which they will be directed to an ‘overflow’ room on the same floor. A streaming link will be available for remote participation as well. Masks are mandatory for in-person attendance at the DisPerSions Lab. We will also request that you remove your shoes when stepping up onto the haptic floor.
**** This performance features a short section of intense flashing light and sound
Performers:
DVN-EAO: Tom Bickley, Bjorn Ericksson, Rory Hoy, Kathy Kennedy, Kieran Maraj, Omar Shabbar, Danny Sheahan, Doug Van Nort
(regrets for this show: Viv Corringham)
Performers for this show are dispersed between the Dispersion Lab in Toronto, and locations in Montreal, Mississauga, San Francisco and Sweden.
Dispersion Lab site, overture/underture – lighting and haptics: Doug Van Nort
Dispersion Lab site, in-performance lighting: Kieran Maraj
Virtual Space stream staging and visuals: Rory Hoy
Networking, audio, tech: Rory Hoy, Omar Shabbar, Kieran Maraj
About:
The Electro-Acoustic Orchestra (dir. Doug Van Nort) is an ensemble comprised of a mixture of acoustic and electronic performers. It is an emergent sonic organism that evolves through collective attention to all facets of sound, and soundpainting-based real-time composition. The conducting language used with the group is based on Soundpainting, with modifications and additions by Van Nort for the electro-acoustic context. In the words of the language’s inventor, Walter Thompson: “The Soundpainter (the composer) standing in front (usually) of the group communicates a series of signs using hand and body gestures indicating specific and/or aleatoric material to be performed by the group. The Soundpainter develops the responses of the performers, molding and shaping them into the composition then signs another series of gestures, a phrase, and continues in this process of composing the piece.”
May 13th, 2022
7-9pm
Elka Bong/ Doug Van Nort Electro-Acoustic Orchestra
The Dispersion Lab is pleased to present the inimitable improvising duo Elka Bong for a performance as part of their Spring miniTour!
Also performing will be the DVN-EAO, with a new configuration: first a series of trio improvisations, followed by real-time composition with the full ensemble (that is, EAI followed by EAO).
The performance will happen both in the lab and across geographically dispersed sites (Toronto/Berkeley/NYC/Sweden).
YouTube link is available here: https://youtu.be/eT_12UQDfQQ
Lineup:
7pm: DVN-EAO
Tom Bickley (EWI+FM synthesis), Viv Corringham (voice+electronics ), Björn Eriksson (feedback boxes), Rory Hoy (bass+electronics), Kieran Maraj (electronics), Omar Shabbar (guitar+electronics), Danny Sheahan (violin+electronics), Doug Van Nort (composition/conduction).
8pm: Elka Bong
(Margolis/Wright duo)
About our guests:
AL MARGOLIS
“… is some sort of evil genius working with sources radically altered up to an utterly unrecognizable state, anarchic manifestations moving in compact determination.”
Massimo Ricci:
Margolis has been an activist in the 1980s American cassette underground through his cassette label Sound of Pig Music; was co-founder of experimental music label Pogus Productions, which he continues to run.
He has recorded and/or performed with Pauline Oliveros, Ione, Joan Osborne, Monique Buzzarté, Katherine Liberovskaya, Adam Bohman, Ellen Christi, Fred Lonberg-Holm, Jane Scarpantoni, Ulrich Krieger, David First, and Dave Prescott, among others.
ifbwana.com
WALTER WRIGHT
“is an interdisciplinary artist, his practice includes computer programming, electro-acoustic music, and video performance. His focus is on “improvisation as a way of being present in the world.”
Wright was one of the first video animators. At Computer Image Corp he animated letters, words, and titles for Children’s Television Workshop. He showed his work at the first computer art conference at the Kitchen (NYC, 1973). In 1973-76, as artist-in-residence at the Experimental Television Center, he pioneered video performance touring public access centers, colleges, and galleries with the Paik/Abe Video Synthesizer.
He is a co-founder of 119 Gallery, the first digital art gallery on the World Wide Web.
Link: https://elkabong2.bandcamp.com
April 26th, 2022
4pm
Dispersion Lab Open Meeting, Spring 2022: Current Research/Creation Projects and Developments
You are cordially invited to hear 10-20 minute presentations on select lab projects that are currently underway, situated in the context of the broader “whys” for this work and the larger lab research agenda.
There will be 5-10 minutes for discussion in between each presentation.
Schedule:
4:00 – 4:15pm: Doug Van Nort – three current research areas: human/machine co-creation, distributed performance/expanded presence, embodied/augmented listening: sonic-haptic mediation
DIGM 5070 – Interactive Media for Electro-Acoustic Orchestra, final presentations
4:15 – 4:35pm: Xi Lu – Performability of sample-based electroacoustic music in the live laptop concert environment
4:35 – 4:55pm: Omar Shabbar – Prepared Response
PhD Students – current research investigations
4:55 – 5:10pm: Janica Olpindo – Important Considerations in Interaction Design
5:10 – 5:25pm: Rory Hoy – eLabOration: Telematically Augmented Meditations and Tools
Master’s Research Project, final presentation
5:25 – 5:55pm: Kieran Maraj – Intergestura: Amplifying instrumental agency
5:55-6pm: wrap-up
April 20th, 2022
11:30am-12:30pm
Dispersion Lab Presentations: Two Presentations by Andrew Raffo Dewar
The Dispersion Lab is pleased to present the second of two lectures by Andrew Raffo Dewar, Fulbright Canada Research Chair in residence at the lab for Winter 2022.
Lecture #2: “Transmedia Transformation and Cross-Domain Mapping as (Music) Composition Strategy”
Presented in partnership with Sensorium as part of their “Lunchtime Seminar” series, Dewar will discuss a range of his musical compositions that investigate “transmedia translation” and cross-domain mapping. He will also discuss an in-progress project; a 3D spatial audio composition that incorporates 1970s oral history recordings made by Dr. Christine Valenciana of participants in a troubling 1930s US repatriation campaign of Mexican-Americans.
About the speaker:
Andrew Raffo Dewar (Composer/Musician/Ethnomusicologist / Fulbright Canada Research Chair, York U. DisPerSion Lab / Prof. of Interdisciplinary Arts at the University of Alabama)
Andrew Raffo Dewar, Ph.D. is a composer, soprano saxophonist, electronic musician, ethnomusicologist, and arts organizer. Recent publications include ethnographic research on 1970s intermedia art in Argentina during a military dictatorship, 1960s handmade electronic music collective the Sonic Arts Union, philosophical issues of ontology in performance and music technologies, original music for his performing ensembles in San Francisco, New York City, and Hamburg, music for film, compositions incorporating ethnographic interviews, biofeedback, and interdisciplinary electronic music installations and performances utilizing 3D spatial audio. He has performed internationally over the past 25 years, with over 200 performances and installations on five continents in the past decade. Recordings of Dewar as a composer and performer are available on over two dozen albums published by record labels throughout the United States and Europe. https://music.ua.edu/people/andrew-raffo-dewar/
April 18th, 2022
6pm-7pm
MUSI/DATT/DIGM 3070/5070- Electro-Acoustic Orchestra Class- Final Performance
12 weeks of learning…
a gesture-based real-time compositional language
listening strategies
creating sound worlds with new instruments/systems
electro-acoustic improvisation
…culminating in a final class performance
Featuring:
from MUSI 3070:
Shidsa Pourbakhsh – Korg Triton Synth
Christian Rickman – Acoustic Guitar, Stylophone
Jacob Whitehead – OP-1 Synth
from DIGM 5070:
Xi Lu – Ableton Live / Processed Samples
Omar Shabbar – Guitar, Max/MSP processing
Guest EAO Performers
Rory Hoy – EAO 2022 Granular/FM Software Instrument
Aida Khorsandi – EAO 2022 Granular/FM Software Instrument
Kieran Maraj – EAO 2022 Granular/FM Software Instrument
and
Doug Van Nort – Soundpainting-based composition/conduction
March 24th, 2022
9am-1pm
Dispersion Lab Presents: Andrew Raffo Dewar
The Dispersion Lab is pleased to present the first of two lectures by Andrew Raffo Dewar, Fulbright Canada Research Chair in residence at the lab for Winter 2022.
Lecture #1: “A brief overview of Anthony Braxton’s music systems”
Dewar will share an overview of legendary experimentalist composer/performer and MacArthur fellow Anthony Braxton’s unique and varied music systems, based on his experience as a performer in Braxton’s touring ensembles since 2005. There will be Q+A discussion time, following the talk.
About the speaker:
Andrew Raffo Dewar (Composer/Musician/Ethnomusicologist / Fulbright Canada Research Chair, York U. DisPerSion Lab / Prof. of Interdisciplinary Arts at the University of Alabama)
Andrew Raffo Dewar, Ph.D. is a composer, soprano saxophonist, electronic musician, ethnomusicologist, and arts organizer. Recent publications include ethnographic research on 1970s intermedia art in Argentina during a military dictatorship, 1960s handmade electronic music collective the Sonic Arts Union, philosophical issues of ontology in performance and music technologies, original music for his performing ensembles in San Francisco, New York City, and Hamburg, music for film, compositions incorporating ethnographic interviews, biofeedback, and interdisciplinary electronic music installations and performances utilizing 3D spatial audio. He has performed internationally over the past 25 years, with over 200 performances and installations on five continents in the past decade. Recordings of Dewar as a composer and performer are available on over two dozen albums published by record labels throughout the United States and Europe. https://music.ua.edu/people/andrew-raffo-dewar/