Cincizeci.
Later this month (on the 29th, at 8:30AM) I’ll have been on this planet for 50 years. Never thought I’d make is this far, but very glad that I did all things considered.
While I’d toyed (as I do every May) with the idea of obscuring this particular passage, I’ve decided to embrace & run with it. So, in lieu of launching the lavish 6 x CD-R boxed set, and after being essentially a hermit for the past 12 months, I’ve been steadily writing back to the folks that had been getting in touch asking after performances, music, and anything else that I could ostensibly provide, and have been setting things up.
This first of many, many events will happen tonight, May 11th, in Greenpoint, Brooklyn; the first in a series of evenings there under the Present Sounds banner as organized by Ka Baird & Camilla Padgitt-Coles. Camilla will be DJ’ing as Ivy Meadows from 6PM onwards, and I’ll be playing a set* at around 8PM. Come early for the vibe.
On May 21st, my old Boston-days buddy Brandon Terzakis** has organized a concert at the Never Ending Books space in New Haven, Connecticut & the plan is is to train my real-time analysis & synthesis engines on his playing & see how deep we can get. This will be my first time out of New York State since leap-year-day 2020, a big deal all around.
On June 3rd, I’ll be playing at Washington Baths in Portland, Maine as organized by the folks behind the wonderful label Poole Music***. Lieven & Floris both regaled with gleaming things about the series & the space, so I’m more than excited to return to Portland after so many years away.
On June 24th, Bryan Kasenic of The Bunker & Going In**** fame has organized a wonderful outdoor concert at Opus 40 in Saugerties, NY, featuring Christina Wheeler, Camille Altay, and the debut of all-timer M. Geddes Gengrass & Ben Seretan’s new project Friends Meeting. This will be a late-afternoon-into-evening, “bring your own blanket” affair & given the splendour & backstory of the Opus 40 installation itself, should be an incredible evening of transcendent music.
On Sunday, July 16th at 8PM I’ll be returning to Union Pool in Williamsburg, Brooklyn to head up a stacked bill w/ Ka Baird & Shelley Hirsch (!!!), & Chuck Bettis***** & David Grant’s Snake Union. I love Union Pool & the entire setup there is tailor-made for an amazing evening of music, socializing, tacos, frozen cocktails, and stumbling out into the warm Williamsburg air with a full heart.
I’d love to keep this energy going all summer long, so please get in touch via the “Contact” page if you’re interested in hosting something somewhere…
* For most of these shows I’ll be hinging on the “Playthroughs” frameworks via a new, portable hardware synth/embedded/computer setup that allows me to both play guitar through and perform the sort of self-sustaining, ebb-and-flow music that I’ve been working on since the early 2000s.
** At one point I was dead-set on releasing a split LP of minimal works by Brandon & Benjamin Nelson (whose recent disc on Senufo is wonderful) but this was waylaid indefinitely by the breakdown of the pressing plant; one of those things I’ve long regretted, so it’s been great to reconnect w/ him & get this one on the books.
*** Some time ago I agreed to pen the liner notes for a Poole Music reissue of Bengt Hambraeus’ “Concrète & Synthesizer Music,” which had been a Creel Pone title (CP 119) & will shortly live on as a lavish vinyl LP reissue.
**** I’ve been serving as the de facto mastering engineer for this Bandcamp series since the get-go, which has been an absolute pleasure; I implore you to check out the 20-odd releases of “Music for Meditation” -lineage music that have been released thus far.
***** One time Chuck literally patiently waited outside of the impound lot at Navy Yard for two hours with all of my gear as I dealt with the blind-rage inducing bureaucracies inside after my rental car ended up there when I (stupidly) parked in a school zone in Brooklyn after a gig at The Stone so many years back, and I will never forget it.
