Morning everyone!
Next week we’re very lucky to have the prodigious MATANA ROBERTS arrive in London for a
show at Hackney’s OSLO.
Matana is a storyteller, musician, ethnographer, historian, bandleader,
arranger, improviser and activist. Three albums deep into her ‘Coin
Coin’ album project for Constellation it’s become clear that she’s also
responsible for one of the most provocative ongoing bodies of work by any
American artist. For this performance, her first in London since the project
begun, she’ll be joined by friend and label partner ERIC CHENAUX, known for his ingenious balladry and entwining guitar
and vocal improvisations. Read on for the whole story , it’s going to be a
really special show, that much is certain.
\\\\\ NEXT
TUESDAY /////
MATANA ROBERTS
‘Coin
Coin Chapter Three’
ERIC CHENAUX
Tuesday 6 October
OSLO, 1a Amhurst
Road, Hackney Central, E8 1LL
MATANA ROBERTS is an internationally renowned
composer, band leader, saxophonist, sound experimentalist and mixed-media
practitioner. Roberts works in many contexts and mediums, including
improvisation, dance, poetry, and theater. She made two records as a core
member of the Sticks And Stones quartet in the early 2000s and has gone on to
release a diverse body of solo and ensemble work under her own name on
Constellation and Central Control over the past decade. She is perhaps best
known for her acclaimed ‘Coin Coin’ project, a multi-chapter work of “panoramic
sound quilting” that aims to expose the mystical roots and channel the
intuitive spirit-raising traditions of American creative expression while
maintaining a deep and substantive engagement with narrativity, history,
community and political expression within improvisatory musical structures.
Constellation began documenting the ‘Coin Coin’ project in 2011 and has
released the first three of a projected twelve album-length chapters to date.
The third chapter of ‘Coin Coin’, entitled ‘river run thee’ and released on Constellation on February 2014, finds Roberts constructing a sound art tapestry from field recordings, loop and effects pedals, and spoken word recitations, alongside her saxophone and singing voices. ‘Coin Coin Chapter Three: river run thee’ which Roberts will be performing at this concert, could arguably be considered first and foremost a vocal work, and notwithstanding its experimental and esoteric structure, a deeply narrative work as well. Not unlike 2013’s ‘Coin Coin Chapter Two: Mississippi Moonchile’, this most recent chapter unfolds as an uninterrupted album-length flow, this time in what Roberts calls “a fever dream” of sonic material, woven in surrealist fashion.
The third chapter of ‘Coin Coin’, entitled ‘river run thee’ and released on Constellation on February 2014, finds Roberts constructing a sound art tapestry from field recordings, loop and effects pedals, and spoken word recitations, alongside her saxophone and singing voices. ‘Coin Coin Chapter Three: river run thee’ which Roberts will be performing at this concert, could arguably be considered first and foremost a vocal work, and notwithstanding its experimental and esoteric structure, a deeply narrative work as well. Not unlike 2013’s ‘Coin Coin Chapter Two: Mississippi Moonchile’, this most recent chapter unfolds as an uninterrupted album-length flow, this time in what Roberts calls “a fever dream” of sonic material, woven in surrealist fashion.
“At my artistic core, I am firmly dedicated to creating a unique and very personal experiential body of sound work that speaks to, and reminds people of all walks of life to reach, stand up, give voice, regardless of difference, created from mere labels of intellectual classification. In my ideal world the idea of ‘difference’, is an illusion designed only for the purpose of modern economic division and elitist intellectual hierarchy. Through my life’s work, I stand creatively in defiance.” Matana Roberts
Roberts has played with and alongside Rob Mazurek, Myra Melford, Vijay Iyer, Roscoe Mitchell and Greg Tate to name but a few and has also recorded as a guest musician with rock, pop and electronic groups as diverse as Godspeed You! Black Emperor, TV On The Radio, Savath & Savalas, Thee Silver Mt. Zion, and performance artists My Barbarian.
http://www.matanaroberts.com/
ERIC CHENAUX is an adventurous guitarist, singer and composer based in Paris. Having been an active player in Toronto experimental music circles with a host of group and collaborative works, Chenaux has more recently amassed a body of solo work across five albums on the Constellation label, centering around his dextrous, fried guitar playing as juxtaposed with a gorgeously lyrical vocal style. An ingenious recombinant use of traditional folk, psychedelic pop and consort music in earlier albums has over time evolved into a wholly uncategorisable form of balladry, shot through with a singular vernacular of guitar improvisation. 2015 has seen Eric release ‘Skullsplitter’, perhaps the strongest document yet of the exquisite, poetical songcraft he snake-charms from the roiling and changeable sonic environments bedded beneath. Alongside it has seen a blooming of his collaboration with Canadian filmmaker Eric Cazdyn, with a set of visual pieces made for each track on the album testament to their ongoing exploration of a fresh, symbiotic approach to music-video.
He has performed with Pauline Oliveros, John Oswald, Michael Snow, Brodie West, Han Bennink, Michael Moore, Josephine Foster, Wilbert De Joode, Gareth Davis, Jacob Wren and Norberto Lobo among many. Eric also composes and performs music for film and contemporary dance, and collaborates on numerous sound installations with visual/sound artist Marla Hlady, including Smedaholmen Tourist (with Amplifiers) (2012) for The Thousand And One Birds festival in Norway. Together with Eric Cazdyn he undertook a two-week residency at The Cube Cinema in Bristol, UK, where they produced and performed the film Play The Cube in 2014.
http://cstrecords.com/eric-chenaux/
Thanks for reading,
have a terrific week!
UPSET THE RHYTHM
x
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UPSET THE RHYTHM /////
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UPCOMING SHOWS \\\\\
MATANA ROBERTS
‘Coin
Coin Chapter Three’
ERIC CHENAUX
Tuesday 6 October
OSLO, 1a Amhurst
Road, Hackney Central, E8 1LL
AARON DILLOWAY
SISSY SPACEK
SISSY SPACEK
MOOR MOTHER GODDESS
Tuesday 13 October
Café OTO, 22 Ashwin
Street, Dalston, E8 3DL
8pm | £10 | http://tinyurl.com/nuz7eot
THE SPACE LADY
MELTING HEARTS
Wednesday 14 October
The Old Baths, 80 Eastway, Hackney Wick, London, E9 5JH
NORMIL
HAWAIIANS
Two
performances.
Saturday 24 October
The Lexington, 96-98 Pentonville Rd, Angel, N1 9JB
MAXIMUM JOY
JD TWITCH (OPTIMO / DJ Set)
BULLION (DJ Set)
Tuesday
27 October
The
Lexington, 96-98 Pentonville Rd, Angel, N1 9JB
PROTOMARTYR
WITCHING WAVES
TENSE MEN
Monday 2 November
The Victoria, 451 Queensbridge Rd, Dalston, E8 3AS
7.30pm | £8 | http://www.wegottickets.com/event/331014
WITCHING WAVES
TENSE MEN
Monday 2 November
The Victoria, 451 Queensbridge Rd, Dalston, E8 3AS
7.30pm | £8 | http://www.wegottickets.com/event/331014
SHANNON AND THE CLAMS
THE CREEPING IVIES
Wednesday
11 November
OSLO, 1a Amhurst
Road, Hackney Central, E8 1LL
MIKAL CRONIN
Tuesday
17 November
Scala,
275 Pentonville Road, King´s Cross, London, N1 9NL
7.30pm
| £13 | http://www.wegottickets.com/event/325344
CALVIN JOHNSON
Wednesday 18 November
The Tin Tabernacle, 12-16 Cambridge Avenue, Kilburn, NW6 5BA
7pm | £10 | http://www.wegottickets.com/event/330306
Wednesday 18 November
The Tin Tabernacle, 12-16 Cambridge Avenue, Kilburn, NW6 5BA
7pm | £10 | http://www.wegottickets.com/event/330306
SLIM TWIG
TARZANA (Spencer Clark, Jan Anderzen, Floris Vanhoof)
Wednesday 2 December
The Victoria, 451
Queensbridge Rd, Dalston, E8 3AS
7.30pm | £6 | http://www.wegottickets.com/event/334563
MOSS
LIME
Monday 7 December
Old Blue Last, 38 Great Eastern St,
Shoreditch, EC2A 3ES
8pm | £5 | http://www.wegottickets.com/event/334740
