image © 2011 NASA/JPL-Caltech

Nothing directly to do with io 0.0.1 beta++, but I will be participating in the Scientific American / American Museum of Natural History Beyond Planet Earth Tweetup on January 18, 2012, starting at 6:00 pm (EST). [More info…]

What does this, however indirectly, have to do with improvisation, semi-autonomous machine musicians, and real-time interactive musical automata? The answer lies between one of the most artful robotics projects, and the relationship between io’s generative innards and the harmony of the planets….

Here are the relevant twitter handles: @hanearlpark, @AMNH and @SciAm.

Han-earl Park

Leaving Cork in the summer of 2011, Han-earl Park was resident in California for six months during which time he performed with Gino Robair, Tim Perkis, John Shiurba, Matt Ingalls, Scott R. Looney, Ted Byrnes and Kris Tiner, and as a guest of Gargantius Effect (Murray Campbell and Randy McKean). In December, Vicmod Records released Han-earl Park and Richard Scott’s ‘artillery’ (VMDL11).

Relocating to Brooklyn in December 2011, Park made his New York debut at the Roulette as part of the Silver Orchestra for Ishmael Wadada Leo Smith’s 70th birthday event presented by Interpretations. His first performances in 2012 was a duo with saxophonist-scholar Tracy McMullen at the Downtown Music Gallery, and with saxophonist-composer Catherine Sikora at The Brecht Forum.

2012 will see the release of Richard Barrett and Han-earl Park’s ‘Numbers’ (CS 201 cd) by Creative Sources Recordings. In addition to what he hopes will be a creative time in NY, he will be back in Europe in April/May performing as part of Numbers and Mathilde 253 (with Charles Hayward and Ian Smith), and, in October, Numbers will be performing across North America.

Bruce Coates

Mutt: Jonny Marks, Bruce Coates and Walt Shaw (photo © 2012 Claire Coates)

In addition to his continuing work with FrImp and Improvisation Birmingham, in April 2012, Bruce Coates performs/conducts as part of Birmingham Improvisers’ Orchestra: Migrations at Déda (Derby):

Using film, dance and performance art, Migration is created in response to the orchestra’s improvised soundtrack. The piece explores ideas about the movement and displacement of people—not only the political, economic and ecological factors, but also the human desire to find a place to belong.

More info…

Franziska Schroeder

In 2011, Franziska Schroeder, the theorist-practitioner, presented at Digital Resources in the Humanities and Arts conference (Ningbo) and performed at the International Computer Music Conference (Huddersfield).

In 2012, Schroeder will be taking on the Artistic Direction for the Sonorities Festival (Belfast), premiering a new work by Evan Parker commissioned by the PRS, running the Sonic Arts Research Centre’s Public Engagement Training for PhD students (‘Big Ears’), performing as part of Noise Quartet Concert (April), premiere of five new works by SARC PhD composers (May).

Forthcoming articles will include a book chapter, ‘Shifting Listening Identities—Towards a Fluidity of Form in Digital Music’, in Identity, Performance and Technology: Practices of empowerment, embodiment and technicity edited by S. Broadhurst and J. Machon (Palgrave Macmillan), and ‘Network[ed] Listening—Towards a de-centering of beings’ in Contemporary Music Review (Routledge).

Press/publicity photos and images of io 0.0.1 beta++, its construction and performances, are collated at:

picasaweb.google.com/hanearlpark/io001beta

Photographs copyright the photographers. If you use any of the images, please credit the corresponding photographer. [Additional images…].

‘io 0.0.1 beta++’ (SLAMCD 531) is available from SLAM Productions. [Details…]

personnel: io 0.0.1 beta++ (itself), Han-earl Park (guitar), Bruce Coates (alto and sopranino saxophones) and Franziska Schroeder (soprano saxophone).

© 2011 Han-earl Park.
℗ 2011 SLAM Productions.

Blackrock Castle Observatory (Cork, Ireland) will be the site for on-stage meetings between human and machine improvisers. This event will mark the debut of two extraordinary machine musicians, io 0.0.1 beta++ and iWife constructed by Han-earl Park and John Godfrey respectively. Featuring Bruce Coates and Franziska Schroeder (saxophones), and Francis Heery (diffusion), the performances will be part critique and part playful exploration, both a boundary-breaking public demonstration of socio-musical technologies and an ironic sci-fi parody….

Presented with funding from the Music Network Performance and Touring Award, and support from the Arts Council of Ireland, Blackrock Castle Observatory, The Castle Bar and Trattoria and the UCC School of Music.

[More…]

More updates forthcoming….

www.io001b.com

…and the old io 0.0.1 beta site is now archived at www.io001b.com/_archive.

More updates coming soon (expect reports on the hardware (re)construction and the upcoming performance at Blackrock Castle Observatory).

beta test 11-10-08_00 [mp3]

beta test 11-10-08_01 [mp3]

beta test 11-10-08_02 [mp3]

beta test 11-10-08_03 [mp3]

beta test 11-10-08_04 [mp3]

beta test 11-10-08_05 [mp3]

Performers are io 0.0.1 beta++ (itself), Franziska Schroeder (saxophone) and Han-earl Park (guitar).

Thanks again to the Arts Council of Ireland for supporting this project, to the UCC Department of Music for providing a space in which to carry out this work, and to Franziska for lending her time and expertise to this enterprise.

I have also learned a lot more about WordPress (with both Stet Lab and buster & friends powered by it), thus the revamp of this site….

More to come shortly.

update

I’ve moved this site from www.busterandfriends.com/io++ to www.busterandfriends.com/io (the side affect being that the old io 0.0.1 beta site is now archived at www.busterandfriends.com/io_archive).