The Monday Club, the best improvising ensemble since Free For All, returns.  Tony Gorman and his band of monday revellers; playing their instruments they way they find them; listening to each other and to the wind.  I'd call this a special event, but all Monday Club performances are special events.  It'll go like this:

The Monday Club

The Monday Club grew from a chance meeting between Tony and Steve. A shared desire to explore sound was enough to start things moving - starting with long notes (to quote Tony - “is there anything they CAN'T do?”), it has quickly become something more. It's never been a conscious directing of events, but more an unfolding as the process deepens...

The sources of this music are varied, elusive and not easily named - the spaces between words, and thoughts; the subtle stirrings of shifting time; flashing inspiration, raging and at once subsiding; a sense of space becoming sound becoming space...

There are deep sonorities and ranging explorations, our vehicle the unique instrumentation and broad range of experience and inspiration within the group. Each time we play something is found, a collective space is arrived upon, and so the journey begins anew even as it continues.

Tony Gorman, Boyd, Stephen Morley, Mary Rapp.

Alto and contrabass clarinets, horn and cello.

Colin Bright SYZYGY Band  sp-A-C--E part 1

Music for Telescope, Binoculars & Improvising Ensemble

A multimedia concept - streaming: -

- LIVE star visual images projected onto a screen
- LIVE 'star' data converted to MIDI signals for the musicians to interact with

The Colin Bright SYZYGY Band, a collective of composer/improvisers, is collaborating with Dr Angelo Fraietta, a software engineer, composer, electronic musical instrument designer, and amateur astronomer.   Dr Fraietta’s current research is in the correlation of astronomical data with artistic performance, and has developed innovative software and hardware specifically for the spA-C--E concept.

The multimedia concept is to stream 'star' data—such as position, elevation, brightness and colour—from astronomical catalogues through the positioning of a telescope & high-powered binoculars.  This data is converted algorithmically into a SOUND CANVAS. Additionally, a live image will be projected onto a screen and the audience will be invited to observe through the binoculars during the performance. Also, a laser marker will be projected into the sky to give the audience a naked eye perspective, which will facilitate their memory of the performance when they look into the night sky on another night, thus providing a true, memorable experience.

Thus, LIVE interaction with star systems that SYZYGY improvise to - inspired by those sounds & images.  It is cutting edge technology requiring imaginative musicality.  Instruments are  mic-ed up  to 2-3 MacBooks + FX etc through Mainstage.  Thus the natural timbres of acoustic instruments AND electronic transformations.

The BIG idea is the interaction between REALTIME now - and  DEEP TIME from space!!! (i.e. millions of years in the past!)

Together, we have developed a broad but flexible structure to work within.  The structure is to give the work shape and form, as well as the flexibility to allow individuality - and a personal ‘voice’.

Some of ideas we can interact with on our tour through the star systems...
Zenith  - Nadir - Contact - Particles - Earth Dance - Moon Dance - Space Dance - Opposition - Conjunction - Universal Chord

SYZYGY are:
Paul Cutlan - clarinets, saxes + FX
Nick Polovineo - trombone + FX
Noam Jaffe - violin + FX
Colin Bright - piano + FX
Aiden Molins - film

Dr Angelo Fraietta, a software engineer, composer, electronic musical instrument designer, and amateur astronomer.