Saturday, March 5, 2016

Recording: Bateman/Grieve/Richards/Sorbara/Ward

Artist: Victor Bateman/Rob Grieve/Tom Richards/Joe Sorbara/Steve Ward

Song: [first piece]

Recorded at Array Space (Acoustic Laptop Music), February 16, 2016.

Victor Bateman/Rob Grieve/Tom Richards/Joe Sorbara/Steve Ward - [first piece]

This night's somewhat-counterintuitive title represents a new experiment from Mark Segger to deploy computers for improvisers not for music-making per se but as a communication tool. Plugged into a LAN hub together, each of the musicians has access to a MAX patch that allows them not only to exchange messages, but also to vote on a temporary leader for the ensemble who can send one-way directives to the players. That makes it a little easier for a larger group to stay on the same page, figure out sonic shifts on the fly, and to know when to end. It's an interestingly transparent tool, as how that plays out depends very much on the personalities of the players.

Unlike the night's earlier quintet, after walking along and feeling things out for a couple minutes, this group of players took things into groove territory and settled in there for most of their set. Featuring stereophonic dual trombones, with Tom Richards on the left and Steve Ward on the right.

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