Carl Testa - Composer and Instrumentalist

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12.02.2011 Tomorrow night I will premiere two new pieces. One is a notated and improvised work for vibraphone, cello, and bass that uses the acceleration of the vibraphone's motor as an aesthetic framework. The second piece is a theater work for voice, vibraphone, cello, electronics, and computer-controlled lighting that I have been working for over a year. This piece had it's first performance in an all electronics and voice version in Kitchener, Ontario in April. I have since reworked the piece for an instrumental ensemble while retaining some of the more idiomatic elements of the electronics. The piece also features computer-controlled lighting which I treat like another instrument. Please come out to the performance if you can. The dance and music quartet Action Theory will also be performing. Details at uncertaintymusic.com.
10.21.2011 In case anyone missed it, there was an article in The New York Times about the Uncertainty Music Series. I thought that the article did a great job putting to words some of the goals and ideas around The Uncertainty Music Series that haven't really been articulated until now. I am very happy to have such a great piece of writing out there on the series. Check it out if you haven't. This weekend I will be performing with the guitarist Kevin Frenette, the pianist James Rohr, and the drummer John McLellan. I performed with Kevin and James last year and had a great time. This will be the first time I have played with John since he sat in Aaron Siegel's short-lived but wonderful improvisation sextet Where From Here? a few years ago. I am looking forward to playing with these guys again. The show is Saturday at Outpost 186 in Boston. Come on out. Last but not least, I have some new music up on my music site. The set is called My Memory Consists of Nothing but Numbers and Feelings. It is a duo release with guitarist Christopher Riggs. We recorded these three pieces back in April and I think they are really special. They combine Chris's textural, noisy, and rhythmic guitar work with some of my more lyrical, timbral, and harmonic bass playing. Obviously I recommend you check it out, it is a free download though you are welcome to donate something if you care to.
10.04.2011 This week I have the honor of performing with Anthony Braxton and the Tri-Centric Orchestra as part of "Energies, Ideas, Intuitions: The Music of Anthony Braxton" at Roulette in Brooklyn. I will be performing with the 12+3tet on Friday night and as part of the Trillium Orchestra on Saturday night. This kind of festival presentation of Braxton's music is unprecedented in the United States. It will showcase a broad range of Braxton's music including piano music, orchestral music, opera, and the Imaginary Space Musics (which includes Ghost Trance Music, Falling River Music, Diamond Curtain Wall Music, Echo Echo Mirror House Music, and now Pine Top Aerial Music). Whew! If you're not in Brooklyn on Saturday for Trillium J, come out to The Uncertainty Music Series and hear a concert featuring The Generous Ensemble and a set by Ben Klein and Marc Burns. This should be a great show. On October 22nd, I head up to Boston to perform with Kevin Frenette, James Rohr, and John McLellan at Outpost 186. I am really excited to be playing with these guys again. If you are near Boston, you should come out.
09.29.2011 I haven't posted an update in a while because I have been pretty busy. The computer-controlled organ concert at Wesleyan went really well. I was very pleased with how it was received and I was happy that I (A) got my piece finished and (B) that the composers were happy with the concert. I spent the whole week testing the computer pieces and making sure everything was working correctly. There will be some kind of recording of the concert made available soon. Stay tuned. Next week is the Tri-Centric Foundation's festival Energies, Ideas, Intuitions, The Music of Anthony Braxton. I will be participating in the Echo Echo Mirror House 12+3tet on Friday night and in the performance of two acts from Trillium J on Saturday night. This is the most comprehensive presentation of Anthony's music ever presented in New York. I would highly recommend you check out at least one night of the festival. There is so much going on that it is hard to choose what to go to, so I would say just go to everything if you can :) I have a number of projects on the horizon for the fall/winter. The biggest of them is the 2nd performance of my piece Spectra. Anne Rhodes and I performed this piece in April in Kitchener, Ontario with just electronics, voice, and lighting. I have decided to re-stage the piece but this time with the addition of vibraphone and cello (the amazing Bill Solomon and Nathan Bontrager). I am really looking forward to working with these musicians. I am also trying to write a new piece for vibraphone, cello, and bass for the 3 of us to perform. We will have to see. These performances will take place December 3rd in New Haven as part of the Take Your Time series at The BIG ROOM. Finally I am starting to work on new pieces for solo string bass and granular synthesis-based electronics. I wrote a couple of these kinds of pieces back in 2009 and 2010, but now I would like to expand it into a complete solo set that I can tour with. This project will probably tour in January. Details are forthcoming.
08.10.2011 This Friday and Saturday The Uncertainty Music Series is presenting a mini-festival of concerts at Bru Cafe and Never Ending Books in New Haven. There are a wide variety of musicians performing including Bird Fly Yellow, James Ilgenfritz, Al Margolis, Nathan Bontrager, Ben Shirley, Kyoko Kitamura, Anne Rhodes, Adam Matlock, and myself. I am particularly excited about the set I will be performing with Adam on Friday night. We have 4 new compositions that we will be presenting that incorporate traditional and non-traditional notation, improvisation, and electronics. I am very excited to be working on compositions in this duo context. This duo along with my duo with cellist Nathan Bontrager have been great opportunities for me to try out new composition ideas within a creative context where we can just play an idea straight through or decide to embellish with improvisation or other ornaments. So needless to say you should come out to both nights of the series as it will be a great time featuring some fantastic musicians. Coming up Thursday in Hartford is the Hartford Phase Shift. This concert series is something of a companion series to the Uncertainty Series as it also tends to focus on improvised, experimental, and electronic music. This series is run by tubist Ben Klein and I highly suggest that you go check it out. This October I will have the pleasure of performing in Anthony Braxton's 12+3tet and Trillium Orchestra as part of the Tri-Centric Festival taking place at Roulette's new space in Brooklyn. This is going to be a 4-day festival showcasing just about every aspect of Anthony Braxton's music system. This includes piano music, orchestral music, opera, and the Imaginary Space Musics (which includes Ghost Trance Music, Falling River Music, Diamond Curtain Wall Music, Echo Echo Mirror House Music, and now Pine Top Aerial Music). This is not to be missed! Details here. More soon! Top photo courtesy of Bird Fly Yellow, Bottom Photo by Opuntia
05.19.2011 Some very special performances coming up this weekend, I will be performing with the Anthony Braxton Septet on Friday here in New Haven at Firehouse 12 and again on Saturday in Victoriaville, Quebec at the Musique Actuelle Festival. This will be the first performance by the Septet of Echo Echo Mirror House Music (EEMHM) outside of Europe. The scores mix cartography with graphic notation and include language music transparencies that the performers can overlay on top of the other scores to increase interpretive possibilities. In addition all performers have iPods loaded with Braxton's discography. The performance begins with all musicians starting the iPods on any piece. When a "change" signal is given the musicians should execute any kind of change. That may be changing a track on the ipod, changing instruments, changing a page from the score, or changing a transparency. There are a lot of possibilities in the music and it is exciting to participate in this early stage when a lot of the strategies can still be worked out. Next week I will be performing in Rachel Bernsen's Corridor as part of the Take Your Time Festival presented by The BIG ROOM and The Uncertainty Music Series. Rachel's piece features 2 dancers, 2 singers, and 2 instrumentalists navigating a new sound and movement score. This piece opens up a lot of new areas in Rachel's work and I am excited to be a part of it. Adele Myers and Dancers will also present new work each night. For more info go to The BIG ROOM website. Photo of AB 7Tet by tictocman
05.09.2011 Lots has happened in the last two months. Anne and I had a successful trip up to Canada with Katie Young. I premiered my new piece Spectra for voice, electronics, and lighting. I also performed in concerts with Tyshawn Sorey and Tom Crean. This past weekend I participated in the Tri-Centric Orchestra's workshops in New York and New Haven, so life is good. This weekend, I will celebrate the release of some of my solo bass pieces on the Striking Mechanism label by performing solo at The Uncertainty Music Series. I will perform a few pieces solo, then perform some improvised duos with the vocalist Anne Rhodes. We performed a wholly improvised set in Toronto last month, so I am excited to do more open improvisation. I will then perform in duo with the cellist Nathan Bontrager. Nathan and I got together back in August and played some duos and the results were really special. So I am excited to get a chance to play again and perform. More to come soon.
03.08.2011 DING! Thanks to my wonderful backers, my Kickstarter project to help me produce my new piece for voice, electronics, and light is now 106 percent funded. Now any extra money that comes in will allow us to offset travel costs going up to Kitchener, Ontario. If you would still like to, please consider backing. There are rewards to be had. This Saturday I have the pleasure of performing in a trio with Chicago-based trumpeter Dan Godston and percussionist Matt Weston. We will be performing as part of the Uncertainty Music Series at Bru Cafe. This is the first time I have set up a show at Bru Cafe and I am excited about the opportunity and the music. Please come out if you can. Details are on the Performances page.
03.08.2011 Busy Busy Busy. I had a fun solo gig on Friday at Ibeam. I performed on electric bass and electronics using a variety of physical objects hooked up to the bass and to the electronics via contact mics. You can listen to the whole set on SoundCloud. If you are on SoundCloud please comment if you would like. This is the beginning of a new solo project that I am working on, and I hope to make a new release from this work in the future. The big news is that today I am launching a Kickstarter campaign to support the premiere performance of my new piece for voice, electronics, and lighting. In order to make the performance happen I need to purchase some additional equipment. If you want to support this project I am offering rewards including updates about the piece, copies of scores, and even an hour-long conversation (in person or via skype) with me about the piece. So please consider backing this project.
02.02.2011 WINTER!!!!!!! Wow, the northeast and I guess the midwest is really getting clobbered with ice and snow. All this time indoors gives us the chance to set up more gigs! And set up gigs we have. Check out the performances page for details on upcoming shows. Lots of exciting things coming up including a set of music with a new quartet as part of The Uncertainty Music Series. A performance of Waver up in Hartford at the Studio at Billings Forge as part of Matt Sargent and Bill Solomon's Festival of New Music. I will also have a chance to perform with one of my favorite orchestral folk bands Goodnight Blue Moon on Feb 19 and April 8. Coming up in April is the premiere of my new piece for voice, electronics, and lighting. This piece will feature the vocalist Anne Rhodes in something that resembles a theater piece. This piece is my 2nd piece to feature light as another instrument/element of the composition. It will take up most of my time over the next 2 months, but I am very excited to be working on a new piece with light. The premiere will be part of David Jensenius's series up in Kitchener, Ontario. Check the performances page for the details.
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