Fulbright, music department host improv music festival
Alex Lanis
Issue date: 12/3/07 Section: News
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The festival will start at 7:30 p.m. Friday with Galactic Gutbucket and will continue into Saturday with various workshops, ranging from Makihara's "One Stick Beating," to 3 Pups Music's "1+1=3."
The experimental band 3 Pups Music from Nashville Tenn., consists of John "Pantha" Hughes and Brad "Newbie Brad" Smith, according to a UA press release.
Garrett Jones explained the differences between free improv and experimental music: experimental is much more structured and less improvised, while free improv is unplanned and unpredictable, he said.
Sloan described the improvisation as being very different from any other music because it can involve the audience. If a cell phone goes off in the crowd, most musicians would try and ignore it, but in free improv, a musician would use that to create the song, he said.
It isn't just sound that influences the music; visual objects play a part as well.
A picture or the name of a book on the coffee table can give us a musical idea to start with, Sloan said.
Almost anything can stimulate musical expression, Jones said.
Keefe Jackson and Fred Lonberg-Holm, both from Chicago, play together in the group Fast Citizens. Jackson, who is formerly from Fayetteville, has played for Delmark Records with groups such as the Lucky 7s, the 774th Street Quartet and the Chicago Luzern.
At 1 p.m. Sunday, the 10 artists will finish the festival with Jack Wright's sermonette, "Playing Tennis with No Net," an allusion to Robert Frost's description of the absence of structure in free-written poetry. Then musicians will end the festival with an improvisational finale.
The Sonic Arts Festival is free to students and the public. The complete list of performances and workshops can be found online at the music department's Web site.
The experimental band 3 Pups Music from Nashville Tenn., consists of John "Pantha" Hughes and Brad "Newbie Brad" Smith, according to a UA press release.
Garrett Jones explained the differences between free improv and experimental music: experimental is much more structured and less improvised, while free improv is unplanned and unpredictable, he said.
Sloan described the improvisation as being very different from any other music because it can involve the audience. If a cell phone goes off in the crowd, most musicians would try and ignore it, but in free improv, a musician would use that to create the song, he said.
It isn't just sound that influences the music; visual objects play a part as well.
A picture or the name of a book on the coffee table can give us a musical idea to start with, Sloan said.
Almost anything can stimulate musical expression, Jones said.
Keefe Jackson and Fred Lonberg-Holm, both from Chicago, play together in the group Fast Citizens. Jackson, who is formerly from Fayetteville, has played for Delmark Records with groups such as the Lucky 7s, the 774th Street Quartet and the Chicago Luzern.
At 1 p.m. Sunday, the 10 artists will finish the festival with Jack Wright's sermonette, "Playing Tennis with No Net," an allusion to Robert Frost's description of the absence of structure in free-written poetry. Then musicians will end the festival with an improvisational finale.
The Sonic Arts Festival is free to students and the public. The complete list of performances and workshops can be found online at the music department's Web site.
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