John Bischoff Sarah Cahill The Cornelius Cardew Choir Paul Dresher & Joel Davel Duo B Giacomo Fiore Adam Fong Amy Foote & Danny Clay Larnie & Bodil Fox Guillermo Gallindo & Sangita Moskow Gautam Tejas Ganeshan Hae Voces Anne Hege “The How Are You Feeling Project” Brenda Hutchinson Dylan Mattingly The Mobius Trio Amy X Neuburg Maggi Payne Robin Petrie and friends Real Vocal String Quartet Wendy Reid Rova Saxophone Quartet Dean Santomieri & Cindy Sawprano The Sparkle Boys Moe! Staiano Ensemble Adam Tendler Faythe Vollrath The Willam Winant Percussion Group Theresa Wong Pamela Z

Brenda Hutchinson will lead the sunset bell ringing as part of her dailybell project. Sunset is at 8:34 PM and everyone is invited to participate. If you have bells, please bring them. For the bell-less, Brenda will have some bells onhand to share.

Giacomo Fiore will explore long-form pieces by Catherine Lamb, Larry Polansky, and Michael Pisaro, and improvise meditative soundscapes for electric and acoustic guitars.

Duo B The San Francisco Bay Area improvising and composing ensemble of percussionist Jason Levis and bassist Lisa Mezzacappa, is a musical think tank of grand schemes and impossible scenarios. Over a dozen years, the ensemble has developed and refined its singular approach to improvisation and composition, through cross-disciplinary projects with film, collaborations with improvising instrumentalists at home and abroad, and intensive study of the recorded work of master improvisers of the past century. At the Garden of Memory 2018, the duo will perform Wadada Leo Smith’s expansive and evocative graphic score, Luminous Axis (2002).

Hae Voces will be featuring selections from “Rapoport Remembered,” a musical tribute to the extraordinary work of visual artist Sonya Rapoport (1923-2015). Imagined and developed by composer-performer team Hae Voces, violinist Kristina Dutton and vocalist Majel Connery, “Rapoport Remembered” is a musical meditation on Rapoport’s Anasazi Series, vivid color pencil drawings from the 1970s. Performing live with violin, vocals, keyboards, and a technical array of live processing, Hae Voces treats Rapoport’s drawings as graphic scores, reading their visual intensity and playfulness like notes on a page.

Probosci The Probosci duo of Gyan Riley and Timba Harris will be playing music from their brand new album Nethermead.

Faythe Vollrath This concert seeks to explore a variety of new music for solo harpsichord, providing the audience with insight into the age defying beauty of this instrument. Viewed primarily as a Baroque instrument, the harpsichord also occupies an important niche in compositions of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. The juxtaposition of old and new in this unique instrument provides a wealth of opportunities for today’s composers in exploring sounds, tonal colorations, and textures. Originally only a Western instrument, this concert will include pieces by international composers, that have adopted the harpsichord into global music. Pieces such as Rain Dreaming by Toru Takemitsu, and Jardin des herbes by Karen Tanaka use exotic sound clouds to invoke images of rain and gardens. Other pieces, such as Lou Harrison’s Sonata for Harpsichord, explore the use of different tonal systems, emulating the sounds of the gamelan. Spinal by Vladimir Tošić explores rhythmic repetition and the slow movent of tonal clusters, wrapping the listener in layers of sound.

Maggi Payne Supercharged Theremin Morph.
Theremin Morph is an interactive experience that invites everyone to play a supercharged Theremin. The vertical antenna on the right controls the pitch of the Theremin and an Aries analog synthesizer and the Morpheus digital synthesizer’s pitch or drum sound. The closer your hand is to the antenna, the higher the pitch.

Bodil & Larnie Fox Bodil and Larnie Fox will be working with Larnie’s low-tech invented instruments, using piezo contact microphones, long strings and “rotors” made with recycled materials, small electric motors, hot glue and bamboo. Larnie and Bodil are both visual artists working with sound.

Theresa Wong As a solo performer, Wong takes the listener into the molecules of the materials at hand. A relentless digging to unearth the raw vibrations of her instruments, in her personalized total art form centered around the voice and cello, a timbral merging gives birth to new acoustically synthesized sounds. For more info, please see: www.theresawong.org

Adam Fong will be performing a new composition titled Mangle for electric bass and electronics. The piece draws inspiration from disfigurement, both literal and conceptual, as reflected through scientific factors such as physiological impacts of abiotic and repetitive stresses, anthropological considerations of historical forms of manual labor, the history of disability rights activism, and meditation on the fluidity of identity and the spiritual transformations that accompany the human experience of senescence.

John Bischoff will perform a 30 minute set of three electronic pieces. Bischoff’s recent work incorporates custom analog circuitry in sonic exchange with laptop synthesis. As he activates the circuit in performance, the resulting tones and noises are analyzed in real-time and used to inform an extended computer response. A binding together of the analog and digital realms is the result, the unique characteristics of each medium counterpoised in time to form a hybrid sensibility. Examples include: Visibility Study (2015) which turns the familiar format of musician-processed-through-looping-pedal on its head. A noisy analog circuit becomes the player while the laptop produces a looping texture via analysis and re-synthesis of each circuit gesture; Level Shift (2017) intersects the timing of circuit actions from early in the piece against subsequent musical actions later on. The resulting counterpoint flows from the sonic interpenetration of two different parts from the same performance. A primary dynamic is found in the shifting balance between textural stability and continual change.

Gautam Tejas Ganeshan new Carnatic music

The William Winant Percussion Group The William Winant Percussion group will be performing the west coast premiere of a Jon Gibson piece for percussion and winds.

Guillermo Galindo & Sangita Moskow
Sonic journeys unto uncharted territories blending modified traditional Eastern and Western instruments with electronics and an imaginative integration of alternative non-Western tunings constantly shifting through complex rhythmic undercurrents are just some of the elements that make the musical pilgrimage of Sangita Moskow and Guillermo Galindo a unique musical experience. Combining their talents for over 10 years, these master musicians have created a unique blend that incorporates Western XX and XXI avant garde and electronic music with a contemporary interpretation of North Indian classical musical traditions.

The How Are You Feeling Project Using recordings of people reminiscing on health, both gains and losses, as a base, they will construct an installation/performance. The piece will have two components:
Recordings of people discussing their health — physical and mental, gains and losses, struggles with medical bureaucracies, finding community, caretaking, healing. Use the semantics of spoken language to pin down the corner of a flapping tent. Use the openness of sound to ventilate the space.
Performers include: Anna Avery – Bass, vocals; Hugh Behm-Steinberg – Turntable, pedals and vocals; Mary Behm-Steinberg – Medical percussion; Chris Christensen – Modular synthesizer and analog tape loops; alex cruse – Autoharp and electronics; Lenny Gonzalez – Electric baritone guitar and pedals; Kevin CK Lo – Violin; Angela Roberts – Cello and synthesizer; Kevin Droese: Guitar and pedals; Anne Lesley Selcer: Vocals and electronics

Dylan Mattingly will be performing solo piano in the Chapel of the Chimes in addition to improvising on cello with violinist Eli Wirtschafter.

Wendy Reid will be performing a new hour+ long tree piece along with Brenda Hutchinson, Aurora Josephson, Ron Heglin, Lulu (her parrot), and possibly a few others.

Anne Hege Improvisations and original songs on The Tape Machine. The Tape Machine is an instrument constructed out of one retrofitted tape cassette recorder and two retrofitted tape cassette players. Using extended vocal technique, live rhythmic augmentation in conjunction with manipulated playback rhythmic augmentation, playback distortion, volume playback as well as record speed manipulation, she will create a sonic world where the present and past mingle together on magnetic tape and the speaking of spirits seems possible.

The Mobius Trio The guitar trio of Robert Nance, Mason Fish, and Matthew Holmes-Linder will be performing:
Brendon Randall-Myers – Making Good Choices
Robert Nance – Plexus
Maurice Ravel – 2nd Movement from String Quartet
Kevin Villalta – Witch Wagon
Santiago Gutiérrez Bolio – Thinking Songs
Adrian Knight – Bon Voyage
Danny Clay – a place that inhabits us
Carlos Lyra – Influencia do Jazz
Anthony Porter – needle-play

The Cornelius Cardew Choir will offer our four-hour version of Pauline Oliveros’ meditative Heart Chant. As in other years, we welcome audience participation and members of the Cardew Choir will be present to help you enter and exit the circle as well as sing alongside you.

Sarah Cahill Garden of Memory founder and pianist Sarah Cahill will give the Bay Area premiere of John Adams’ I Still Play and she will be joined by violinist Kate Stenberg for Tocar by Kaija Saariaho and three movements of Suenos de Chambi by Gabriela Frank.

A Midsummer Celebration on 2018’s Summer Solstice (Ritual No. 10 by Amy Foote/Danny Clay)
Performers: Amy Foote (voice, autoharp, wine glasses, chimes), Lora Libby (voice, wine glasses), Danny Clay (Sound Gardener, wine glasses)

To Begin, gather some beautiful, colorful, and playful objects that delight.
Also, gather some beautiful, colorful, and playful sounds that delight.

Go to a garden that gives you a sense of curiosity and place your objects and sounds in the garden in a way that illuminates the space, but does not dominate. Spend time with the garden.

Bring a few instruments in the folk tradition (autoharp, bells, chimes, wine glasses, etc). Every 10-15 minutes, play a playful tune about summertime love to renew the playfulness and warmth of the space. To make sure everyone (seen and unseen) enjoys themselves, it is suggested that these musical events are varied and chosen at random. Do this by choosing runes that represent each event. You may also use any other means of chance process. Each event should be performed delicately, playfully, and must not overwhelm the garden sounds but must instead grow from them. Songs and events may be arranged by the performers and participants in ways that are most pleasing to themselves and/or most pleasing to the garden spirits.

Amy Foote and Lora Libby will sing and play wind chimes, autoharp, and/or wine glasses. Danny Clay will also play instruments, combs, or drips, as needed in each song or fluxus ‘event’. This means that every 10 or 15 minutes we will perform one of the following pieces, as decided by our chance process: “Dreamlover” (Mariah Carey) / “I don’t want to wait” (Paula Cole) / “Angel” (Shaggy ft. Rayvon) / Wind Music (Shiomi) / Comb Music/Comb Event (Brecht) / Drip Music (Brecht)

As people pass by, they may either participate with sound (should we be performing Comb music, Drip music, or Wind Music.)

Rova Saxophone Quartet Since its inception in 1978 – forty years ago – Rova has always performed “structured improvisations.” The jazz form is designed for improvising and is one form of “structured improvisation.” But in our forms created for Rova, we devise rules or games or sound-specific events which we can then include in combinations / variations in each new structured improvisation that we create. In our sets on the hour in at Chapel of the Chimes tonight, we will fill the half-hour sets with music and sounds that fit the space. Our newest long-form structure is called NC17. It includes seven scenarios which can be cued in by the performers during the piece. But in one version we might cue them all in. In another version we might use only one or two or three, and re-cue amongst those, ignoring the other cueing options. The decisions are spontaneous but always influenced by the music of the moment. So you’ll be seeing new versions of the piece each time you come by.

Pamela Z will be performing solo works for voice and electronics.

Paul Dresher & Joel Davel Moving Parts – Paul Dresher with Joel Davel (2011-18) for Hurdy Grande and Marimba Lumina. Moving Parts is Dresher and Davel’s evolving work for these two invented instruments. The work combines both fully composed sections (including the structure of all the live loops) as well as improvisational elements that provide elaboration on and connectivity between the composed materials.

About the Hurdy Grande: Collaboratively created and built by Paul Dresher and Daniel Schmidt for the invented musical instrument theatrical work Schick Machine, the Hurdy Grande is inspired by its namesake, the hurdy gurdy – a medieval European folk instrument about the size of a large guitar and whose strings are bowed hand-cranked wooden wheel.

Dresher and Schmidt’s Hurdy Grande borrows the idea of mechanically bowing strings with a spinning wheel but in all other ways, it is entirely different from the traditional instrument, particularly in it’s size – the strings are nearly 10 feet long – and because the wooden wheel spins under the power of a variable speed motor (controlled with a foot pedal). This leaves both of the performer’s hands free to play on the strings. More importantly unlike the hurdy gurdy, whose strings are constantly touching the wheel – providing a nearly constant drone, the Hurdy Grande’s seven strings lay just above the spinning wheel and the performer presses down on each of the strings with a finger in order to engage/bow it with the spinning wooden wheel.

Most typically, the finger presses on the string at a precise point in the harmonic series between the 2nd and 16th harmonic, though it is also possible to pluck the strings like a guitar or to pinch the string at any point in it’s length while pressing into the wheel in order to obtain pitches not in the open string’s harmonic series.

The Hurdy Grande is capable of a vast array of simultaneous sound production, combining the sounds and techniques of bowed stringed instruments, the harp and percussion. It is capable of generating more simultaneous and contrasting layers of sound than virtually any other acoustic instrument in the hands of a single (or two) player(s).

About the Marimba Lumina: A recent instrument design by synthesizer pioneer Don Buchla in collaboration with Joel Davel and Mark Goldstein, Marimba Lumina is a sophisticated electronic instrument that has more expressive control than a typical electronic keyboard. Modeled somewhat after its acoustic namesake, it is a dynamically sensitive electronic mallet controller that brings an extended vocabulary and range of expression to the mallet instrument family. Marimba Lumina’s playing surface includes a traditionally arrayed set of electronic bars. Each bar is made up of two overlapping antennas that receive proximity information from each of the four mallets. This allows the Marimba Lumina to respond to new performance variables such as position along the length of each bars. In addition, each mallet is tuned to a unique frequency which allows one to program different instrumental responses for each mallet. This all augments the potential for expressive control with easily implemented pitch, volume and timbre modulation.

Real Vocal String Quartet We now have a bass player…an incredible one at that. We have been awarded a Gerbode Grant and are in the midst of writing and recording a new body of work with collaborative artists from 8 of San Francisco’s international sister cities. We will release this (our 4th) CD and premiere the work next spring at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts. To move forward with this project, RVSQ welcomes Sumaia Jackson on five string fiddle, Helen Newby on cello and Sam Shuhan on string bass. Yes BASS. We are changed and it’s a beautiful sound.

The Sparkle Boys Sparkle Boys is a sound of twisted circuits kalimba mush loops, swirling spirit cats being accidentally stepped on and running down the hall of banana leaf drapery to the playful joy of pursuant bees. Music to promote a weekly frisbee game. The helpers are calling from inside the house screams the startled detective. Matthew and Eric met in Philadelphia in 2003 this was is the best and only option.

Robin Petrie and friends will be playing new and improvised music on stringed instruments and percussion, featuring the hammered dulcimer.

Moe! Staiano Ensemble Moe! Staiano is an Oakland-based composer/drummer whose large ensembles, Moe! Staiano Ensemble and Moe!kestra!, have performed in both Europe and the United States. His dense, heavy and intense compositions often include unconventional instrumentation, such as sirens, u-bolts, prepared guitars and wine glasses, as well as traditional orchestral and rock instruments. His composition, “Away Towards the Light,” is an exploration of tonal interplay and contrasting rhythms for nine electric guitars, bass and drums composed in three movements, and is his first composition for multiple electric guitars. It will be performed in an abbreviated version specially for this event (with no bass and drums, obviously).

Amy X Neuburg will perform her customary assortment of “avant-cabaret” songs for voice, live looping and electronic percussion — always a few new tunes and some old favorites. Amy has been a staple at Garden of Memory for — oh gosh — almost forever. She looks forward every year to this magical event, and especially enjoys its family-oriented nature and seeing the delighted faces of young kids being turned on to adventurous new music.

Amy has presented her energetic and unclassifiable music, solo and as a composer for ensembles, all over the U.S. and the world.

Dean Santomieri will be performing, (guitar & voice), with Cindy Sawprano, at this year’s Garden of Memory Solstice Concert. Cindy plays saw, hurdy-gurdy, accordion and voice, as well as an array of sound-making items that she uses for looping. They will be performing a number of spoken word pieces, modern classical songs (and originals), instrumentals and improvisations.
Cindy and Dean will be in The Chapel of Meditation, where Dean has performed for the last few years with violinist Thea Farhadian. They will be alternating 30-minute sets, on the hour and half-hour, with the amazing Tuvan Throat Singer, Soriah!

Adam Tendler will chance-determine his three sets so that no piece repeats and no set will be the same.
Works to be played include:
-for thing (Marina Poleukhina)
-Music for Piano 4 (Toshi Ichiyanagi)
-Imaginary Husband (Elodie Lauten)
-Le Loriot (Olivier Messiaen)
-while nailing at random (David Lang)
-Mad Rush (Philip Glass)