NYC shows--J Fried

Joshua Fried (jf@escape.com)
Mon, 4 Aug 1997 11:26:33 -0400 (EDT)

I post this because I think it will be of interest to subscribers. If this is
contrary to the regulations or to the spirit of the group, please accept my
apologies, and let me know, so I can keep my foot away from my mouth--er,
keyboard--the next time.

I have two performances coming up at Lincoln Center-Out-of-Doors.

On Saturday, August 9th during the day, a performance and
demonstration of my instrument the MUSICAL SHOES.

On Wednesday, August 13th in the evening, a performance of SPELL FOR
OPENING THE MOUTH OF N, my collaboration with Douglas Dunn, featuring 8
singer/actors responding to headphones, and a dance company of 10.

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Details follow:

SHOE MUSIC
performed by Joshua Fried
HOMEMADE INSTRUMENTS DAY
Saturday, August 9th, 1997
workshop/performance from 2pm-3pm, additional workshop 4:45-5:30
Admission: FREE

Lincoln Center North Plaza, Broadway and 63rd Street
Many other interesting homemade instruments also!

- - -

SPELL FOR OPENING THE MOUTH OF N
Music: Joshua Fried Choreography: Douglas Dunn
Design: Mimi Gross Lighting: Carol Mullins Text: Ruth Margraff

SINGER/ACTORS: Paula Murray Cole, David Figueroa, Gretchen Krich, Tania
Mara Miller, Laurence Rawlins, Marlene Tholl, Susan Thompson, Vanessa
Walters...

...and DOUGLAS DUNN & DANCERS: Amy Baker, Janet Charleston, Derek Clifford,
Georgia Corner, Grazia Della-Terza, Mark Drahozal, Douglas Dunn, Lennard
Louissy*, Edmund Melville, Kari Richardson.
*appears courtesy Dance Theater of Harlem

Wednesday, August 13, 1997, 8:15 pm
(Rain date: August 14th)
Admission: FREE

LINCOLN CENTER/DAMROSCH PARK BAND SHELL
Amsterdam and 62nd
Enter on Broadway or 62nd

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Here are brief descriptions of the work:

THE MUSICAL SHOES are made of four ordinary, upturned shoes mounted on
stands. A pick-up is embedded in the heel of each shoe. Each pick-up is
wired to a noise gate which releases a bit of any ongoing source material
at the instant the shoe is struck; the source can be anything--from a
voice to live radio. No digital sampling or MIDI is involved, but
metaphorically Shoe Music turns the whole world into a giant sound
sampler. I plan to have fun.

SPELL FOR OPENING THE MOUTH OF N uses Headphone-Driven Performance, in
which performers try to imitate pre-recorded vocals that are
played over headphones. The performers have never heard these sounds
before, and yet they are asked to reproduce the input as it happens--with
every word, pitch and expression accurate and NO LAG TIME WHATEVER. This
last requirement makes the task quite impossible and the result resembles
a bizarre, dramatic, mostly indecipherable new language--even though the
source material is, for the most part, plain spoken English. We like it.
In SPELL... the distinctions between actor, singer and dancer (not to
mention composer/choreographer) are blurred. We see metaphoric links
between our "instructed" interactions on stage and the interplay of
cultural values in contemporary society. The performance feels a bit
like a ritual from the distant future or past, and there is a whiff of
ancient Egypt. But perhaps most importantly, headphone-driven performance
and other "instruction"-type techniques have enabled us to make an
exploratory dance along the edges of language, narrative, intention and
self-control.

(SPELL FOR OPENING THE MOUTH OF N was made possible in part by the
generous support of the National Endowment for the Arts, the New York
State Council on the Arts, The Mary Flagler Cary Trust, the Harkness
Foundations for Dance and private donations. The composer/choreographer
commission fees were made possible by a grant from Meet The Composer's
Composer/Choreographer Project, a national program funded by The Pew
Charitable Trusts and The Helen W. Buckner Trust. Underwritten by the
American Composer's Forum with funds provided by the Jerome Foundation )

- - -

If you'd like more information, just send an email with, oh, just about
anything in the subject line, and my brown-eyed 10-digit reply robot will
send an automated response.

Thanks for reading. Joshua Fried jf@escape.com