Sunday, February 25, 2007

DCIC in-store at Crooked Beat

On Friday night, the DC Improvisers Collective played a little show at Crooked Beat in Adams Morgan. It's a super-cool little record store - the kind of place that I'm especially grateful for these days with the music retail business in such turmoil. It's also the kind of place that I'm not allowed to browse in because I'll spend a small fortune in no time at all. On this occasion, I had my hands full with the guitar playing, so was able to keep my paws out of the record bins and kept a few dollars in my pocket for dinner and a beer afterwards (Asylum is just up the street and they have Shiner on tap, and several vegan treats on the menu).

We set this show up as a "release party" for our new quartet disc that's out on Sachimay Records' "interventions" series.

For this show, I left the laptop-guitar-rig at home (to save space, the "stage" at the store is quite small). So I had to do the whole show with no effects. No looping. No gadgets (except low-tech stuff like alligator clips, paintbrush, etc). Imagine that - I had to play the guitar. That is my job in this group after all. Hmmm. I think it worked out pretty well, and honestly, I think I should do it this way all the time. Cameron mentioned after the show that she thought there was better listening and interacting among the group - maybe because I had to focus on playing guitar and not think about what buttons to push. She's a smart one... I think I better keep her around ;-)

Photo by Alexandra Gardner

Friday, February 16, 2007

Low End String Quartet

I'm delighted to introduce my newest project / ensemble:
The Low End String Quartet.

We've got a myspace page thrown together. Be our friend, and you can hear some music there too. We'll be playing at Warehouse Next Door on March 18.

Thursday, February 15, 2007

Professor Matis

Today I just did my first teaching at the college level. I taught a dance class at the University of Maryland. For real. (stop laughing)

I was subbing for Daniel's improv class. We talked about listening. We did some improvising. Jeepers college students look really really young.

Tuesday, February 06, 2007

DCIC in-store, Feb. 23

Save the date...



Come experience DCIC and celebrate the release of our new CD, MEME + VARIATIONS - Live recordings from 2005-2006 part of Sachimay Records' "Interventions" series.

It's a full length album of DCIC's quartet lineup, recorded in various places such as rehearsals, live shows, and a radio broadcast.

It's only $5. You can read more (and order a copy) from our site or from Sachimay Records. Seriously, it's only $5. How cool is that?


RSVP for the in-store and "share" this event with your friends via upcoming.org...

Friday, February 02, 2007

DCIC at Warehouse Next Door, Feb 1

I had a gig last night with the DC Improvisers Collective (DCIC). We shared a bill with Tim Feeney and Vic Rawlings (from Boston) and The Caution Curves. We played as a trio, the same "power trio" lineup we've been using for the last few months. We played last, and it was getting late so once again it was a short set. Here's the last short piece we did (headline on the blog post is a link to the mp3). We did two pieces before this one... but they ran together, so in practical terms it was one long piece (around 20 minutes). The "score" for the set was negotiated on stage a few seconds before we played. I think it was "a short free one, then a soft long one, then another short free one." And we pretty much stuck to that plan. Mike did some very cool bass clarinet work during the soft one, followed by some very cool soprano sax (actually saxello if you care about such things) work when the dynamic level started to rise.

The show is uploaded to "the vault" so if you really want the whole thing you can get it...

We've also released a new CD, part of Sachimay Records' "Interventions" series. It's a full length album of DCIC's quartet lineup, recorded in various places such as rehearsals, live shows, and a radio broadcast. It's only $5. You can read more (and order a copy) from our site or from Sachimay Records. Seriously, it's only $5. How cool is that?

We learned last week that Dischord Records will not be releasing our new studio album. That was not a surprise - since we're pretty far afield from the music that Dischord specializes in, so we're still trying to figure out the best arrangement for releasing the DCIC "power trio" album. Leave comments if you have any suggestions, thanks!!!