All Over Albany

EMPAC summer 2017 season

For the first time, EMPAC has put together a summer seasons of events.

Summers at the venue have typically been dedicated to artists' residencies and research. But this year it's also added a handful of public events, ranging from concerts to film to theater.

Here's a quick scan of the slate:

All blurbage via EMPAC where quoted, except where noted.

May 26: Elysia Crampton
"Bolivian-American electronic musician Elysia Crampton has described her style as 'severo,' a word suggestive of the raw textures and violent juxtapositions she creates with source material ranging from American pop to cumbia, hip-hop, ratchet, and South American metal."

May 31-June 4: Albany Symphony's American Music Festival
From ASO: "The American Music Festival is a bold, five-day festival of innovative concerts and artistic happenings across Troy, NY. Experience thrilling new works by living American composers and cross-genre artists." There are also performances at the Troy Music Hall and St. Paul's Episcopal Church.

July 10: Markus Noisternig
"As part of EMPAC's Spatial Audio Summer Workshop, audio researcher Markus Noisternig will present an evening of multi-channel audio works. Using a 248-channel Wave Field Synthesis (WFS) array and a 60-channel Ambisonic dome, Noisternig will showcase the capabilities of this immersive system in a pristine acoustic space."

July 13: Hans Tutschku
"During the second night of public concerts highlighting EMPAC's Spatial Audio Summer Workshop, Hans Tutschku will present four multi-channel electronic compositions arranged for a large array of loudspeakers. Tutschku is a master in the creation and performance of music that includes sonic movement, space, and scale as important features of the listening experience."

July 20: Lucy Raven: Low Relief
"Low Relief combines artist Lucy Raven's multi-year research into industrial image making, conducted in part through a series of EMPAC residencies, and the artworks that resulted--RP31 (2012), Curtains (2014), and the EMPAC-commissioned cinema event Tales of Love and Fear (2015)--into a monographic book designed by EMPAC graphic artist Eileen Baumgartner."

July 20: Phil Tippett and Lucy Raven - Starship Troopers
Following the book even, Lucy Raven and special-effects supervisor Phil Tippett will present an excerpt of their in-progress moving-image work Coming Attraction. And Tippett will talk about his work on Starship Troopers -- the evening will then end with a screening of the film.

Tippett worked on the original Star Wars films (and a scene in The Force Awakens), Jurassic Park, and Robocop.

August 10: Andrew Schneider - YOUARENOWHERE
"Performer, writer, and interactive-electronics artist Andrew Schneider presents his Obie Award-winning show YOUARENOWHERE. This rapid-fire and witty theater performance cycles through expressions of laughter, surprise, and angst. Its dialogue traverses quantum mechanics and parallel universes, missed connections and YouTube videos in an existential meditation on time and presence."

Here's a NYT article about the work from last year.

August 16: Ambrose Akinmusire
"Signed to the legendary label Blue Note Records, Akinmusire is a rising star in American Jazz. At 19, he began touring professionally with saxophonist Steve Colemen, before studying with Herbie Hancock, Wayne Shorter, and Terrence Blanchard at the Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz. In 2007, he won both the Thelonious Monk International Jazz Competition and the Carmine Caruso International Jazz Trumpet Solo Competition. Akinmusire has since worked with Jazz icons from Vijay Iyer and Aaron Parks to Esperanza Spalding and Jason Moran, recording two albums as a bandleader, including 2014's The Imagined Savior Is Far Easier to Paint. In 2015, he contributed to rapper Kendrick Lamar's Grammy-nominated album To Pimp a Butterfly."
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photo: Emra Islek