I uploaded some footage taken of my performance at the ‘Touch My Project’ Interactive Art show at the University of Georgia here. Thanks again to everyone who made it out, it was fun to finally have all the pieces in place. I’m hoping to do some more official documentation highlighting the new features of the munome sometime in the future, so peel those eyes.
Also feel free check out Scapegoating Demonstration I.
This is documentation for an interactive-art piece I call the munome which I am using as the backbone of the Aman Amun performance.
It is meant to be a conceptual exploration of taking something that is open source (the monome) and making it even more flexible and open. The monome itself is only a grid of buttons, but this very simplicity also opens up room for almost endless functionality. For this piece I have virtualized this instrument in Max-Msp and added ways to dynamically control it both functionally and visually.
Note that this is only a small fraction of what the Aman Amun performance entails, but it illustrates some of the other ideas I am actively experimenting with. The performance seeks to explore the gradiated region that sits between “live performance,” “djing” and “vjing.” The monome is clearly an instrument, but the use of pre-recorded samples is very reminiscent of the practice of Djing rather than live performance. The active control of the visual display enters the realm of Vjing, but the visual information (as you will see more clearly in future documentation) is largely controlled by the music itself.
Technical Details:
The Munome is running MLR and tr256 alongside Reason for the drums sounds. I am using Johnney Lee’s Wii Whiteboard to take the performance from behind the computer screen and place it out in front of the viewer.
I apologize for the video, audio, and performance quality. Expect more of all of the above in future documentation when time and equipment permits it. Thanks to midimeek, stretta, tehn, and the others of the monome community for helping make this possible. Thanks to Eric Marty and the others of the ARTX Dept. @ UGA for help with equipment and technical details. More to come.
http://www.amanamun.com
http://www.monome.org
http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~johnny/project…
http://www.cycling74.com/
Waxing documents the beginning of my experimentation with the idea of taking traditionally composed and heavily lyrical music (ie. composed with a piano or guitar) and combining it with the heavily process oriented and explorative composition approach of electronic music. Most of the songs were written and recorded over the summer and fall of 2008 in my home studio in Athens. Real drums, some vocals, and some guitars were recorded at Rockvale studio in Murphysboro Tennesee with the help of Zac Litwack. The drumming is done by Nick Curtis.
Like the stage of the lunar cycle for which its named, ‘Waxing’ is meant to be the beginning of the process of revealing Aman Amun. It is the beginning of my exploration with electronic music, and is, certainly, the first attempt that I’ve ever made of putting my emotions right out on the table with my artwork.
See if you can sympathize, download it for free at bandcamp or contribute to the man at iTunes. If you want a tangible copy shoot me an email. Maybe I’ll set up a system for offering tangible copies if they’re requested.