Blank Forms RADIO

To conclude “Coming Together: Attica 50 Years On,” Blank Forms presented a day-long May Day radio show commemorating the 1971 Attica rebellion. Celebrating the 50th anniversaries of both Archie Shepp’s Attica Blues and Frederic Rzewski’s compositions “Attica” and “Coming Together,” the show featured key compositions and political recordings from the 1970s, including a rare concert of Rzewski’s Attica works with Julius Eastman, Sonia Sanchez reading at the prison accompanied by incarcerated poets and musicians, and a post-mortem from Bobby Seale about his participation in negotiations at the prison. Hosts Ciarán Finlayson and Lawrence Kumpf interviewed Renée Levine Packer, author of This Life of Sounds: Evenings for New Music in Buffalo (Oxford University Press, 2010); Glo Harris, wife of Beaver Harris; and Michael J. Hull, director of the film Betrayal at Attica (2021) and custodian of the digital archive of Elizabeth Fink's Attica Brothers Legal Defense evidence collection—writer Isaac Brosilow conducted an interview with Joshua Melville, son of Attica Brother Sam Melville. This event was produced in conjunction with the New York University Steinhardt Department of Art and Art Professions.

Coming Together: A Mayday Broadcast

The Public's Not Ready For You Yet: A Cricket Radio Show

Special guest shows from around the world.

https://www.nts.live/shows/guests/episodes/blank-forms-19th-may-2023

Blank Forms: Arbitrary Fun with Lawrence Kumpf and Lary 7 190523

Produced in conjunction with Clocktower Radio (clocktower.org).

This week Blank Forms' Lawrence Kumpf and Arian Rew dedicate the hour to avant-garde vocalist Phew whose eclectic career has consistently attracted collaborations with the cream of her contemporaries in left-field popular music. 

She started her first group Aunt Sally after attendening a Sex Pistols show, An Osaka art-punk band releasing one coveted album on Vanity Records in 1979. Ryuichi Sakamoto then produced her debut single as a solo artist and her subsequent classic self-titled LP features the propulsive backbone of CAN's Jaki Liebezeit and Holger Czukay. The next three decades took her from post-punk with members of Einstürzende Neubaten and DAF to experimental pop with Jim O'Rourke, her stoic voice remaining unmistakably Phew throughout.

Blank Forms : : Clocktower.org

Blank Forms #10: Phew

A conversation between scholar and historian Amy Cimini, Yarn/Wire percussionist and Adjacencies interpreter Russell Greenberg, and Lawrence Kumpf situating Maryanne Amacher’s "Adjacencies" within the lineage of her larger body of work. They discuss the practical challenges surrounding the interpretation and re-staging of the piece 51 years after its last performance and play a variety of pertinent audio, including a rehearsal recording of "Adjacencies"’ original performance by Jan Williams and Edward Burnham, audio research material used as a model for its reinterpretation, and a selection from the later piece "City-Links..: Buffalo" demonstrating Amacher’s practice of recycling audio material from earlier work.

Blank Forms #21: Maryanne Amacher's Adjacencies

Blank Forms' Lawrence Kumpf is joined by composer Tashi Wada for a show surveying Wada's work and methodology of the past decade. They discuss Wada's time and studies with James Tenney at CalArts, his early forays into just intonation, and his close collaborations with cellist Charles Curtis and his father Yoshi Wada.

Tashi Wada is a Los Angeles-based composer and performer whose works explore harmonic overtones, resonance, and dissonance through precise tuning and a gradual change in pitch. Grounded in a belief that “music should be as direct as possible,” his compositions use apparently simple structures to generate rich and unanticipated perceptual effects. Working in relation to American experimental music, microtonal music, and so-called drone music, Wada’s practice is also informed by interdisciplinary performance and Fluxus-affiliated artists. He studied composition at CalArts with James Tenney and for many years has performed alongside his father, composer Yoshi Wada.

Blank Forms Radio

Blank Forms #22: Tashi Wada

Non-profit curatorial platform for ⏳-based art.