This is a sound piece I created for one of my classes. The central idea of the piece focuses on a daydream. We begin in one place, and slowly drift through, encountering things that are vastly different than where we began. We suddenly find ourselves looking around wondering where we are. No sooner, we begin to drift back to where we began, with no memory of our journey. Nothing but a few faint echos. At the end, we find ourselves where we began, but it looks different. Our journey changed our perception of our surroundings. 
-Best experienced through headphones

A Study In Disorientation

My inspiration for this piece came about as I was reading about the Project Of Music For Magnetic Tape. This was a collective of composers in New York during the 1950s, including John Cage, Morton Feldman, David Tudor, Earle Brown, and Christian Wolff. I was definitely most inspired by Cage, and also Feldman, but to a lesser degree. What interested me most about Cage’s composition Williams Mix, was that he created this very intricate collage of sound. When I listened to it, I found certain sounds I recognized popping out of this dense texture. I became fascinated about this idea about creating a tape piece that was built of sounds from my personal experiences. Cage also had an extremely complex set of parameters that he used to compose. 
Although I couldn’t replicate these, I decided on my own set of parameters. The first two were:
1. All sounds must be recorded back to back on a single reel.
2. The sound material must be made up of sounds I encounter on a regular basis.
Another thing I knew, was that I wanted to work with short sections of sound. But, rather than cutting each piece of tape to a specific length, I opted to cut the tape in varying lengths. So the next parameters were:
3. All tape must be cut in varying lengths, in as random a manner as possible (without using a random number process)
4. All tape lengths must be between .5 seconds and 8 seconds (3.75”-60” respectively)
The final parameters had to do with affecting the sound. In his composition Intersection, For Magnetic Tape, Feldman used a technique which involved splicing in sections of leader tape to create silences in the midst of long sounds. Also, a pretty standard technique for affecting sound was reversing sections of tape. So the final parameters were:
5. The piece must contain between 1-3 occurrences leader tape splicing
6. Roughly 1/4 of the tape must be reversed (of varying lengths)
I recorded all the sounds using a Wollensak T-1500 Tape Recorder using Scotch Low Noise 1/4” tape with the stock microphone. 
I also recorded music from my turntable, which Cage also did in pieces such as Imaginary Landscape No. 5. Recordings include:
-The Beatles- Come Together
-The Beatles- Here Comes The Sun
-Judy Garland- Over The Rainbow
-Bizet- Carmen Suite No. 1: Prelude
-Dukas- The Sorcerer’s Apprentice
 I also recorded excerpts from John Cage’s Lecture On Nothing, and a National Weather Service Broadcast. 
	The result is The Sound Of Daily Life, and I am very pleased with how it turned out. It was a great learning experience, as I spliced over 800’ of tape by hand. It was very time consuming, but extremely rewarding. My hope is that as people listen to this piece, they will be able to relate to some of the sounds, in the was that I did when I listened to Williams Mix. Without divulging all the secrets of the piece, the one I will say, is that the piece ends with an timer going off, which I feel is significant, and closes the piece beautifully.

The Sound Of Daily Life

This is an arrangement I made of a John Cage lecture titled 2 Pages, 122 Words On Music And Dance. Arranged for 3 speakers. Performed live at the Burchfield Penney Art Center in Buffalo NY by Post-Sonus Orchestra:
John Smigielski- Speaker 1
Anthony Henry- Speaker 2
Leanna Goddard- Speaker 3

2 Pages, 122 Words On Music And Dance

Live recording of Post-Sonus Orchestra performing John Cage's Radio Music on 5/8/14.
-Radio Music (1956)- Radio Music was composed using chance operations. The score indicates 56 different frequencies between 55 and 156 kHz, notated with numbers, not on conventional staves (as in Imaginary Landscape No. 4). Cage indicates that the work is in 4 sections, to be programmed by the player(s), with or without intervening silences. To be performed as a solo or ensemble for 1-8 performers, each at one radio. Composed in 1956. Premiered in New York, May 30, 1956


Radio Music

This is a rough test of a new Max patch i've been working on. It takes two audio signals and allows for processing at various levels within the sound files. In addition to the dry signals, they each have a controllable delay line and ring modulator. The values for these are controlled either in real time, through a randomizer (operating with semi controlled values) or a combination of the two. The patch allows for multiple signal combinations (dry+dry, dry+ring, ring+delay/ring etc.), in the future I will be adding further processing combinations as well as separate gain controls at each processing level. 
The recordings used in this test are first, a live electronic performance of mine, and second the first movement of Music for 18 Musicians (Pulses) by Steve Reich

Two Signal Max Patch

Walking Left Handed for Solo Multiple Percussion and Tape by Casey Cangelosi. Performed by John Smigielski on Monday November 30, 2015 at Slee Hall, University at Buffalo.

The inspiration for Casey Cangelosi's piece Walking Left Handed comes from an actual interview with a young woman. Through a federally-funded research project, the woman tries to explain the effects of LSD on her perception. She insists that, although she is color-blind, she can now see and understand color. She even describes see one color in particular, orange. The composer was taken by the idea of doing something extreme or even dangerous for the purpose of revelation and furthering one's awareness. 

Throughout the piece, the minor 2nd motivically attempts to smare one key area to another. The focus is not so much on the relationship between keys, but the doorway leading from one to the other. The pre-recorded tape (CD) will accentuate this as well; it's sounds are all acoustic and not digitally altered. LIke the minor 2nd, it is the hope of the composer that the tape will also serve as connective tissue from one world to the other (acoustic to electronic-acoustic in this case). The last connecting theme is found in the lighting; the transfer from natural light (candles) to electric light (the head lamp). The title Walking Left Handed refers to walking a left handed path. Taking an uncommon or forbidden journey in hopes of great results.

Walking Left Handed (Casey Cangelosi)

Momentary Expanse (2008)for Solo Vibraphone with 2-channel 1-bit music 

Recorded on 4/30/15 in Lippes Concert Hall at SUNY Buffalo

John Smigielski M.M. Percussion Recital 4/30/2016

Momentary Expanse (Tristan Perich)

Percussionist
Sound Artist
Buffalo NY

*P/C Susanna Hancock

John Smigielski

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