Collaborations

A short sonification based on a photograph by <a href="http://sidsmith.blogspot.co.uk/">Sid Smith</a> as part of Sid's String Quartet project, where he offers photos to be used as graphical scores. Go <a href="http://sidsmith.blogspot.co.uk/2014/01/string-quartet-online-collaboration.html">here</a> for details.

I chose a very literal approach that also afforded me the opportunity to play with the very interesting <a href="http://warmplace.ru/soft/ans/">Virtual ANS</a> software. It is possible to treat an image as a sonogram and then translate it to audio. The vertical axis is used for pitch and the horizontal axis represents time, according to the settings one uses. Every detail in the image is represented in some way in the rendered sound. I did some post-processing in Audacity to add some reverb and adjust the amplitude.

The photograph is copyright Sid Smith, all rights reserved.

String Quartet XIV #4 (for Sid Smith)

Live at 119 Gallery (Lowell, MA) on Tuesday, May 17, 2011. Walter Wright & Dave Seidel: electronics.

Walter is playing a small analog hand-held synth (the name of which I can't recall) with a volume pedal. I'm playing a Drone Lab in a feedback loop with Digitech Grunge distortion pedal with volume and wah pedals.

Dinosaurs  - duo with Walter Wright at 119 Gallery (2011-05-17)

Recorded live at Sonorium (Salem, MA) on September 6, 2014. There is some background noise from the air conditioning system, but it's not too bad.

Palimpsest: Sonorium 2014-09-06

An improvisation in E-flat from a concert at The Stone in NYC, Sunday June 12 2011. It was both Mary Jane's and Dave's birthday.

Mary Jane played the Droneo iPhone app and piano with e-bows. Dave played a Drone Lab synth box with various pedals (Digitech Grunge, Electro-Harmonix Deluxe Memory Man, Electro-Harmonix Holy Grail, Boss volume pedal, Screaming Demon wah pedal). There is a bit of unintended distortion in a few spots where we hit certain resonant frequencies.

Mary Jane's website is http://mjleach.com.

The Gemini image is from http://www.tattoosymbol.com/just-for-site/gemini.html

Droning Geminis -  duo with Mary Jane Leach at The Stone (2011-06-12)

Doug (@douglasmseidel): samples (Cyril Ritchard reading Alice in Wonderland; some bird), SuperCollider, reverb thing

Dave: NovaDrone, FreqBox, DEP2b, Deluxe Memory Man with Hazarai, Boomerang III, Ekdahl Moisturizer

Recorded live in Dave's basement and pretty much left alone.


Kwadril (with Doug Seidel)

Recorded live at 119 Gallery, Lowell, MA, 20 December 2014. Christos Koulendros: electronics (left), Dave Seidel: electronics (right), Walter Wright: drums and voice (center). All analog, no plan.

Image from http://www.superluminal.com/cookbook/gallery_conference.html

Koulendros Seidel Wright: Conference of the Birds (live)

Jimmy Hughes (Buchla Music Easel, center), Al Margolis (amplified violin, left), Dave Seidel (Ashbory bass, right). Recorded live at XFest 2015 at Gateway City Arts in Holyoke, MA on Friday Feb. 27, 2015.

Xfest 2015 (Hughes Margolis Seidel)

Made in 2004, first published in 2006. Details at http://mysterybear.net/article/15/half-remembered

Please see http://soundcloud.com/douglasmseidel for more of Doug's music.

Doug Seidel & Dave Seidel - Half Remembered (2004)

An acoustic guitar duo, the last finished collaboration between me and my late friend Jon Gams. This was originally issued on a CD that accompanied issue #5 of Jon's magazine Lingo (see http://168.144.121.83/newhp/lingo/lingo5.html). We had been making music together since 1975, and this was a return to our roots: two acoustic guitars. Jon played a steel-string guitar (right channel), I was playing a nylon-stringed guitar (left channel).

Jonathan Gams & David Seidel: Fascists Call Beauty a Joke (1995)

Bill Bacon: percussion and penny whistle, Dave Seidel: electronics and cricket & cicada recordings, Greg Kowalski, visuals. You can see a video Greg made for this track at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KbRLyIfOEAU.

This was a live performance at the Flopera House (Boston, MA) for the first night of Flestival ("the flestival for the rest of us") on December 9, 2011 - the eve of the full frost moon.


Ouroboros: Frost Moon - at The Flopera House (2011-12-09)

This is an audio excerpt from the Ouroboros set at XFest (119 Gallery, Lowell, MA) on Feb. 26 2012, right up to the point at which Steve Norton, Marc Bisson and Dei Xhrist came on and we morphed into a Grau Garten set (they very kindly allowed me to stay and play with them). Greg Kowalsky, who is a member of both groups, provided live visuals throughout. Bill Bacon, the other sound maker in Ouroboros, was unable to join us for this one.

I used a setup that I refer to as "no-input mixer without the mixer." It uses an Audible Disease Rupture pedal instead of a mixer, with a signal loop consisting of a Heavy Metal distortion pedal, a Moogerfooger ring modulator, and a Deluxe Memory Man with Hazarai. The output of the Rupture goes though a Holy Grail Plus reverb. No sound sources, just modulated feedback, a snake swallowing its tail.

Image: Spindle whorl from <a href="http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Popular_Science_Monthly/Volume_2/January_1873/Art_in_the_Stone_Age">Arts in the Stone Age.</a>.

Ouroboros: Whorl - at XFest (2012-Feb-26)

A live improvisation recorded  March 24, 2012 at 119 Gallery in Lowell, MA. The performers were Laurie Amat (voice, processing, whistle, noisemakers), Michael F. Dailey Jr. (drums, voice), Gregory Kowalski (visuals) and Dave Seidel (electronics). It was the first time that this group of people had played together. There was no rehearsal or preparation, except for the fact that we had spent the day together (along with some other folks) participating in a voice/improvisation workshop conducted by Laurie. Greg's work is apparent in this recording only by implication, but it was an integral part of the experience; a video recording was made and may eventually be made available. Dave is responsible for the title (ex post facto). Special thanks for Walter Wright for the space and the support.

Photo: "1909 Newcastle Train Tunnel" by <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/aresauburnphotos/2699269321/">Nick Ares</a>, licensed under <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/deed.en">Creative Commons</a>.

The Bullet Train of Lost Souls (Amat/Dailey/Kowalski/Seidel)

This is an excerpt of a performance given on the front steps of the Peterborough Town House (1 Main St., Peterborough, NH) between approximately 10pm and 10:40pm on June 8, 2012 as part of The Thing In The Spring 2012. I made the sound as <a href="http://gregorykowalski.com">Greg Kowalski</a> projected his visuals on the side of the building across the street. It was an intermittently rainy (sometimes stormy) day, and we weren't sure we would be able to play outside. But the rain stopped about half an hour before we set up so we decided to take a chance. The rain started up again about five minutes after we had gotten our equipment back into our cars after playing.

I played Monotron Delay, Drone Lab and prerecorded cricket/cicada sounds, with a short effects chain consisting of a phase shifter and a Deluxe Memory Man. No looping; stuff that sounds looped was achieved in other ways. I recorded it on a Zoom H4 digital recorder at 96KHz/24-bit. Post-production was minimal: reduce the amplitude by 2 dB, add fade-in and fade-out to the selection, and convert to a 48K 320mbps MP3.

Image: "storm breathing dragon" by McBeth - see http://www.flickr.com/photos/mcbeth/3766612842/ - licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.0 Generic (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0).

Ouroboros: Unsettled Night (excerpt)

Xfest 2013 at 119 Gallery, Lowell, MA. First set on Saturday night, Feb. 23, 2012.

Jack Wright: tenor and soprano sax; Jed Speare: laptop; Dave Seidel: electronics; Ben Wright: acoustic bass; Dave Miller: drums. Intro/outro: Walter Wright.

As is generally the rule for Xfest sets, this particular ensemble had never played together before.

Xfest 2013 Saturday Feb 23, Set 1 (Wright, Speare, Seidel, Wright, Miller)

Track 2 from "Sing Men and Women!" by Alan Morse Davies and mysterybear, on the At Sea netlabel.

To stream and/or download the entire release, please visit http://mysterybear.bandcamp.com/album/sing-men-and-women.

Download and/or Buy

Sing Woman (with Alan Morse Davies) from "Sing Men and Women!", 2013

Experimental electronic music, mostly in the drone category. This is where I put live sets, one-offs, experiments, and excerpts from longer releases.

CD: "~60 Hz" on Irritable Hedgehog - http://recordings.irritablehedgehog.com/album/dave-seidel-60-hz

All releases, including netlabel items: 
http://mysterybear.net/music

https://mysterybear.bandcamp.com/

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