Parochial Dissonance describes the tragedy, loss, and suffering experienced when we narrow the scope of our worldviews. The album is a series of solo pieces captured from three streaming performances during the COVID-19 pandemic, and two live performances just before. John C.S. Keston improvised each piece within sets of rules applied to process, time, texture, and tonality. The pieces were performed on various synthesizers and Rhodes electric piano with occasional use of looping, arpeggiation, and signal processing. In his work Keston is drawn to systems that allow for chance and for improvising responses to randomized elements in the music. In his ongoing series of “duets” he has improvised in the field with mechanical and environmental soundscapes including laundry machines, freight trains, and a wind activated sculpture called the Singing Ringing Tree in Northern England. He has developed several generative sound design applications that algorithmically morph sounds on electronic instruments in real time. This toolset and approach led the work on Parochial Dissonance into experimental realms of abstract sound. The title refers to the tragedies, loss, and suffering experienced when we narrow the scope of our worldviews.

Keston has spoken, performed, and/or exhibited original work at the International Sound in Science Technology and the Arts (ISSTA) conference in Ireland, Northern Spark, the Weisman Art Museum, the Montreal Jazz Festival, the Walker Art Center, the Burnet Gallery, Walker’s Point Center for the Arts, the Minnesota Institute of Art, the In/Out Festival of Digital Performance, the Eyeo Festival, INST-INT, Echofluxx (Prague), and Moogfest. Keston composed the music for Parking Ramp Project, directed and choreographed by Guggenheim fellow Pramila Vasudevan and performed with the trio Bloodline and nearly fifty dancers in a parking ramp near the Mall of America. He was commissioned by the Walker Art Center to compose music for former Merce Cunningham dancers during the Common Time performance series. He composed and performed Panic by Proxy an electroacoustic, audiovisual piece in collaboration with Syrian artist and filmmaker Khaled Alwarea at the Walker Art Center. Along with Cody McKinney Keston started sound/simulacra a monthly performance series which explores musical improvisation as a faithful and intentionally distorted representational process.

Mastering by Jesse Whitney
Artwork by Pete Kvidera

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Parochial Dissonance

https://aethersound.bandcamp.com/album/mothership

Mothership is a series of studies based on a hypothetical; leaving a doomed planet for the isolation of space with little prospect for survival. Composed during the COVID-19 lockdown the work was a way to imagine the terrors of futuristic yet far too possible scenarios such as a global environment too toxic to support life and beyond the point of recovery, or less likely but equally horrific, hostile alien occupation. Many of the pieces evoke the cold, indifferent, vacuum of space, while others emphasize the psychological deterioration that years of solitude and confinement in space travel would cause. Interspersed among the twenty pieces in the collection are a handful of delicate, consonant vignettes because there is no peculiarity without familiarity, and no horror without hope.

The album artwork was created using a Generative Adversarial Network (GAN). The process, an example of machine learning, generated the image using OpenAI’s unconditional ImageNet diffusion model with Contrastive Language-Image Pretraining or CLIP (github.com/openai/CLIP) and the prompt “Dying Earth”. This was made possible thanks to a process shared by researcher Katherine Crowson @RiversHaveWings. 


Mothership

These tracks were all produced using dogmatic limitations imposed on the techniques and process allowed. By following these rules the album was composed, performed, produced and mixed in less than two weeks. 

1. No overdubbing. All tracks were recorded at the same time.
2. No computer sequencing. All sequencing was on the instruments used.
3. No looping or shuffling parts in post. Editing for length and content was allowed.
4. Minimal processing in the mix. Fades, one delay, and one reverb was used. 
5. No mix tricks in post. Reverse and rolls were performed live. 

Purchase

Builders of the Fauxpocalypse

This is one in a series of mixes that I am creating by improvising on the DSI Tempest synched to the Korg Volca Keys, which is in turn synched to the Korg Monotribe. Minor editing for length and simple processing has been applied, but there's no extensive post-production or mastering.

Chimera Crew

This is the fourth in a series of mixes that I am creating by improvising on the DSI Tempest synched to the Korg Volca Keys, which is in turn synched to the Korg Monotribe. Minor editing for length and simple processing has been applied, but there's no extensive post-production or mastering. Produced in preparations for:

http://www.northrop.umn.edu/events/builder-universe

Builders of the Universe

This is the sixth in a series of mixes that I am creating by improvising on the DSI Tempest synched to the Korg Volca Keys, which is in turn synched to the Korg Monotribe. Minor editing for length and simple processing has been applied, but there's no extensive post-production or mastering.

Sangre Azur

This is the seventh in a series of mixes that I am creating by improvising on the DSI Tempest synched to the Korg Volca Keys, which is in turn synched to the Korg Monotribe. Minor editing for length and simple processing has been applied, but there's no extensive post-production or mastering.

Pipes and Pressure

This is the nineth in a series of mixes that I am creating by improvising on the DSI Tempest synched to the Korg Volca Keys, which is in turn synched to the Korg Monotribe. Minor editing for length and simple processing has been applied, but there's no extensive post-production or mastering.

Rubul Mujayyab

To produce this analog noise I used the LFO on the Roland MKS-80 to slowly sweep the filter. 

Analog Noise Slow Filter Sweep

Being Again

Quarantine

Impossibilities I

Meander

Heat Signature

Consonant Dissonance

Schoenecker Center Performance Teaser

More about this:

http://audiocookbook.org/making-music-with-the-internets-most-reviled-synthesizer/

DarkStar Drone

DarkStar Dense Chords

DarkStar Sample and Hold

DarkStar Upward Arp with Bend

A short demo sequenced used in the article about PreenFM2 on AudioCookbook.org:

http://audiocookbook.org/the-most-powerful-tiny-fm-synth-preenfm2/

PreenFM2 Demo Sequence

I took a little time out today to play this tribute to Aretha Franklin on my somewhat out-of-tune Rhodes electric piano. I can’t imagine a world without Aretha’s voice. Dear Aretha, thank you for your amazing music. You are immortalized in admiration and will be missed.

Natural Woman Tribute to Aretha Franklin

This is track number eight from the album One Day to Save All Life by Keston and Westdal. The album can be purchased directly from UnearthedMusic.com, or for any of the usually e-music retailers, including iTunes or Amazon.

Keston and Westdal - Six Weeks

Custom designed patch from the AudioCookbook Experimental Patch Set for the Sequential Prophet Rev2. For more information please visit https://audiocookbook.org/tag/prophet-rev2/

U1P2 Bells Out Of Tune

U1P11 Creepy Thundar

U1P7 Cats On LSD

U1P8 Weird Gurgles

U1P6 Wide Saws

U1P5 Degraded 0.1a

U1P4 Wide Piano Spread

U1P3 Pseudo Marimba

U1P13 Dante's Inferno

U1P10 Vibranova

U1P1 Delayed Lead

U1P20 Spitty Clav

U1P34 Clicky Kimball

This is about 37 minutes from the first set at the Kitty Cat Klub on September 28, 2009. Ostracon is a duet featuring Ostraka (John Keston) using custom built generative music software called the GMS (visit http://audiocookbook.org for more information) and Dial System (producer and drummer, Graham O'Brien). Although present during the set the drums don't come in until 3:00 minutes into this recording becuase of a late start on the recorder.

Ostracon Live Recording, September 28, 2009

This track was composed using the REV2 Degrader software from AudioCookbook.org.

REV2 Degrader Experiment

Parochial Dissonance describes the tragedies, loss, and suffering experienced when we narrow the scope of our worldviews. The album is a series of solo pieces captured from three streaming performances during the COVID-19 pandemic, and two live performances just before. John C.S. Keston improvised each piece within sets of rules applied to process, time, texture, and tonality. The pieces were performed on various synthesizers and Rhodes electric piano with occasional use of looping, arpeggiation, and signal processing. In his work Keston is drawn to systems that allow for chance and for improvising responses to randomized elements in the music. In his ongoing series of “duets” he has improvised in the field with mechanical and environmental soundscapes including laundry machines, freight trains, and a wind activated sculpture called the Singing Ringing Tree in Northern England. He has developed several generative sound design applications that algorithmically morph sounds on electronic instruments in real time. This toolset and approach led the work on Parochial Dissonance into experimental realms of abstract sound. The title refers to the tragedies, loss, and suffering experienced when we narrow the scope of our worldviews.

Keston has spoken, performed, and/or exhibited original work at the International Sound in Science Technology and the Arts (ISSTA) conference in Ireland, Northern Spark, the Weisman Art Museum, the Montreal Jazz Festival, the Walker Art Center, the Burnet Gallery, Walker’s Point Center for the Arts, the Minnesota Institute of Art, the In/Out Festival of Digital Performance, the Eyeo Festival, INST-INT, Echofluxx (Prague), and Moogfest. Keston composed the music for Parking Ramp Project, directed and choreographed by Guggenheim fellow Pramila Vasudevan and performed with the trio Bloodline and nearly fifty dancers in a parking ramp near the Mall of America. He was commissioned by the Walker Art Center to compose music for former Merce Cunningham dancers during the Common Time performance series. He composed and performed Panic by Proxy an electroacoustic, audiovisual piece in collaboration with Syrian artist and filmmaker Khaled Alwarea at the Walker Art Center. Along with Cody McKinney Keston started sound/simulacra a monthly performance series which explores musical improvisation as a faithful and intentionally distorted representational process.

Pandæmonium

Organism

Fracture

Plasticine

Transmit

A7's Theme

Sonya's Theme

Nightgaunt

Hydrophobia

Submit booking, licensing, and label correspondence to keston@audiocookbook.org

John C.S. Keston is an award winning composer of electronic, experimental, and instrumental music. His work embraces the chaotic ambiguities of environmental and sensorial influences providing context within unpredictable or everyday events. His unconventional compositions convey a spirit of discovery and exploration through the use of graphic scores, chance and generative techniques, analog and digital synthesis, experimental sound design, signal processing, and acoustic piano. His compositions parallel indeterminate improvisation activating what remains immutable within traditional forms of notation driven music. Performers are empowered to use their phonomnesis, or sonic imaginations, to contribute to the work.

His music appears in The Jeffrey Dahmer Files (2012) and he composed the music for the short Familiar Pavement (2015) presented at the MNKINO Film Score Fest. He has appeared on more than a dozen albums including two solo albums on Unearthed Music. His latest release, Isosceles (2016) has drawn comparisons to the Stranger Things soundtrack. In 2011 he won the Minnesota Emerging Composers Award for electronic musicians. In 2013 he won the Jerome Fund for New Music for his project documenting binaural duets with the Singing Ringing Tree in the UK. 

John has performed and exhibited original work at Northern Spark, an all night arts festival with over 200,000 attendees (MN); the Weisman Art Museum (MN); the Montreal Jazz Festival; the Walker Art Center; the Burnet Gallery (MN); the In/Out Festival of Digital Performance (NYC); the Eyeo Festival (MN); INST-INT (MN); Echofluxx (Prague); WMC (Miami); and Moogfest (NC). In addition, Keston has worked with Atmosphere, Jon Davis, Martin Dosh, Peter Hennig, Joshua Herbst, Cody McKinney, Graham O'Brien, Adam Svec, and Nils Westdal to name a few. John resides in Minneapolis where he is a professor of creative multimedia at the University of St. Thomas and founded the widely read sound design resource  <a href="http://audiocookbook.org" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">AudioCoobook.org</a> where he shares sounds and writes about his unique approach to composition, production, and performance.

John C.S. Keston

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