Rich pads and aggressive drum machine from Casio's first professional synthesizer, circa 1985.

CT6000 sample

Recorded live at the Chicago Museum of Contemporary Art, 2002

What Are Doing It (live)

Imagined Compositions for Water uses a single theme to produce its effects without synthesizers or traditional instruments. Just as Stone (Sub Rosa, 1992) used stones, rocks, etc; and Redwing (Sub Rosa, 1995) used air; "ICFW" uses source audio and video recordings made exclusively from Oceans-Rivers-lakes-waterfalls-etc, modified using analog & digital filters and effects, and only minimal computer processing. Homemade electronic controllers are used to direct many of the effects.

"You start to wonder if what you're hearing is the sound of water from an alien perspective, natural tones subjected to interpretive organs which have no correlation to our own eardrum." (Earpollution)

from the LILITH album "Imagined Compositions for Water" (Hushush: 2002)

VIII: Atlantic Ocean recorded at Hattaras Island, North Carolina (excerpt)

Recorded at the Double Door in Chicago in '96 with homemade electronics & gestural controllers.

LILITH
Field Notes
1999: World Domination Recordings, WDM 10098-2 (CD)

Field Notes (excerpt) Live 1996

MIDIfied Simmons SDS-800 strutting it's stuff.

SDS800 - D/I - PREAMP - A/D (no effects)

Simmons SDS-800

Tweaky MIDIfied Simmons SDS-800.

SDS800 - D/I - PREAMP - A/D - MondoMod (auto-panner)

SDS7, analogue section only

SDS7 - PREAMP - A/D; MondoMod (auto-panner) on toms; Brick Audio plate reverb on snare & cymbals

Simmons SDS7 - analogue section

SDS7, both digital & analogue sections

SDS7 - PREAMP - A/D; aggressive compression & limiting added at the end

Simmons SDS7

Excerpt from "lesser gods iv" on nipple runs:
1987: self-released (ltd ed 50 cass with elaborate packaging)
Re-released on White Noise: 1988 (WNCS 01)
Re-released on Le Gros Bit Ici: 1993

nipple runs.

lesser gods iv

Lesser gods iv (1987)

Scott Gibbons & the Roberto Gini Ensemble, for Socìetas Raffaello Sanzio's "Il Combattmento"

Every Sound Is An Insidious Silence

From "four ways of saying h3o" 1999: Hushush, HSH01 (CD)

"Surrealist atmospheres, crepuscular metallic textures and disquieting whispers compose a picture of eerie colors that seem to suggest the image of the world after the Apocalypse..." (Amazing Sounds)

Tributorium

Remix of the theme from Romeo Castellucci's "Paradiso" (Avignon, 2008)

Theme From Paradiso

Scott Gibbons + Chiara Guidi, from "Summa Tragedia" - A collection of sounds from the laboratories, episodes, outgrowths and film cycle of Tragedia Endogonidia - for Socìetas Raffaello Sanzio (dir. Romeo Castellucci)

2007: Rarovideo, RVD 40143 (3xDVD+CD)

The Departure Of The Fleet

GQ.c 3.16

"Subterranean Sky" - a 2002 collaboration between sculptor george deMerle and composer Scott Gibbons - is a spacial environment that defies everyday perceptions of mass, form and time. An incredibly strong yet lightweight plastic, originally developed by deMerle using materials from NASA, is the medium used to create delicate fabrics of a proposed alternate reality.

The first to propose putting art into space*, deMerle sculpts light out of darkness with this webbing to create environments which seem to defy gravity. In fact, a recent deMerle piece which was so large as to fill an aircraft hangar weighed only 1 lb total, suspended. deMerle is best known as a political activist who fights for civil liberties, and for many decades he was considered an Outsider artist. But his art is a natural extension of his politics, which celebrates the necessity of personal expression for self-actualization.

Gibbons' original audio score is incorporated directly into the piece, directed through speakers that are integrated into deMerle's ethereal sculpture.

Although this is their first collaboration, deMerle and Gibbons have been close friends since the mid-80's, and in many ways Gibbons' work with audio is the sonic equivalent of deMerle's webbed designs; both of which often suggest more than they reveal.

* Although the NEA was very excited to back this project in 1977, they were ultimately unable to do so as there was no category for this kind of proposal.

Subterranean Sky (excerpts)

Montage from FOLK, by Romeo Castellucci / Socìetas Raffaello Sanzio.

Folk

Scott Gibbons​​ has been composing music for more than 30 years, with a two-fold exploration into the possibilities of natural acoustic sound on the one hand, and those of audio technology on the other. Although he is a seminal and influential composer of Dark Ambient and micromusic, his work is not so easily pigeonholed. His compositions demonstrate an acute balance between delicacy and physicality, often focusing around frequencies that are at the outermost limits of human hearing, and embracing quietness as a central element. A series of early releases on the Sub Rosa label - based only on singular natural sound sources such as stones and air - has received praise from all over the world and provided inspiration for many "single-source" artists in their wake. He has created many unique electronic instruments for use on stage and has earned a strong reputation for his live performances. In fact his first live album - 1999's Field Notes - was one of All-Music Guide's "Best Albums of the Year" across all music genres. Gibbons has also created many works for large-scale spectacle with Groupe F to accompany fireworks which utilize the sound of pyrotechnics as part of the musical arrangement.

In addition to collaborating with Early Music ensembles including the Hilliard Ensemble and the Roberto Gini Ensemble, Gibbons has also worked wth Contemporary artists such as Dead Voices On Air, Not Breathing, and the Flying Luttenbachers. He has released more than 30 albums with various groups and solo, including seminal electro-acoustic works by Lilith: Stone (Sub Rosa: '92) and Redwing (Sub Rosa: '94) ; music created entirely from sounds recorded at the molecular level for the performance Unheard ('13) with Romeo Castellucci; a suite created from the writings of a goat entitled The Cryonic Chants (KML Recordings: '08) with Chiara Guidi ; forward-looking synthetic pop by Strawberry: Strawberry (Taigkyo: '02) ; critically acclaimed electronica by Orbitronik: My Computer My Stereo (Thousand: '99) ; and, with Golan Levin & Gregory Shakar: Dialtones / a Telesymphony (Staalplaat: '02), a performance for more than 200 cell phones. He has increasingly sought to intertwine music with other disciplines, and to collaborate with artists from diverse fields. He has created music and sonic events for the award-winning theatre productions of Romeo Castellucci and Socìetas Raffaello Sanzio (Genesi: From the Museum of Sleep, Tragedia Endogonidia, Inferno); Flame Tornado ('05) with Kevin Binkert of Survival Research Labs; music for the 120th anniversary of the Eiffel Tower which incorporated sounds of the tower itself, and a string of commissions for the Palace of Versailles with pyrotechnic company Groupe F; and Subterranean Sky ('01) with sculptor george deMerle. His compositions frequently appear in international loci such as the Swiss National Exposition (Switzerland), the ARS Electronica Festival (Austria) and the Louvre (France).

Scott Gibbons

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