as featured on:

Radio Eclectus #74: Haroun & the Sea of Grunge (Dec. 10, 2020)

Join us as we clear out some Seattle avant-grunge, with buzzing new tracks by several Northwest musicians. We also bid farewell to Noah Creshevsky and Harold Budd, and honor the late Charles Wuorinen with highlights from a recording of his opera Haroun and the Sea of Stories, a surprisingly jocular setting of Salman Rushdie’s novel by this notoriously serious-minded composer.

There’s more: the debut recording of Body Meπa (a new power quartet featuring Melvin Gibbs), the latest albums from British live-electronic band Langham Research Centre and “lowercase music” inventor Steve Roden, a new project from Marina Rosenfeld that’s a hybrid of composed music and sound installation, Wergo’s new CD dedicated to Younghi Pagh-Paan’s cross-cultural music on her 75th birthday, and a remarkable and prophetic early example of English minimalism that’s just been rescued from 47 years of oblivion. Radical new music from the Northwest and beyond, guaranteed carol-free for the Holidays!

Photo credits: Harold Shapero via Brandeis University, Noah Creshevsky by Michael Hafftka via Open Space, Younghi Pagh-Paan via Ricordi, Langham Research Centre via the artists, Charles Wuorinen By Javier Del Real, Dorota Czerner via the artist, Salman Rushdie by Kubik, Melvin Gibbs by Michael Hoefner, Harold Budd by Masao Nakagami, Thomas Simaku via University of York, Yarn/Wire via the artists, installation by St Celfer, Marco Stroppa via the artist.

Bandcamp

Suite #3: Dirge 1

Wave Track #7 comes to us from St Celfer, a Korean-American sound artist and musician who splits his time between Sao Paulo and Seattle. His track, Fifty One, wastes no time announcing itself, beginning with a sequence of machine-like, harsh sounds that rise in volume before slowly giving way to a melancholic rhythm, interspersed with soft tones that combine to create a nostalgic, almost cinematic quality. In just under three minutes, St Celfer manages to elicit a strong yearning for elsewhere, a sensibility that encapsulates–and communicates with–the other works presented in Infrasonica’s Wave #7. We hope you enjoy listening. INFRASONICA.ORG

Fifty One

as featured on:

Audio Collision with Cadmium Red on WOZO FM 103.9, Knoxville, TN:
#154 74, StC Lives 51-61-74 (December 5, 2021)

The recent St Celfer releases on Bandcamp are stereo mixes of 16-track works, that were spatially distributed in the gallery using directional speakers, during your show in São Paulo, Brazil. "Singspiel," to me, makes it most easy to imagine (of the work on Ten Tracks) how the sounds might have struck my ear in a gallery space. The sped-up voices could be gallery visitors moving around the space, mingling with room tone and random sounds bouncing around the walls. The deep bass bumps also have an almost accidental feel. But as with "Ricercare" there is a lullabye-ish tune that warps in and out, giving the piece a forward-moving, musical direction, rather than just "ambience."

Tom Moody

Suite #9: Singspiel

Audio Collision with Cadmium Red on WOZO FM 103.9, Knoxville, TN:
#332 Guillotar 0.3.5.9.11.15.34, Suites 1-9 (July 6 2025)

0.10 "A" + "B" = The bookends to Suites #1-9. The 16 tracks for each musical piece were released previously and separately as earcon's last album, 'Guillotar', during a musical lull dredging up studio material from my final days in Brooklyn when I was surrounded by the mountains of vintage synthesizers and effects which I had accumulated over the years and that I finally had to sell to make ends meet. Those tracks became the stems for St Celfer's Suites #1-9.

I can say now this project accidentally started in 2005 when one of the tracks in these compositions was captured live. It was from another world - I did not know what to do. In 1975 Lou Reed released Metal Machine Music claiming it was Classical. I think it is. Unfortunately, his ego, bruised by the reception to MMM, could not stand behind it until the last year's of his life. The "Symphony" in 3 parts does stand behind the claim that this music is, indeed, rooted in this tradition.

Why it's called 0 and 10: It's a direct reference to Kazimir Malevich's '0.10' when he showed his groundbreaking Suprematist works, including 'Black Square', for the first time. Check out the conversation with Tom Moody for more: (www.tommoody.us/archives/2020/12/04/on-breaking-the-square-a-conversation-between-john-parker-and-tom-moody/)


Guillotar 0.3.5.9.11.15.34

The 60's were a good era for 'psychedelic' music - at least, this is what's said. Allow me some visual clanging and flip that 6 to a 9 and talk about the Seattle 90's, also effluent in the 'psychedelic':

"I’ve been listening to old Nirvana bootlegs. I can say my music is influenced by the smashing of instruments at the end of their gigs. Each one is a unique orchestration but within a structure until it exhausts itself. It’s not random or just noise. There is a timing and build of tension. It is even more dramatic to only hear it rather than to watch it.

Kurt Cobain used to make music by surfing the radio and piecing it together with no editing, like early musique concrete collages. He had an old cassette recorder where you have to push the record and play buttons together and then push pause. You can hear the clicks, the getting up to speed..."*

...the tape warbles, and the shitilly timed stops.

*excerpted from the conversation with Tom Moody (www.tommoody.us/archives/2020/12/04/on-breaking-the-square-a-conversation-between-john-parker-and-tom-moody/)

Always live and improvised: Step.4D™ by St Celfer™. 

StC Lives I

Para Antonio was originally composed on a toy piano & guitar pedal. My nephew, Jack Kehoe, arranged the song enabling new versions including his (for Flute, Clarinet, Bass Clarinet, and Tuba) and St Celfer's (for 4 machines). 

Much of my music is inspired by Classical like St Celfer's 11 Suites which follows, albeit loosely, THE "rules" - made with some gambiarra, noise, and chaos, of course.

Antonio tragically passed away for reasons unrelated to the COVID pandemic. He was an actor with an upcoming movie release [ https://www.imdb.com/name/nm13865825/bio?ref_=nm_ov_bio_sm ].

Step.4D² Motifs for Keys

A (Para Antonio)

The 60's were a good era for 'psychedelic' music - at least, this is what's said. Allow me some visual clanging and flip that 6 to a 9 and talk about the Seattle 90's, also effluent in the 'psychedelic':

"I’ve been listening to old Nirvana bootlegs. I can say my music is influenced by the smashing of instruments at the end of their gigs. Each one is a unique orchestration but within a structure until it exhausts itself. It’s not random or just noise. There is a timing and build of tension. It is even more dramatic to only hear it rather than to watch it.

Kurt Cobain used to make music by surfing the radio and piecing it together with no editing, like early musique concrete collages. He had an old cassette recorder where you have to push the record and play buttons together and then push pause. You can hear the clicks, the getting up to speed..."*

...the tape warbles, and the shitilly timed stops.

*excerpted from the conversation with Tom Moody (www.tommoody.us/archives/2020/12/04/on-breaking-the-square-a-conversation-between-john-parker-and-tom-moody/)

Always live and improvised: Step.4D™ by St Celfer™.

Thanks to my Brooklyn bandmates, Ron, Pat, Drew, Richard and Marc, who taught me how to play, often on the job - meaning: live on stage, including an experienced crowd at CBGBs (R.I.P.) or, worse, a noisy Williamsburg art party.

Thank you also to the people I met on the internet in typical places but also others, where you listened to my story and helped me put together this homemade instrument with ideas & materials.

Postscript: Thank you Mateusz for your correspondence and wisdom
"You cannot sell yourself to the wind. If you need money, work in another profession and create as a hobby." - Komendarek

Thank you finally to M.Po [tommoody.us], Bia, BS corp language and almost all communication nowadays for the Step.4D² titles. Also, the Saxen for the Kaoss.

Groovy Doorbell (earcon Remix)

"At times it reminds me of Charles Ives with several ensembles playing simultaneously, and motifs fading in and out of our attention."
--Tom Moody

<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>

On Breaking the Square: A Conversation between John Parker and Tom Moody: www.tommoody.us/archives/2020/12/04/on-breaking-the-square-a-conversation-between-john-parker-and-tom-moody/

Suite #2: Rhapsody

Hello,

I have come back in time and named myself St in order to catch your attention. My name merely says 'reflec ts' when you look at it in a mirror.

We have mirrors in the future but no currency, and things cost nothing to make thanks to capitalism. We ditched that too and call your time the Second Dark Ages. (But understand it needed to happen - please do not take offense; it was simpler this way.)

I make sound pieces and was able to patch together an instrument that is close to familiar to what I have in the future. It all mounts to a single mic stand with interconnected gear attached to it which I have arranged so I can best play it live.

You can read a nice article about it here:
www.tommoody.us/archives/2021/03/26/st-celfers-step-4d-instrument/

These are single edit live performances. I plan to release them as 3+ track albums. I have done over 200 pieces keeping roughly ⅓ of them which I begin to present here.

This first release is curated for easy digestion and a taste of the future. I hope you enjoy and, if so, can become a contributor. More future very soon.

Thank you,

StC

-all beats made by cd skips
-notes made by cd skips and guitar pedals powered by theremin

read about Step.4D™ here:
www.tommoody.us/archives/2021/03/26/st-celfers-step-4d-instrument/
and here:
stcelfer.blogspot.com/p/step4d.html

Dedicated to my three mentors:

Denzil Hurley for pushing me out the door and ultimately sending me to New York (Brooklyn) and coming to my one and only (until now) Seattle musical performance.

To Tom Moody who has guided me since arriving in the 'art capital' and after leaving continues to be a beacon (especially to not give in to the likes economy). Thank you for the continued conversations.

Finally, in memory of Matt Freedman (1957 - 2020), my Brooklyn neighbor and Masters teacher. He would have wanted me to do something unexpected: (vimeo.com/80740361)

Always live and improvised: Step.4D™ by St Celfer™

website

I'm happy to announce on September 17, 2021, Step.4D² was brought into this world.

There hasn't been much time to celebrate as things could be called tense, us three stuck in a room together. Hear the back and forth conversation, track by track, culminate with the last part of track #16. Sounds like Step.4D² is here to stay.

See you in 2022. I am building a portable and more minimal device, Step.4D.bkwrdE, for playing with others.

Always live and improvised: Step.4D™ by St Celfer™.

².209

I'm happy to announce on September 17, 2021, Step.4D² was brought into this world.

There hasn't been much time to celebrate as things could be called tense, us three stuck in a room together. Hear the back and forth conversation, track by track, culminate with the last part of track #16. Sounds like Step.4D² is here to stay.

See you in 2022. I am building a portable and more minimal device, Step.4D.bkwrdE, for playing with others.

Always live and improvised: Step.4D™ by St Celfer™

².39

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_nHZHzbOAh1ENjvBvtTRr4n-eYyq28Wj1Q&playnext=1&index=1

Para Antonio was originally composed on a toy piano & guitar pedal. My nephew, Jack Kehoe, arranged the song enabling new versions including his (for Flute, Clarinet, Bass Clarinet, and Tuba) and St Celfer's (for 4 machines).

Much of my music is inspired by Classical like St Celfer's 11 Suites which follows, albeit loosely, THE "rules" - made with some gambiarra, noise, and chaos, of course.

Antonio tragically passed away for reasons unrelated to the COVID pandemic. He was an actor with an upcoming movie release [ www.imdb.com/name/nm13865825/bio?ref_=nm_ov_bio_sm ].

St Celfer returns with tracks culled from a series of live shows, each one a showcase for his inventive experimentalism. Bandcamp New & Notable Jun 26, 2023

Ping Me Bjork (Super Happy Fun Land)

Jasm (Espaço Garganta)

I'm happy to announce on September 17, 2021, Step.4D² was brought into this world.

Step.4D².39

Para Antonio (original)

Seattle’s St Celfer writes immersive electronic songs that encompass both haunting beauty & wild experimentalism. Bandcamp New & Notable May 24, 2021

St Celfer

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