As part of their 2022 Early Music Festival, Zeitgeist and 113 Collective invited electronic sound artists to create realizations of Alvin Lucier's work "Gentle Fire," written for synthesizer operators/sound creators. 

"Gentle Fire" involves taking the sound of something you find unpleasant (breaking windows, sinking ships, jackhammers, snoring) and using an electronic process/synthesizer to change those sounds into a sound you find pleasant or soothing (Ocean waves, droning bees, birds). This process can take as long as you like, and you can use any process you wish. Lucier’s only instructions are that the two sounds be clearly heard, and the process be slow, gradual, and clearly heard. 

We are honored to have received realizations of "Gentle Fire" created by sound artists from our local area and well beyond. We hope you enjoy the variety and creativity of their work.

Gentle Fire: Paul Schwarzkopf / Manual Controller

Gentle Fire: Michael Wittgraf

Gentle Fire: Jay Afrisando

Gentle Fire: Denver Nuckolls

Gentle Fire: Brian Heller

As part of their 2022 Early Music Festival, Zeitgeist and 113 Collective invited electronic sound artists to create realizations of Alvin Lucier's work "Gentle Fire," written for synthesizer operators/sound creators.

"Gentle Fire" involves taking the sound of something you find unpleasant (breaking windows, sinking ships, jackhammers, snoring) and using an electronic process/synthesizer to change those sounds into a sound you find pleasant or soothing (Ocean waves, droning bees, birds). This process can take as long as you like, and you can use any process you wish. Lucier’s only instructions are that the two sounds be clearly heard, and the process be slow, gradual, and clearly heard.

We are honored to have received realizations of "Gentle Fire" created by sound artists from our local area and well beyond. We hope you enjoy the variety and creativity of their work.

Gentle Fire: Charlie Gannon

Gentle Fire: Christopher Scully - Thurston

This track is from the album Zeitgeist and is available for purchase on CD Baby here: http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/zeitgeist3

Pattern Study No. 2

Set Sail for the Sun

This track is from the album Zephyr and is available for purchase on CD Baby here: http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/zeitgeist2

Listen to the Rolling Thunder

For the Birds is a compelling combination of colorful musical performance, songs, and storytelling featuring Zeitgeist, humorist Kevin Kling, and composer Victor Zupanc. 

Zeitgeist - For The Birds - 01 - Overture

For the Birds is a compelling combination of colorful musical performance, songs, and storytelling featuring Zeitgeist, humorist Kevin Kling, and composer Victor Zupanc

Zeitgeist - For The Birds - 02 - Cape Clear

Zeitgeist - For The Birds - 03 - For The Birds

Zeitgeist - For The Birds - 04 - Crow

Zeitgeist - For The Birds - 05 - The Drive - In

Zeitgeist - For The Birds - 06 - Nighthawks

Zeitgeist - For The Birds - 08 - Sparrow

Zeitgeist - For The Birds - 10 - Woodpecker

Zeitgeist - For The Birds - 15 - Hummingbird

If Tigers Were Clouds...

Ironia - An Improvisation on the Arthur Ferris Instruments

Yoko Ono: Pieces for Orchestra

New Albion 1994

Harold Budd's music is as close to "new age" as Zeitgeist is likely to get. Harold Budd, well known for collaborations with Brian Eno and the Cocteau Twins, writes simple and utterly gorgeous music. Contains Harold Budd's She Is a Phantom (1992), written for Zeitgeist, and In Delius' Sleep (1974). On this recording, Budd joins the ensemble, playing piano and narrating his poetry.

Performers: Heather Barringer, Jay Johnson, Tom Linker, Bob Samarotto, Harold Budd (voice and piano).

Recorded live to 2-track at Westminster Church in Minneapolis on November 20, 1993.

She is a Phantom

In Delius' Sleep

Angels alight in the messy evening sky.

She's by the window. You can see her face faintly through the encrusted crystal.

Laurel.

Handsome. The spineless little prick was so handsome.

Like perfume from old to new vapor, we become thinner.

We step across the cliff but that was a different, different time - a definitely different place.

I blink and she's gone. The stairwell is packed with strangers.

A lazy smile across the enormous room.

Emboldened by a fresh view of my visage, I take stock. My dreams perish.

Pantomime becomes her.

Breathless, she left her shoe by my favorite Bourdelle. I

Shadows Of Shadows Passing by Daniel Nass

And the Sound is Thunder by Daniel Nass

Performed by Zeitgeist (Heather Barringer and Patti Cudd, percussion; Pat O’Keefe, woodwinds; Shannon Wettstein, piano) and Paul Elwood, banjo and voice
Recorded at Wild Sound Recording Studio in Minneapolis in 2010.
Engineer: Matthew Zimmerman
Producer: Scott Miller

a forty-four smokeless was commissioned by Zeitgeist with funds from the American Composers Forum Jerome Commissioning Program in 2007. The ensemble requested a composition with five-string banjo; composer Paul Elwood wrote the banjo part for himself, and the piece is based on the Appalachian folk tune Little Sadie.  Little is known about the factual events in the song about a man named Lee Brown who dispassionately murders a woman named Little Sadie. It is thought the events occurred in North Carolina because that is the only place where a town named Thomasville is only 60 miles from a town named Jericho, where Brown, in the song, says he ran after the murder. It is a curious tune in which the murderer expresses no remorse – and no reason for the killing is given.  One verse of the song, not used in this composition, says “ Forty one days, forty one nights, forty one years to wear the ball and the stripes; I'll be here for the rest of my life, and all I done was kill my wife.” In spite of the dark nature of the text, as is the case with many folk songs, the tune has entered the common repertoire of many bluegrass and old-time bands. Some melodic and harmonic material in the composition is derived from Little Sadie, but the piece also wanders freely amongst other musical material exploring the coloristic and harmonic combinations of the diverse instruments in the ensemble. The composition is dedicated to Zeitgeist.

A Forty - Four Smokeless By Paul Elwood

In Bone-Colored Light features a collection of works created for Zeitgeist in the first decade of the new millennium. As an aural portrait of our artistic work of the last 10 years, it reveals the fertile creative relationships we forged and the aesthetic concerns that piqued our artistic curiosity. As performers, our relationship with these works and the people who created them has been spiritually enlivening, intellectually challenging and joyously transformative. Each of these works is remarkable, and the artistic voice resonating through each is undeniably singular. As a collection, they represent our zeitgeist. Released 2010

Performed by Heather Barringer, percussion; Patti Cudd; percussion; Pat O'Keefe, woodwinds; and Shannon Wettstein, piano, In Bone-Colored Light features new music composed by Anthony Gatto, Kathy Jackanich, Jerome Kitzke, Ivo Medek and Ethan Wickman.

In Bone-Colored Light

Ivo Medek: Into the Same River B

Ivo Medek: Into the Same River A

Anthony Gatto: Lucky Dreams

Lauded for providing “a once-in-a-lifetime experience for adventurous concertgoers,” Zeitgeist is a new music chamber ensemble comprised of two percussion, piano and woodwinds. One of the longest established new music groups in the country, Zeitgeist commissions and presents a wide variety of new music for audiences in the Twin Cities and on tour. Always eager to explore new artistic frontiers, Zeitgeist collaborates with poets, choreographers, directors, visual artists and sound artists of all types to create imaginative new work that challenges the boundaries of traditional chamber music. The members of Zeitgeist are: Heather Barringer, percussion; Patti Cudd, percussion; Pat O’Keefe, woodwinds; and Nicola Melville piano. Information about the ensemble and its activities can be found at www.zeitgeistnewmusic.org.

Zeitgeist New Music

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