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Jason Kahn "On Metal Shore" (2011) Editions 001 LP http://jasonkahn.net/editions/catalog/on_metal_shore.html
Edition of 250
Composed and recorded 2008-2010 by Jason Kahn in Zurich and Horw, Switzerland Cover artwork by Jason Kahn.
Side A: 18:19
(12.00 euros LP + 8 euros shipping)
(12.00 euros LP + 10 euros shipping)
Excerpt Side A
Excerpt Side B The idea for "On Metal Shore" goes back to the 2008 collaboration "Vista" with Boston artist Asher. The genesis of this piece was early morning recordings I made on the shores of the Lake of Zurich in 2007, where I played some very resonant steel railings with my hands. There was something magical for me about being down by the water an hour or so before sunrise. My hands were freezing and as I played a flock of birds in a tree nearby would fly away from my noise (even though I wasn't playing very loudly) and then re-group again only minutes later, repeating the whole process over and over again during the course of the recording. I had the sense that I was engaging with the environment on several levels, from the give and take of the birds to the rising sound levels of my playing in response to the incoming waves lapping at the concrete retaining wall below the steel railing. I wanted to re-visit this approach with "On Metal Shore," which takes its title from this first experience on the shores of the Lake of Zurich playing with metal railings. "On Metal Shore" was recorded from 2008-2010. The composition uses not only recordings made of me playing found metal constructions outside but studio recordings of various metal objects and percussion instruments being vibrated with sound waves played through different types of transducers. In a sense, then, "On Metal Shore" is a composition about percussion, but not only. It's also about the idea of "playing" with an environment and taking my percussionist's skills outside the studio and into uncontrolled situations. Some of the other location recordings for "On Metal Shore" were made at the Binaural Residency in Nodar, Portugal, where I found some water tanks with good sounding metal ladders welded to them. More lakeside recordings were made, this time on the shores of the Lake of Luzern, while on another residency at the Haus am See in Horw. In this case, a small dock nearby the house where I was staying had a line of steel railings which were incredibly resonant and played nicely with the water quietly splashing against the nearby boats and the dock's wooden piles. At a construction site in Oerlikon, a suburb of Zurich, I found some long metal pipes which I recorded with the microphones placed deep inside, tapping lightly on the pipes with my fingers. The rumble of passing trains running parallel to the site provided a good juxtaposition to my playing. And at a school nearby where I live I found a drainage pipe closed off with a large plate of steel, which responded to the lightest of playing with a soft mallet. In the distance, water running down another pipe offered a strong contrast to the ringing tones of the steel plate. In my studio I set up a mini version of my installation "Wires (2008)" and experimented with various frequencies of sound waves vibrating the steel wires, recording this in front of tin can resonators attached to the wires. I also made recordings of other metal objects and drums activated with various transducers, ranging from small piezo elements to large "bass shakers."
I had never set out to compose a piece for percussion, but I guess in the end this is "What On Metal Shore" is, though perhaps not just about the sound of percussion but about the idea of how and where I play it, be it outside or in the studio, with my hands or without, set vibrating by the oscillation of sound waves or accompanied by a flock of birds or the sound of water. http://www.thewire.co.uk/articles/8125/ In this second edition of 'a quiet position' we find pieces that explore quietude, audible silence, active listening, compositional line, performance documentation and more. In gathering these pieces together for you, the intention was to present what could only ever be a small sample of some of the ways in which field recording and an active approach to listening as part of the finished work has developed and informed explorative music in recent years. Each piece stands on its own of course, however there is something additional to be gained by listening to the entire gathering of work in one continuous experience - as when out 'in the field', one's ears begin to yield more and more
Participating artists: Kiyoshi Mizutani, Alexander Wendt, Sarah Hughes, Stefan Thut, Jason Kahn, Anne Wellmer, Ivan Palacky, David Lacey, Patrick Farmer, Anne Guthrie, Dawn Scarfe, Manfred Werder, Signe Liden, Lasse-Marc Riek, Peter Toll, Embla Quickbeam, Julia Holter Els Viaene. http://bannedproduction.com/index.html
These two pieces were recorded in the Kunstraum Walcheturm here in Zürich. This is an art space run by a friend of mine. The main room where I made these recordings is pretty large and very resonant. "Espírito Santo" was recorded one October day in Lisbon in the cellar of the "Espírito Santo" building. Formerly a bank, this building had been empty many years and was recently opened again for artists to use as studio and exhibition space. The room we recorded in, resembling at first glance more a cave than a cellar, is remarkable for its acoustics. With eight-meter high ceilings, brick walls and concrete floor we found ourselves dealing with a very responsive space. In addition to this, the local subway line ran adjacent to the building and its vibrations could be felt (and heard) during the recording. Manuel suggested we record in this space. In the end, as much our musical interaction as our relationship to the acoustical qualities of the space shaped how we played and how these recordings ultimately sounded. It would be an exaggeration and perhaps a cliché to once again invoke the name of Fernando Pessoa with reference to Lisbon, but for me there is definitely something to the pace and feeling of these recordings which reminds me of Pessoa's endless lifetime opus "The Book of Disquiet." The music progresses slowly and at times verging on a dreamlike momentum. While recording these pieces I soon lost my sense of time, floating in the catacomb of sound we were creating. Manuel Mota // electric guitar Jason Kahn // percussion, analog synthesizer
Recorded October 23, 2009 http://binauralmedia.org/news/en/
The catalog includes essays, critical texts, field diaries, photographs and drawings of more than 40 artists who developed art projects at Nodar Artist Residency Center between 2007 and 2009.
Texts by:
Sound compositions by: Concert recordings made in January this year in Melbourne at the Stutter concert series and in Sydney at the Now Now Festival. Free download.
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