blog

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more news

well.

i guess i am not as good as i thought keeping this updated.

mostly because the work life these days is kind of in limbo. i am making some sketches for an upcoming tv doc, waiting on a few grants to see if i got them….the same old thing i suppose, for those of you not familiar with the life.

some nice things, though: leela gilday was nominated for a juno for her album sedzé. since i was the drummer on the whole record, is it ok to say i was nominated too? i’m going to assume yes. so there: i was nominated for a juno! 3rd time lucky maybe. its a great CD.

also i am going to be providing music over the internet for the mirvish production of theatre gargantua’s production of e-dentity. very fun. i can do it in my pajamas if i want. oh, wait, i can’t. there’s going to be a webcam.

wish there was more music to share, but its all project based at the moment, so no peeking.

happy spring.

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back

i’m back.  even though i landed about a week ago.  keeping up and getting back into the groove is taking up a certain amount of time.

lots of great news on the work front, including a new myspace page to highlight composition and sound design work, shows with arabic singer maryem tollar, getting accepted to the 2nd round of the fresh ground commissioning selection process, and beginning the process of scoring a TV doc (more news later).

i have also been working on making some short films based on my experiences in india and created from lo res footage i shot there.  the preliminary work is proving to be very inspiring and i am really looking forward to the process of creating video works and scoring.

waiting on a few grants to see what i will be concentrating on next.

happy new year.

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work

figures.  time is short and i am getting going.  just took my first pung lesson today, with members of anjika, priti patel’s manipuri company.  sideways drumming is hard.  also going to check out sudharshan chakraborty’s company sapphire as well as trying to find time to see a few shows and do family stuff.  i have to get back here…..

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old/new

a hectic last minute train shuffle brought us back to kolkata from varanasi, where we did the puja to immerse my father’s ashes into the ganga on new year’s eve.

i am overwhelmed.  i can’t write about it now, much less even think about making audio from this experience.  there was so much sound i wanted to capture but i am beginning to realize that now i think i am going to have to let it go.  to filter it and remake it for others to hear somehow. 

going there made me realize the ganga is indeed a goddess.  every night we were there we watched the aarathi from a boat on the water.  never have i felt so thankful to…what?  be alive?  fulfill my father’s last wishes?  be in varanasi?  not sure.  there is a lot i am not sure about.  but thankful nonetheless.

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hungry tide

“But at the same time, who would have thought that it would be so intensely satisfying to have your future resolved, to know what you were going to be doing next year and the year after that and so on and so on, until who knows when?…It would be enough; as an alibi for a life, it would do; she would not need to apologize for how she had spent her time on this earth.”  Amitav Ghosh, The Hungry Tide

the british museum is holding a huge exhibition of bengali culture until jan 7th.  i know so little about what that is.  it feels so huge to even begin to understand.  even to go to kalighat to ask about dhak lessons feels like a huge undertaking—to be fair i suppose it is, which anyone who  has been there would know.

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tumbani

met sound artist bhudaditya chattopadhyay last night.  very interesting fellow, doing great work here in kolkata.  we talked a lot about audio restoration, soundscape work, and, of course, gear.  particularly interesting was hearing the stories of strange collectors and collections.  there is a lot of wonderful music here that is being lost, archived haphazardly and outright thrown away.  the same issues are at play in egypt, where my friend alfred gamil is trying to revive the song repertoire of the early 20th century.  a large collection of cylinders and shellacs were given to the french government a number of years ago, and my naive questions about appropriation and such issues were dismissed by a wave of his hand.  he says that archive was the best thing that happened to egyptian music—everything is being stored in climate controlled conditions under high security, but open for all.  i wonder what is happening in canada. 

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arrival

i made it.  still jetlagged but happy to be back.  everything is as i remember it, but way more prosperous.  it is obvious that the middle class is growing and has a lot more money.  more noise than i remember as well. 

yesterday there was a concert of folk music from various regions of bengal.  it was really quite amazing, unfortunately i didn’t quite get where everything was from—the bengali was too formal for me to catch everything.  further details available as they come to light.  of particular interest was the chhauu dancing—unbelieveable costumes, music.  backflips.  really.  looking forward to seeing more.

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jaal mala 12.06

i am avoiding packing.  i keep remembering why i’m going to india.

so i made some music from jaal mala (garland of water) which is a piece on quell that i made about my dad.

listen here.  its my new year’s gift to you.

i feel better.

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off to india

apologies for the lack of posts.

i’m heading to india on saturday, to put my father’s ashes to rest. not yet sure all that will be involved but the main focus is to go to varanasi to put the ashes in the ganges there.

i will also be doing lots of recording of environmental sound, taking some lessons in dhak (the bengali puja drum), and meeting some sound artists and contemporary art practitioners in kolkata.

i’ll be keeping the blog semi updated during this time.

upcoming for the new year: various projects (audio art, video, net) and woodshedding to create new works. dance performances, school shows, etc. oh yeah, getting married.

finally, there is a new improv uploaded, an outtake from the bad monkey bad bad monkey CD.

happy new year.