Bay Area Improv Scene
Encyclopedia
The Bay Area Improv Scene is a commonly used name for a loose association of musicians and composers centered in the San Francisco Bay Area who create a style of music that evolved largely from avant-garde jazz
and modern classical music, with influences from other areas such as Electronic art music, Free improvisation
, and Musique concrète
. Other names of this scene tend to use phrases such as "Creative Music" to try to incorporate a wider focus than just the improvisational
approach.
This scene is comparable to the New York Downtown Scene
(which is most often associated with John Zorn
) and historically both scenes date back to the same time period in the early 1960s. A listing of some people who have been associated with the scene can provide a sense of the range of the music: List of Bay Area Improv Scene bands and artists
This is a very instrumental music, showing its primary influences from the jazz and modern classical worlds: the most common instruments are horns
, woodwinds, and strings
. Guitars and percussion are also often used, though not usually in the rock n' roll
style, and the use of electronics
is very common.
Vocals
are somewhat rare, and recognizable lyrics
are still rarer.
Many of the practitioners are formally trained musicians, capable of playing conventional music with relative ease. If they choose to play rougher, noisier sounds, it is almost always a matter of choice, not necessity.
Central to the scene's conception of itself is the freedom to break rules: it does not shun the conventional virtues such as melody
and rhythm
, but it also accepts the atonal
and the arrhythmic.
This is a relatively unpredictable music, it varies tremendously from moment to moment, and from performance to performance. It is not reliably loud or soft, energetic or contemplative. If it "gets into a groove" it does not often stay there.
This is a music that often (though not always) has a very intellectual quality which can run contrary to the usual presumption that music is primarily about the expression of emotion.
As Gino Robair puts it in an interview with "The Wire":
Vijay Iyer
concurs with Gino Robair's assessment: "'The Bay Area was a really nurturing environment, where I gained my creative footing and figured out what I wanted to do as an artist,' Iyers explains. 'It was nice to have the time and space to stretch out among creative people without really having the pressure of New York, where you can’t really screw around.'" .
Tim Perkis
, in an interview with Derk Richardson about the "Noisy People" documentary also agrees:
Derk Richardson regards the history of the scene as composed of two intertwining threads: an irascible individuality, tempered by periods of pulling together into collective efforts.
) which aren't usually included in the "improv scene". Also, the term "Improv" has been increasingly associated with a form of comedy theater
that's completely unrelated to this style of music.
Many attempts have been made to invent a more general term, such as "New Music" or "Creative Music" but these have the converse problem of being too non-specific, and no alternative name has achieved common use .
Notably, the New York analog of the scene simply uses a geographical reference ("Downtown") as a label. One suggestion is that it might be best to adopt the name of the long-running events calendar, and simply call it "The Transbay Scene".
. Very few performances take place in the South Bay or North Bay
regions, though there are occasional related events in locations such as Santa Cruz
, Big Sur
, or Sacramento
.
Many performances have taken place in small one-off venues, or as part of relatively short-lived weekly series, but at any point in time, there are typically a few larger, longer-lived performance venues that define the character of the scene, for example Beanbenders, Luggage Store Gallery or 21 Grand. In addition, there are annual festivals that happen at special venues (or sometimes, among multiple scattered venues).
The locations of performances are usually promoted in the newsletter "The Transbay Calendar" and in the on-line bayimprovser.com listing, as well as through occasional write-ups in the popular press.
founded in 1962 (Tape Music
was one of the original names for what we now think of as Electronic Music
). Pauline Oliveros, later a member of the San Francisco Tape Music Center, began playing free improvisations with Terry Riley
and Loren Rush
in 1958. Some of these sessions were recorded at KPFA
.
The Tape Music Center ultimately merged with the Mills Center for Contemporary Music
, and the Mills College
graduate program remains one of the common points of reference for members of the scene.
The Rova Saxophone Quartet
(formed in the late 70s) is an early, well-known group, featuring a more avant-jazz approach. At the same time, Henry Kaiser and Greg Goodman gained prominence with their European-inspired improvisational musics. Each founded record labels, Metalanguage Records
(Kaiser, with Larry Ochs) and The Beak Doctor (Goodman), and organized concerts featuring performers such as Derek Bailey, Evan Parker, Charles K. Noyes, and Toshinori Kondo. Also active from the 1970s on were Henry Kuntz, John Gruntfest, and Ron Heglin.
In the late-80s there was an "improvcore scene" centering on "Olive Oil's", located on the waterfront in what was then an industrial neighborhood of San Francisco.
This featured performers such as the Splatter Trio, the Rova Saxophone Quartet and the Molecules.
.
In the early 90s, Radio Valencia in San Francisco's Mission district began its well-regarded Sunday night jazz series, curated by Don Alan, one of the proprietors of the cafe. The founding of Amoeba Records by scene stalwart Marc Weinstein provided a significant boost to local artists, and its racks bristling with avant-garde musics of all kinds became a magnet for drawing musicians from all over the world.
1991 saw the founding of the Improvised Music Association which organized concerts, put out a compilation cassette of music, and published a newsletter eventually named FREEWAY. Active members included Dan Plonsey
, Mantra, Randy Porter, Myles Boisen, and Tom Djll. The Berkeley Store Gallery hosted numerous IMA-associated concerts, a series that circuitously led to the Beanbenders series.
In the mid-90s, the Beanbenders venue emerged in Berkley, which for a few years was the center of the scene in the East Bay. It is most often associated with Dan Plonsey
, the most prominent member of a collective including other members such as Bill Hsu.
Another characteristic venue of the mid-90s was "The Dark Circle Lounge" weekly series, run by Gino Robair
at the Hotel Utah.
The Luggage Store Gallery hosts the longest running weekly series in the area
having been founded in the mid-90s. Originally it was largely directed by Damon Smith, though currently it is curated by Rent Romus
and Matt Davignon, who are also active with the 509 Cultural Gallery.
Another long-lived weekly series is also located in a San Francisco art gallery: The Merdian Gallery , in the Union Square area. This series was originally founded by Philip Gelb.
A leading venue in the east bay has been 21 Grand in Uptown Oakland
. 21 Grand was awarded Best Multidisciplinary Art Gallery: Broadest definition of taste by The East Bay Express in 2007:
Some of the more significant Bay Area ensembles that have come and sometimes gone in this time period include the Rova Saxophone Quartet, Splatter Trio, Negativland, MX-80, New Klezmer Trio, Eskimo, The Molecules, Pluto, Rotodoti, Daniel Popsicle, Jettison Slinky, Caroliner Rainbow, Vaccumtreehead, The Manufacturing of Humidifiers, Natto Quartet, Room, Adam Lane's Full Throttle Orchestra, Rubber City, Zen Widow, Trance Mission, Opeye, Glenn Spearman's groups, the Clubfoot Orchestra, The Hub, TJ Kirk, Blectum From Blechdom, Pinkmountain, Grosse Abfahrt, Graham Connah's various groups, The Lost Trio, Spezza Rotto, Moe!kestra, What We Live, Positive Knowledge, sfSound, Oakland Active Orchestra, Brassiosaurus, Good For Cows, and Ghost In The House.
), there are a number of locally based independent labels that have traditionally featured recordings from the scene:
Tim Perkis produced a documentary about Bay Area musicians, many of whom are active in this scene, "Noisy People":
John Shiurba writing about Beanbenders:
Descriptions of the Beanbenders music series:
The Bay Area New Music mailing lists (discussion and events announcements):
Avant-garde jazz
Avant-garde jazz is a style of music and improvisation that combines avant-garde art music and composition with jazz. Avant-jazz often sounds very similar to free jazz, but differs in that, despite its distinct departure from traditional harmony, it has a predetermined structure over which ...
and modern classical music, with influences from other areas such as Electronic art music, Free improvisation
Free improvisation
Free improvisation or free music is improvised music without any rules beyond the logic or inclination of the musician involved. The term can refer to both a technique and as a recognizable genre in its own right....
, and Musique concrète
Musique concrète
Musique concrète is a form of electroacoustic music that utilises acousmatic sound as a compositional resource. The compositional material is not restricted to the inclusion of sounds derived from musical instruments or voices, nor to elements traditionally thought of as "musical"...
. Other names of this scene tend to use phrases such as "Creative Music" to try to incorporate a wider focus than just the improvisational
Musical improvisation
Musical improvisation is the creative activity of immediate musical composition, which combines performance with communication of emotions and instrumental technique as well as spontaneous response to other musicians...
approach.
This scene is comparable to the New York Downtown Scene
Downtown music
Downtown music is a subdivision of American music, closely related to experimental music. The scene the term describes began in 1960, when Yoko Ono—one of the Fluxus artists, at that time still seven years away from meeting John Lennon—opened her loft at 112 Chambers Street to be used...
(which is most often associated with John Zorn
John Zorn
John Zorn is an American avant-garde composer, arranger, record producer, saxophonist and multi-instrumentalist. Zorn is a prolific artist: he has hundreds of album credits as performer, composer, or producer...
) and historically both scenes date back to the same time period in the early 1960s. A listing of some people who have been associated with the scene can provide a sense of the range of the music: List of Bay Area Improv Scene bands and artists
Nature of the music
While most practitioners of this music are consciously avoiding the restrictions of any one particular genre, some generalizations can be made:This is a very instrumental music, showing its primary influences from the jazz and modern classical worlds: the most common instruments are horns
Horn (instrument)
The horn is a brass instrument consisting of about of tubing wrapped into a coil with a flared bell. A musician who plays the horn is called a horn player ....
, woodwinds, and strings
String instrument
A string instrument is a musical instrument that produces sound by means of vibrating strings. In the Hornbostel-Sachs scheme of musical instrument classification, used in organology, they are called chordophones...
. Guitars and percussion are also often used, though not usually in the rock n' roll
Rock N Roll
-Personnel:*Ryan Adams - Bass, Composer, Costume Design, Guitar, Keyboards, Multi Instruments, Vocals, Vocals *Billie Joe Armstrong - Vocals *Melissa Auf der Maur - Vocals...
style, and the use of electronics
Electronic musical instrument
An electronic musical instrument is a musical instrument that produces its sounds using electronics. Such an instrument sounds by outputting an electrical audio signal that ultimately drives a loudspeaker....
is very common.
Vocals
Singing
Singing is the act of producing musical sounds with the voice, and augments regular speech by the use of both tonality and rhythm. One who sings is called a singer or vocalist. Singers perform music known as songs that can be sung either with or without accompaniment by musical instruments...
are somewhat rare, and recognizable lyrics
Lyrics
Lyrics are a set of words that make up a song. The writer of lyrics is a lyricist or lyrist. The meaning of lyrics can either be explicit or implicit. Some lyrics are abstract, almost unintelligible, and, in such cases, their explication emphasizes form, articulation, meter, and symmetry of...
are still rarer.
Many of the practitioners are formally trained musicians, capable of playing conventional music with relative ease. If they choose to play rougher, noisier sounds, it is almost always a matter of choice, not necessity.
Central to the scene's conception of itself is the freedom to break rules: it does not shun the conventional virtues such as melody
Melody
A melody , also tune, voice, or line, is a linear succession of musical tones which is perceived as a single entity...
and rhythm
Rhythm
Rhythm may be generally defined as a "movement marked by the regulated succession of strong and weak elements, or of opposite or different conditions." This general meaning of regular recurrence or pattern in time may be applied to a wide variety of cyclical natural phenomena having a periodicity or...
, but it also accepts the atonal
Atonality
Atonality in its broadest sense describes music that lacks a tonal center, or key. Atonality in this sense usually describes compositions written from about 1908 to the present day where a hierarchy of pitches focusing on a single, central tone is not used, and the notes of the chromatic scale...
and the arrhythmic.
This is a relatively unpredictable music, it varies tremendously from moment to moment, and from performance to performance. It is not reliably loud or soft, energetic or contemplative. If it "gets into a groove" it does not often stay there.
This is a music that often (though not always) has a very intellectual quality which can run contrary to the usual presumption that music is primarily about the expression of emotion.
Character of the Bay Area scene
This is not often a popular music, and it survives with very little in the way of commercial support. Performance spaces are organized and run by a spirit of volunteerism, with occasional arts grants. The musicians often support themselves by "day jobs" (though sometimes these "day jobs" consist of performing other types of music). The lack of commercial opportunities is sometimes seen as a positive feature of the scene:As Gino Robair puts it in an interview with "The Wire":
Overall, the Bay Area scene seems to encourage people to cross over the boundaries of musical styles and collaborate. Part of the reason, I believe, is that there is very little "careerism" here: because there are so few sustainable well- paying gigs, people aren't so concerned with having to keep some kind of performance style "pure" by not mingling with other kinds of music. And the talent pool is massive, despite there being no real music industry, compared to, say, New York City or LA. Musicians who settle here are in it for the right reasons: to explore sound, even if it takes them into unknown territory. Cage, PartchHarry PartchHarry Partch was an American composer and instrument creator. He was one of the first twentieth-century composers to work extensively and systematically with microtonal scales, writing much of his music for custom-made instruments that he built himself, tuned in 11-limit just intonation.-Early...
, Lou HarrisonLou HarrisonLou Silver Harrison was an American composer. He was a student of Henry Cowell, Arnold Schoenberg, and K. P. H. Notoprojo Lou Silver Harrison (May 14, 1917 – February 2, 2003) was an American composer. He was a student of Henry Cowell, Arnold Schoenberg, and K. P. H. Notoprojo Lou Silver Harrison...
, Henry CowellHenry CowellHenry Cowell was an American composer, music theorist, pianist, teacher, publisher, and impresario. His contribution to the world of music was summed up by Virgil Thomson, writing in the early 1950s:...
, Steve ReichSteve ReichStephen Michael "Steve" Reich is an American composer who together with La Monte Young, Terry Riley, and Philip Glass is a pioneering composer of minimal music...
, Pauline OliverosPauline OliverosPauline Oliveros is an American accordionist and composer who is a central figure in the development of post-war electronic art music....
, Terry RileyTerry RileyTerrence Mitchell Riley, is an American composer intrinsically associated with the minimalist school of Western classical music and was a pioneer of the movement...
... all spent formative years here doing unique and highly creative work.
Vijay Iyer
Vijay Iyer
Vijay Iyer is a jazz pianist, composer, bandleader, producer, electronic musician, and writer based in New York City.-Biography:Born in 1971 and raised in Rochester, New York, Vijay Iyer is the son of Indian Tamil immigrants to the US. He received 15 years of Western classical training on violin...
concurs with Gino Robair's assessment: "'The Bay Area was a really nurturing environment, where I gained my creative footing and figured out what I wanted to do as an artist,' Iyers explains. 'It was nice to have the time and space to stretch out among creative people without really having the pressure of New York, where you can’t really screw around.'" .
Tim Perkis
Tim Perkis
Tim Perkis is an experimental musician who works with live electronic and computer sound.He has founded or played in live computer network bands such as the...
, in an interview with Derk Richardson about the "Noisy People" documentary also agrees:
"It really is a social unit," Perkis said of the improv scene. "At one point in the film, Gino [Robair] talks about it being like a family. It really is a cohesive scene, and it's almost like being in one large band over the course of years. And when other improvisers come into town from elsewhere to play, it's often revealed how there is sort of a shared Bay Area aesthetic and idiom -- a different dialect than what people coming in might be doing.
Derk Richardson regards the history of the scene as composed of two intertwining threads: an irascible individuality, tempered by periods of pulling together into collective efforts.
Name of the scene
The name "Bay Area Improv Scene" is frequently contentious because while many of the performances on the scene embrace improvisational techniques, no one is opposed to composition, and many of the people associated with the scene favor it. There are also some logical problems with it as a classification, because there are other musical scenes that use improvisation (e.g. freestyle hip-hopFreestyle rap
Freestyle rap commonly refers to rap lyrics which are improvised through a acapella or with instrumental beats, i.e. performed with no previously composed lyrics, or "off the top of the head"...
) which aren't usually included in the "improv scene". Also, the term "Improv" has been increasingly associated with a form of comedy theater
Improvisational theatre
Improvisational theatre takes many forms. It is best known as improv or impro, which is often comedic, and sometimes poignant or dramatic. In this popular, often topical art form improvisational actors/improvisers use improvisational acting techniques to perform spontaneously...
that's completely unrelated to this style of music.
Many attempts have been made to invent a more general term, such as "New Music" or "Creative Music" but these have the converse problem of being too non-specific, and no alternative name has achieved common use .
Notably, the New York analog of the scene simply uses a geographical reference ("Downtown") as a label. One suggestion is that it might be best to adopt the name of the long-running events calendar, and simply call it "The Transbay Scene".
Venues
Despite the phrase "Bay Area" in the name, the scene doesn't really span the entire Bay Area region: the performance venues have largely only been located in either San Francisco or in the East BayEast Bay (San Francisco Bay Area)
The East Bay is a commonly used, informal term for the lands on the eastern side of the San Francisco Bay, in the San Francisco Bay Area, in California, United States...
. Very few performances take place in the South Bay or North Bay
North Bay (San Francisco Bay Area)
The North Bay is a subregion of the San Francisco Bay Area, in California, United States. The largest city is Santa Rosa. It is by far the least populous and least urbanized part of the Bay Area...
regions, though there are occasional related events in locations such as Santa Cruz
Santa Cruz, California
Santa Cruz is the county seat and largest city of Santa Cruz County, California in the US. As of the 2010 U.S. Census, Santa Cruz had a total population of 59,946...
, Big Sur
Big Sur
Big Sur is a sparsely populated region of the Central Coast of California where the Santa Lucia Mountains rise abruptly from the Pacific Ocean. The name "Big Sur" is derived from the original Spanish-language "el sur grande", meaning "the big south", or from "el país grande del sur", "the big...
, or Sacramento
Sacramento
Sacramento is the capital of the state of California, in the United States of America.Sacramento may also refer to:- United States :*Sacramento County, California*Sacramento, Kentucky*Sacramento – San Joaquin River Delta...
.
Many performances have taken place in small one-off venues, or as part of relatively short-lived weekly series, but at any point in time, there are typically a few larger, longer-lived performance venues that define the character of the scene, for example Beanbenders, Luggage Store Gallery or 21 Grand. In addition, there are annual festivals that happen at special venues (or sometimes, among multiple scattered venues).
The locations of performances are usually promoted in the newsletter "The Transbay Calendar" and in the on-line bayimprovser.com listing, as well as through occasional write-ups in the popular press.
History
One might trace the beginnings of the scene back to the formation of the San Francisco Tape Music CenterSan Francisco Tape Music Center
The San Francisco Tape Music Center was founded in 1962 by composers Morton Subotnick and Ramon Sender as a "nonprofit cultural and educational corporation, the aim of which was to present concerts and offer a place to learn about work within the tape music medium"...
founded in 1962 (Tape Music
Tape Music
Tape Music is an experimental 10" vinyl release by Jack Dangers. The vinyl release was coupled with the album Sounds Of The 20th Century No2 when released as a flexi disc vinyl....
was one of the original names for what we now think of as Electronic Music
Electronic music
Electronic music is music that employs electronic musical instruments and electronic music technology in its production. In general a distinction can be made between sound produced using electromechanical means and that produced using electronic technology. Examples of electromechanical sound...
). Pauline Oliveros, later a member of the San Francisco Tape Music Center, began playing free improvisations with Terry Riley
Terry Riley
Terrence Mitchell Riley, is an American composer intrinsically associated with the minimalist school of Western classical music and was a pioneer of the movement...
and Loren Rush
Loren Rush
Loren Rush is a U.S. composer. His works include the drone piece Hard Music for three amplified pianos. The piece features no melodic figuration but rather clouds created by only one note, the low D above cello C, repeated quickly enough by each player to be heard as nearly continuous...
in 1958. Some of these sessions were recorded at KPFA
KPFA
KPFA is a listener-funded progressive talk radio and music radio station located in Berkeley, California, broadcasting to the San Francisco Bay Area. KPFA airs public news, public affairs, talk, and music programming. The station signed on-the-air April 15 1949, as the first Pacifica Station...
.
The Tape Music Center ultimately merged with the Mills Center for Contemporary Music
Mills College
Mills College is an independent liberal arts women's college founded in 1852 that offers bachelor's degrees to women and graduate degrees and certificates to women and men. Located in Oakland, California, Mills was the first women's college west of the Rockies. The institution was initially founded...
, and the Mills College
Mills College
Mills College is an independent liberal arts women's college founded in 1852 that offers bachelor's degrees to women and graduate degrees and certificates to women and men. Located in Oakland, California, Mills was the first women's college west of the Rockies. The institution was initially founded...
graduate program remains one of the common points of reference for members of the scene.
The Rova Saxophone Quartet
Rova Saxophone Quartet
The Rova Saxophone Quartet is a San Francisco-based saxophone quartet formed in October 1977 at the same time as their "less adventurous" but better known colleagues the World Saxophone Quartet. The name "Rova" is an acronym formed from the last initials of the founding members: Jon Raskin, Larry...
(formed in the late 70s) is an early, well-known group, featuring a more avant-jazz approach. At the same time, Henry Kaiser and Greg Goodman gained prominence with their European-inspired improvisational musics. Each founded record labels, Metalanguage Records
Metalanguage Records
Metalanguage Records was founded in 1978 by Henry Kaiser and Larry Ochs. It showcased Rova as well as many independent artists and produced the Rova Arts Festival in 1980.-Discography:*ML 101 Rova Saxophone Quartet - Cinema Rovaté 1978...
(Kaiser, with Larry Ochs) and The Beak Doctor (Goodman), and organized concerts featuring performers such as Derek Bailey, Evan Parker, Charles K. Noyes, and Toshinori Kondo. Also active from the 1970s on were Henry Kuntz, John Gruntfest, and Ron Heglin.
In the late-80s there was an "improvcore scene" centering on "Olive Oil's", located on the waterfront in what was then an industrial neighborhood of San Francisco.
This featured performers such as the Splatter Trio, the Rova Saxophone Quartet and the Molecules.
.
In the early 90s, Radio Valencia in San Francisco's Mission district began its well-regarded Sunday night jazz series, curated by Don Alan, one of the proprietors of the cafe. The founding of Amoeba Records by scene stalwart Marc Weinstein provided a significant boost to local artists, and its racks bristling with avant-garde musics of all kinds became a magnet for drawing musicians from all over the world.
1991 saw the founding of the Improvised Music Association which organized concerts, put out a compilation cassette of music, and published a newsletter eventually named FREEWAY. Active members included Dan Plonsey
Dan Plonsey
Dan Plonsey is a jazz saxophonist, popularly labeled as a free jazz musician. -Career:...
, Mantra, Randy Porter, Myles Boisen, and Tom Djll. The Berkeley Store Gallery hosted numerous IMA-associated concerts, a series that circuitously led to the Beanbenders series.
In the mid-90s, the Beanbenders venue emerged in Berkley, which for a few years was the center of the scene in the East Bay. It is most often associated with Dan Plonsey
Dan Plonsey
Dan Plonsey is a jazz saxophonist, popularly labeled as a free jazz musician. -Career:...
, the most prominent member of a collective including other members such as Bill Hsu.
Another characteristic venue of the mid-90s was "The Dark Circle Lounge" weekly series, run by Gino Robair
Gino Robair
Gino Robair is an American composer, improvisor, drummer, and percussionist. In his own work , he plays prepared/modified percussion, analog synthesizer, ebow and prepared piano, theremin, and bowed objects...
at the Hotel Utah.
The Luggage Store Gallery hosts the longest running weekly series in the area
having been founded in the mid-90s. Originally it was largely directed by Damon Smith, though currently it is curated by Rent Romus
Rent Romus
Rent Romus is an American saxophonist/multi-instrumentalist, bandleader, music and performing arts producer, and community leader living in the San Francisco Bay Area.-Beginnings:...
and Matt Davignon, who are also active with the 509 Cultural Gallery.
Another long-lived weekly series is also located in a San Francisco art gallery: The Merdian Gallery , in the Union Square area. This series was originally founded by Philip Gelb.
A leading venue in the east bay has been 21 Grand in Uptown Oakland
Uptown Oakland
Uptown is a neighborhood in Downtown Oakland, California, located just north of the center of downtown. Its boundaries are ill-defined, but most definitions include the area bounded by Grand Avenue at the north, Telegraph Avenue on the west, City Center plaza on the south, and Harrison Street on...
. 21 Grand was awarded Best Multidisciplinary Art Gallery: Broadest definition of taste by The East Bay Express in 2007:
Even in the ultracosmopolitan East Bay, it's difficult to find venues that are willing to book the kind of wacky, experimental-music shows that wouldn't go over in a place like the Stork Club — shows in which you'd expect to see Tom Djll blowing into the wrong end of a trumpet, Phillip Greenlief bobbling a triplet figure over and over, or the Moe!kestra! reading from a graphically notated score. It's even harder to find venues with a desire to make such music accessible for all ages. Enter 21 Grand, a beloved gallery and performance space that showcases some of the best avant-garde poets, authors, playwrights, experimental filmmakers, photographers, conceptual artists, and musicians from local and national underground scenes.
Some of the more significant Bay Area ensembles that have come and sometimes gone in this time period include the Rova Saxophone Quartet, Splatter Trio, Negativland, MX-80, New Klezmer Trio, Eskimo, The Molecules, Pluto, Rotodoti, Daniel Popsicle, Jettison Slinky, Caroliner Rainbow, Vaccumtreehead, The Manufacturing of Humidifiers, Natto Quartet, Room, Adam Lane's Full Throttle Orchestra, Rubber City, Zen Widow, Trance Mission, Opeye, Glenn Spearman's groups, the Clubfoot Orchestra, The Hub, TJ Kirk, Blectum From Blechdom, Pinkmountain, Grosse Abfahrt, Graham Connah's various groups, The Lost Trio, Spezza Rotto, Moe!kestra, What We Live, Positive Knowledge, sfSound, Oakland Active Orchestra, Brassiosaurus, Good For Cows, and Ghost In The House.
Labels
While artists on the scene often record on small, individual labels (and some occasionally have releases on larger labels, or ones centered in a different location, such as TzadikTzadik
Tzadik/Zadik/Sadiq is a title given to personalities in Jewish tradition considered righteous, such as Biblical figures and later spiritual masters. The root of the word ṣadiq, is ṣ-d-q , which means "justice" or "righteousness", also the root of Tzedakah...
), there are a number of locally based independent labels that have traditionally featured recordings from the scene:
- Edgetone Records
- Evander Music
- Limited Sedition
- Rastascan Records
External links
- http://bayimproviser.com
- http://www.transbaycalendar.org/
Tim Perkis produced a documentary about Bay Area musicians, many of whom are active in this scene, "Noisy People":
- http://noisypeople.com
John Shiurba writing about Beanbenders:
- http://www.absoluterealtime.com/resume/SFBayGuardian061996.html
Descriptions of the Beanbenders music series:
- http://www.plonsey.com/beanbenders/reviews95.html
The Bay Area New Music mailing lists (discussion and events announcements):
- http://music.mills.edu/pipermail/newmusic/
- http://music.mills.edu/mailman/listinfo/newmusic