busy week in mid-may

things are being nice & busy here in may - and the weather is warming too - not, warm enough to be completely comfortable in t-shirt & shorts, but that is on the way, maybe.....regardless, it's been busy here in chicago for me, so busy that i'm not getting the time to do this writing, not to mention i've been working on the computer more than typical also as i got some new gear, which once going, is going to make the computer so much easier to work with, i hope. on thursday the 19th I played at Rodan with Ajemian, Nori Tanka & Matt Lux. This was a good, I had dropped by the week before to see Jason & Nori play, mentioned to them we should play a few times together before I get out of town, and here we were, playing. Rodan wasn't as loud as it normally is, thankfully, though still loud enough to make you know you can do what you like without worrying about if everything is golden. we played two sets late into the night, going between the loose to the solid beat driven sound that only an acoustic & electric bass can conjure.
on saturday night i played at the charleston with can-ky-ree; i had been there the night before to see matt schneider, jeb bishop, anton hatwich and tim daisy play some tunes - they had sounded good & it was a good night at the bar with shevitz pouring the drinks & me, brian dibblee, kevin davis, & benjamin balcom drinking them & finding anagrams of our names....playing with can-ky-ree was a good time. i'd had some time to practice with a recording of our last show so i felt much more confident with the music - learning the spaces that i can fill in & gettting a better playing style to go with the music. we played two sets to a room that alternated between being loud enough to make it hard for us to hear & applauding us strongly. we can blame both on the fact that people like to drink alchohol.
sunday was possibly the first truly beautiful day of 2005 here in chicago - it was sunny and in the mid 70's - perfect weather to spend time leisurely outside, riding bikes, eating food, having beers, and whatnot. i went to vadim sprikut's place in the evening around 7 to see kevin davis & woody sullender play - it was really great, they played in vadim's living room - the windows were open so you could hear the sounds from the street, some musical magic happened when a push-cart ice cream vendor walked by, his bells creating a nice balance to the banjo & cello sounds. kevin played some really great stuff & was laying into his cello for awhile, sawing the shit out of it. i'm glad i saw them play - todd carter next played in the basement, a sound piece that was very quiet & well-paced....
last night (wednesday the 25th) i played again with can-ky-ree. it was a good show at the hideout with a fine turnout - i really like playing a the hideout, it's too bad that they can't find it economically feasible to have the jazz music. the audience was attentive which made me feel a bit more exposed on the clarinet. i also hadn't any time early this week to run through the material. i wasn't hearing things as well as i had on saturday, it seemed like every next note i was sure to play wrong - and i had only dry reeds..... but, i worked through it and there were some fine moments. i really do enjoy playing with that group. the songs that tom musick writes are easy to listen to but have just enough complexity to keep your mind moving.

rolldown empty bottle 5-18-2005

not been playing a ton lately, but have been playing with the good groups - last night played with rolldown - jason adasiewicz's band with me, josh berman, jason roebke & frank rosaly. this is another group which should play more often but doesn't. the personnel is familiar to playing with each other, but this group has all the music written by adasiewicz. we had the full night at the bottle on a wednesday night, i got there just a little early - around 9, we had a practice the day before but i brought in a chart of an old tune played by the shelton dibblee quartet - a group that stopped playing shows back in 2001. so, we ran through that chart real quick while setting up. before we played this fellow struck up conversation with me as he wanted to know when we were going to start - it was already after 10. turns out he's a truck driver that moved to michigan from georgia, likes classic rock & free jazz. who'd of thunk. the musci was good & there was a good turnout for the first set - i guess it started feeling late - maybe we took too long of a break, but the second set while the music was even better, the crowd had dwindled to very few. oh well - the only thing i regret is we didn't record it. all of these shows should be recorded, you never know when some good stuff is going to happen. berman sounded good - his range has improved alot - he was playing some high stuf that seemed pretty natural to come out - and shevitz was of course rockin the vibes, & jumping around a little for certain notes.
chad taylor was in town - even though he had to get a plane at 7:30 am today, he stayed for both sets and to hang afterwards.
the only bad thing was that in between sets someone knocked over the cup of water i had next to my horns and the water soaked my neckstrap - luckily the horns were okay. i always forget to bring my instrument stand - i should stop forgetting.....though then someone could just knock over my horn completely. maybe just put it in a safe place in between sets? what a novel idea.

shelton / boykin / ajemian / reed : hungry brain 5-8-2005

it was a strange weekend with weather fluctuations - in the 40s on saturday, in the 80s on sunday - chicago, you are a manic depressive weatherland. tonight played at the hungry brain with david boykin, jason ajemian & mike reed, we had played together before, and i looked forward to this show. all weekend long there were shows in conjunction with the 40th anniversary of the founding of the aacm, reed & boykin played in the concerts, reed played the final concert which happened earlier in the night, so didn't get to the brain until around 11:30, so we didn't start until quite late. this time david brought his tenor & clarinet - i brought my alto. again the improvising felt really good - we really played as a group, not as individuals, & the crowd was really appreciative of the music - it's interesting because david & i definitely have different styles, but they seem to work together well - giving each other room without being worried about stepping on the others' toes if one of us takes the lead...
we didn't finish until around 1:15 i think, pretty late for a sunday, no? it was surprisingly a pretty light night for the brain, as it was so warm outside, but probably an after effect of a weekend of free concerts by the aacm.

relay signals who cares how long you sink empty bottle 5-4-2005

a night of three groups at the empty bottle - all with shared personnel & slightly different aesthetics - it was also a record release for two records put out by lucky kitchen : relay signals & who cares how long you sink . I took part in both projects which were both recorded several years ago (2002 or 3?) - they're finally seeing the light of day, which is good. it was a good night at the bottle, brought my clarinet & computer for the first set which was with tim daisy, jason ajemian, myself & ernst karel - the set was an additive process - tim started out solo, joined by jason, then me, then ernst - we all stayed acoustic, starting sparse & simple, until ernst was in for a bit, then we gradually turned to our electronic sides, moving to a wash with clotted noises coming out of the pa & ajemian's amp, getting quite loud by the end...
ernst & kyle bruckman played an ekg set - great analog electronic sounds, slow moving, though stimulating textures -the electronics are interspersed with a bit of oboe, trumpet & english horn- they are very good at bringing out synthesized sounds that i'm envious of - they work really well together too -
who cares how long you sink played last - the group was comprised of eveyone who had played before plus amy cimini on viola & katherine young on bassoon. it was all acoustic - marimba, bass, viola, bassoon, alto, trumpet, oboe. all the pieces were written by ajemian awhile back when we were living on cortez street - it's similar to matt bauder's weary already of the way music, but a bit more minimal & chamber music like. we played four of the pieces combined into one suite - a good way to end the night.

arrive hungry brain 5-1-2005

after a long lapse, finally had a chance to play with arrive, the quartet which i first wrote music for back in 2001. for some reason, the group has only played a handful of times in the last 4 years. the original lineup is me on alto, jason roebke on bass, jason adasiewicz on vibraphone and tim daisy on drums. there's really no explanation for not playing the music more often, except that we had made a recording back in 2001 that i think went really well, and it is somewhat tough playing the music live, as i've listened to the recording so many times - it's hard for me to not try to emulate the recording while playing live. so, in the past i put lots of time in between dates, in an attempt to keep the music quite fresh when we play. i think it works, though whenever we play i feel that it would be good to do it more.
for this date, tim was actually out of town, so i called up frank rosaly to play the drum parts - it worked out well. one of the things about the music is that the compositions are pretty minimal, but they influence the improvising greatly - it's not a group where the improvising just goes anywhere & doesn't reference what has come before it. we played two sets, the crowd was light and there were a few talkers, but we got them to quiet down one way or another. except for one guy who was making bird noises every now & then. what rock do these people crawl out from underneath? it was good playing though, there were some real moments when we all played together. i've been really liking Roebke's playing lately, he's really got something individual happening. actually had seen him play the night before at Heaven gallery with Brian Labcyz - they worked really well together, Brian did some processing of Jason's sound, but also did computer generated tones - a good balance.
Arrive will have another chance to play in June - looking forward to it.