jürg frey / radu malfatti / michael pisaro “three backgrounds” compact disc-recordable

• three backgrounds (45:50)

b-boim press release...

b-boim 005 three backgrounds [2006] three compositions by jürg frey, radu malfatti and michael pisaro simultaneously performed by the composers recorded live at “merkin hall“ in new york

michael pisaro / toshiya tsunoda “crosshatches” double compact disc set

• 1.1 (17:58)
  
• 1.2 (6:24)
  
• 1.3 (5:38)
  
• 1.4 (14:40)
  
  
• 2.1 (9:29)
  
• 2.2 (11:45)
  
• 2.3 (3:58)
  
• 2.4 (15:10)

erstwhile press release...

michael pisaro / toshiya tsunoda crosshatches erstwhile 066-2 total time: 85:02 crosshatches is michael pisaro's second release for erstwhile after 2010's 2 seconds/b minor/wave, and the erstwhile debut for a long-time favorite musician of the label, toshiya tsunoda. crosshatches was composed, recorded and assembled by tsunoda and pisaro over a period of 14 months, as a single 85 minute work in eight sections.

michael pisaro / taku sugimoto “2 seconds • b minor • wave” compact disc

• 2 seconds (20:00)
  
• b minor (20:00)
  
• wave (20:00)

erstwhile press release...

michael pisaro/taku sugimoto - 2 seconds / b minor / wave erstwhile 061 total time: 60:04 michael pisaro and taku sugimoto are not generally closely associated, but have quite a bit in common. both are composers whose primary instrument is the guitar, both have close ties to the wandelweiser collective (pisaro is a longtime member), and both have pursued their unique paths without much concern as to how the rest of the world will perceive them. 2 seconds/b minor/wave marks their first collaboration, but these aesthetic overlaps allow their independently conceived recorded parts to fit together remarkably naturally. michael pisaro has been associated with the wandelweiser collective since just after their formation in the early nineties. the departure points for his music were john cage's ideas of the durational frame, ben johnston's work with alternate tunings, christian wolff's opening of the relationship between composition and performance, and alvin lucier and james tenney's use of scientific hypotheses to explore sound phenomena. pisaro has spent much of the last decade making field recordings, and occasionally using them in his work. much of his recent composition, and especially the work with his primary collaborator, percussionist greg stuart, has concerned the massing and then the spatialization of sound to create 'homemade' environments. pisaro lives in southern california, teaching at the california institute of the arts, running the experimental music workshop, and curating his own recently launched recording imprint, gravity wave. this is his first recording for erstwhile. currently sugimoto's interest focuses on composition and its performance, rather than improvisation. with taku unami and masahiko okura, sugimoto organizes the almost-monthly chamber music concert at loop-line and the irregular taku sugimoto composition series at kid ailack art hall, both in tokyo. he runs the label slub music, which in addition to sugimoto's own recordings has released cds by other japanese musicians as well as wandelweiser mainstays radu malfatti and antoine beuger. he has just issued the first four discs compiling the abovementioned composition series, a strong statement on two double cds documenting his work over the past few years. this is his second recording for erstwhile after 2000's seminal the world turned upside down, and he also took part in the amplify 2002 festival in tokyo and is featured on the box set of that event. 2 seconds/b minor/wave is a long distance collaboration, with each musician composing and recording their own parts, before hearing what the other had done. pulse, pitch and wave were the three areas they wanted to explore on the three pieces, and  loose rules/guidelines were agreed on beforehand, as follows: '2 seconds' was a unit of pulse, either as a basic unit or a point of departure; 'b minor' was a key, with sugimoto playing harmony and pisaro playing melody: and 'wave', with no further details, simply whatever that word brought to mind. this was the extent of the specific discussion between the two, and thus the entirely fluid melding of the results is a testament to their deep understanding of the other's aesthetic/s. yuko zama's intuitively empathetic design is a perfect symbiotic fit for the music contained within.

michael pisaro “tombstones” long playing record

• blues fall
  
• fool
  
• new orleans
  
• silent cloud
  
  
• tombstone
  
• a stranger
  
• stop
  
• a better way
  
• why?

human ear music press release...

michael pisaro — tombstones following alain badiou, we might say that an entirely secular resurrection occurs when an idea that appears to be dead is taken up with a new impulse, possibly for different ends. the tombstones take tiny fragments of old and not-so-old songs and put them into an experimental music situation, introducing them to a kind of chaos, where the arrangement of the written out material is up for grabs. in june of 2009 we took a group of musicians to studio paradiso in san francisco, made on-the-spot arrangements of the songs and recorded them, mostly in one or two takes. i selected performances with this question in mind: did the song happen? - michael pisaro this presents an exhilarating challenge in a culture already saturated by hallucination, paradox, and shadowplay. each “tombstone”, as these tracks are called, is literally a “sampled” bit of structure, tuning, lyricism, beat or phrasing; a mystery moment sourced from perhaps, the beatles, dj screw, bob dylan or ugk, to name a few. (the actual sources are a closely guarded secret, but in some cases not hard to guess.) pisaro distills the archetype of sampling into a fragment of intention, the groundwork of a sound, and ultimately, a cultural techne at once beyond the reach, and at the origin of the act of editing. or in other words, it’s the knowledge-seeker’s paradox in music: while it is not possible to know all there is in creation, it is quite possible to distill the elegant, simple processes at its heart. with this distillation, pisaro attempts to freeze one curious tension after another, in which the voice (or the archetype of the voice) is shaken out of a field of interferences, and made to speak as if in song. in the band, electronics are conspicuously absent (but not forbidden). two electric guitars (played by grier and pisaro) appear. otherwise, tombstones relies on a rather economical spread of acoustic instruments and percussion, some conventional, some not-so-conventional. the pulsating drones of harmonium (tashi wada, julia holter) and e-bow guitar anchor the field with unwavering strings (cassia streb, laura steenberge, laena myers-ionita) and flute (kelly coats) performed without a hint of vibrato. percussionist rob esler offers a surprising range of naturalistic (sometimes eerily synthesizer-like) performances that aim for halo more than punctuation. the effect will be familiar to those who frequently listen to like-minded music whose focus is on unmediated experience of the subtlest timbres. however, in tombstones’ zoomed-in context, a double-image is generated: a face in lucidity and a face in suspense. suspended, as it were, between exhilaration and anticipation, vocalists janet kim, julia holter, laura steenberge and lisa tolentino each approach their performances in unique ways.

michael pisaro “tombstones” compact disc

• blues fall (6:12)
  
• fool (4:42)
  
• new orleans (5:16)
  
• i didn't say anything (6:45)
  
• silent cloud (6:15)
  
• tombstone (3:11)
  
• a stranger (3:04)
  
• unmoon (5:40)
  
• stop (2:44)
  
• a better way (13:45)
  
• why? (0:05)

human ear music press release...

michael pisaro — tombstones following alain badiou, we might say that an entirely secular resurrection occurs when an idea that appears to be dead is taken up with a new impulse, possibly for different ends. the tombstones take tiny fragments of old and not-so-old songs and put them into an experimental music situation, introducing them to a kind of chaos, where the arrangement of the written out material is up for grabs. in june of 2009 we took a group of musicians to studio paradiso in san francisco, made on-the-spot arrangements of the songs and recorded them, mostly in one or two takes. i selected performances with this question in mind: did the song happen? - michael pisaro this presents an exhilarating challenge in a culture already saturated by hallucination, paradox, and shadowplay. each “tombstone”, as these tracks are called, is literally a “sampled” bit of structure, tuning, lyricism, beat or phrasing; a mystery moment sourced from perhaps, the beatles, dj screw, bob dylan or ugk, to name a few. (the actual sources are a closely guarded secret, but in some cases not hard to guess.) pisaro distills the archetype of sampling into a fragment of intention, the groundwork of a sound, and ultimately, a cultural techne at once beyond the reach, and at the origin of the act of editing. or in other words, it’s the knowledge-seeker’s paradox in music: while it is not possible to know all there is in creation, it is quite possible to distill the elegant, simple processes at its heart. with this distillation, pisaro attempts to freeze one curious tension after another, in which the voice (or the archetype of the voice) is shaken out of a field of interferences, and made to speak as if in song. in the band, electronics are conspicuously absent (but not forbidden). two electric guitars (played by grier and pisaro) appear. otherwise, tombstones relies on a rather economical spread of acoustic instruments and percussion, some conventional, some not-so-conventional. the pulsating drones of harmonium (tashi wada, julia holter) and e-bow guitar anchor the field with unwavering strings (cassia streb, laura steenberge, laena myers-ionita) and flute (kelly coats) performed without a hint of vibrato. percussionist rob esler offers a surprising range of naturalistic (sometimes eerily synthesizer-like) performances that aim for halo more than punctuation. the effect will be familiar to those who frequently listen to like-minded music whose focus is on unmediated experience of the subtlest timbres. however, in tombstones’ zoomed-in context, a double-image is generated: a face in lucidity and a face in suspense. suspended, as it were, between exhilaration and anticipation, vocalists janet kim, julia holter, laura steenberge and lisa tolentino each approach their performances in unique ways.