Showing posts with label Kip Rosser. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Kip Rosser. Show all posts

[S05E02] August 2023 - Kip Rosser (part 2)




In the August 2023 episode of the Theremin 30 podcast, host Rick Reid continues his conversation with Kip Rosser that began in the March 2023 episode. Featured music includes recordings by Tharsis Project, Andrew Levine, Paulo Pascual, and Kip Rosser.

FEATURED MUSIC*

  • "Prototype" - Tharsis Project: Ernesto Mendoza and Jon Carr (Mexico City, Mexico)
  • "Live at Cosmos Lisboa" [excerpt] - Andrew Levine (Hamburg, Germany)
  • Selections from "Negro Púrpura" - Paulo Pascual (Vigo, Spain) 
  • Theme from "Idle Hands are the Devil's Playground" - Kip Rosser (Morrisville, Pennsylvania, USA)

*The full-length recordings featured in this show were used with the knowledge and permission of the artists and composers. Please support the artists by visiting their websites, purchasing their recordings, and attending their performances. 

ADDITIONAL MUSIC

INTERVIEW GUEST

CALENDAR OF THEREMIN EVENTS

MEDIA LINKS

SUPPORT THIS PODCAST

CONTACT

CREDITS 

Copyright 2023 Rick Reid 


--------------------------------------------

TRANSCRIPT

Please note: This transcript was created with the help of speech-to-text AI.  It may contain some errors.

David Brower  00:04

This is "Theremin 30," thirty minutes of theremin music, news, events and interviews, with a new episode about every 30 days. Now, here is your host from Denver, Colorado, USA -- Rick Reid!

Rick Reid  00:19

This is the August 2023 episode of the Theremin 30 podcast and the second episode of season five. I took a bit of a break since the last episode I got caught up in my freelance work projects and some health issues, including some weird problems with my voice. But I'm sounding more like myself now. So if you're ready to listen to me, I believe I'm ready to talk. In this episode, I have Theremin music from Tharsis project Andrew Levine, Paolo Pascual and my interview guest Kip Rosser. I had Kip on the show back in March to talk about the Juliet Shaw legacy project, but you only heard about half of the conversation. So this month, I'm going to play the rest of that interview, as Kip talks about his own musical adventures. 

To get things going. Here is the second single from Tharsis project, a collaboration between John Carr and Ernesto Mendoza, with a track called "Prototype." 

Rick Reid

We started the episode with "Prototype by Tharsis project. After that we heard an exclusive edit from the new live experimental album "Andrew Levine Live in Portugal." This track recorded may 3 of this year at Cosmos in the Campolide neighborhood of Lisbon features Andrew on Theremin and electronics with Jose Bruno Purina on bass, and Ernesto Rodriguez on Viola. The full track and the entire album are available on Bandcamp. Click on Andrew's name in the show notes at Theremin30.com. 

After the break, I've got that Theremin 30 calendar of events and film music from Paulo Pascual. And later in the show I'll visit with Kip Rosser so stay tuned.

Rick Reid

It's time now for a look at the Theremin 30 calendar of Theremin events. On August 3 Andrew Levine joins organist Michael Von Hinsenstern for a classical recital in Bat Berka, Germany. Also on August 3, Marla Goodman celebrates the opening of her Theremin-themed art exhibit in Billings, Montana, with a live performance. Then on August fourth, there will be an artist reception and Theremin demos. To learn more about her wonderful theremin artwork, look for the link in this month's show notes. Both August 15 and August 27 are recognized as the birthday of Professor Leon Theramin. Why two birthdays? Well, it has to do with the Russia switching calendar systems a long, long time ago. But that gives us two days to celebrate. So I'm not complaining. For details about these events and many more, check out the interactive calendar on Theremin30.com. If you have a theremin event you'd like me to list on the calendar, send me a note with all the details. You can reach me with the contact form on the Theremin 30 website. And lately I've been a bit lax about finding events to add to the calendar so do help me out by sending me information about your concerts, workshops and other Theremin-related activities. 

"Negro Purpura" or black purple is a Spanish historical documentary that looks at how hallucinogenic fungus was cultivated by farmers in Galicia. The 2021 film directed by Sabela Iglesias and Adriana Villa Nueva has been playing at festivals in Europe this year. Paolo Pascual of Vigo, Spain, created the music for the film, and he sent me some cues to play on the show. Maybe it isn't obvious, but I don't speak Galician particularly well, so I'll give the English titles. First we'll hear "the magic of fungus" followed by "lights in the River."

Rick Reid

That was music by Paulo Pascual from the soundtrack of the documentary film Negro Purpura or black purple. It's a movie about the history of the hallucinogenic fungus that grows on grain in the Galicia region of Northwest Spain. You can watch the film's trailer featuring Paulo Pascual's music on the Theremin 30 YouTube playlist.

Coming up after this break go visit with American thereminist Kip Rosser, so stay right here. 

Rick Reid

I interviewed Kip Rosser earlier this year about the Juliette Shaw Legacy Project. Because we were talking about Juliette Shaw, I didn't have time in the show to share parts of our conversation about his own career as a thereminist. So I'm going to fix that right now. Kip Rosser. Thanks so much for joining us on that Theremin 30 podcast. 

Kip Rosser  18:04

You're very welcome. Happy to be here.

Rick Reid  18:06

You are involved in theremins in lots of different ways. So give me a little brief introduction of your history of Theremining.

Kip Rosser  18:15

I started playing in 1996. And it was a complete fluke. There was a radio station in East Orange New Jersey called WFMU. At that time, they were wild. You never knew what you were going to hear. And they used to put out a catalog called Weird Stuff every year. One year, I got the catalog. And on the bottom right-hand corner was a little, tiny ad that advertised a theremin kit that you could buy. It was 150 bucks back then. It was by Paia, the Paia Thermax. And I had no idea that Moog was still making theremins, that there was an entire theremin community out there. I just knew what a theremin was. So I bought the kit, put it together. And for seven months that's the theremin that I used. After that I realized I could have bought one put together, and I got a Moog. But it wasn't called Moog at the time. It was called Big Briar. It  was a Big Briar Etherwave. And that was really the transition point. Because playing that instrument was completely different. I had to basically relearn how to play the theremin. It was more stable, it was more accurate, I could get a lot more done with it. So I started in 1996. And from there I just practiced for two years before allowing myself to play in public at all.

Rick Reid

You've played with orchestras and...  

Kip Rosser

I've never played with an orchestra I would love to. That's one of my fantasies. But there are a lot of people who have played with orchestras, but I never have. I've played with live musicians on various occasions. Rarely. There was a time when I had a wonderful jazz and classical pianist that I play with regularly. She and I played for years, but she moved away. I played with a concert pianist from San Francisco and one of my CDs is him and myself in 2005. He and I put on the show at the New York International Film Festival called "The Unholy Secrets of the Theremin." One Sunday afternoon in 2005, while we were on stage Bob Moog died. While I was playing his Etherwave Pro. I never met Bob Moog, but I did speak to him on the telephone one time, and he yelled at me. He yelled at me because it was my first public theremin performance, was done on Cape Cod, and very odd wiring, and the theremin wouldn't function no matter what. So I called Moog Music. And Bob Moog answered the telephone. This was around 1998-1999. And we talked a little bit, and he told me I could get a deep cycle marine cell, which is like a car battery to hook up to a power inverter and power the Theremin off of that, which I did, was very expensive at the time, like $200 for a deep cycle marine cell. And he asked me, "How long have you been playing the Theremin?" I said "two years, and it's my first public performance." And he hit the roof. He started screaming at me that Clara Rockmore and Lydia Kavina practiced six and a half hours a day every day for six years before they dared to play in public." And I couldn't believe that. Bob Moog was yelling at me. That was the only time, my only conversation with him at all. He chewed me out for not going for another four years before coming out to play. I always watched interviews with him. I always wanted to meet him. I wish he could have heard me play. I have no animosity towards him at all for yelling at me. It was just his mood that day. I thought it was hilarious. Bob Moog is laughing at me and yelling at me. It was really funny. 

Rick Reid  21:42

You've done some movie soundtrack work, haven't you?

Kip Rosser  21:45

Lydia Kavina, Charles Lester, a couple of other people have played for film scores out of Hollywood. And I've only done one Theremin score. I wrote the score for an independent film by Michael Jason Allen called "An Idle Mind is the Devil's Playground." You can see it on Prime I believe. You can also see it on Tubi. It's a film that's only about an hour long because he knew he didn't want to try to sustain it for longer. It's in beautiful black and white. The cinematography is amazing. And it's sort of his homage to a Twilight Zone. He found me on ReverbNation and contacted me and asked me if I would be willing to write the score for his film. And I said, Sure. So I did. There was another very, very short film by a director named Sabina Ptasznik. She asked me to write a score for Theremin music is more properly, I would call it sound effects for her movie called Gravity. It was also a filmmaker. Her name at that time was Toddy Burton. It was about a 15 minute film. The film composer contacted me and asked him if I would play the Theremin parts in his score. So I was able to do that as well. Those are the only film experiences that I've ever had.

Rick Reid  22:58

Most people know you from your YouTube videos. Tell people about that, who maybe haven't seen them.

Kip Rosser  23:03

Since 2011, apart from the music videos which I occasionally put up, my real focus was putting up tutorials. Starting in 2011, till just last year, I have made theremin tutorials, which to me was the only thing that I thought was really worth putting up. It felt like a contribution. Playing music, you see tons of theremin videos, people playing music, and there are some wonderfully amazingly talented Thereminists out there now. I would argue that there are more theremin players in the world now than there ever have been, ever. I put up these tutorials because I thought this is what I can really contribute. At the time that I started I never knew that there were things online. When I got the Etherwave, it came with a VHS tape of Lydia Kavina's Mastering the Theremin. It changed a little bit about the way I started playing. But my vision for what I wanted to play was always far exceeding my technical abilities. So when I began learning to try to play Bach and Dvorak and things like that, I had to develop techniques that I've never seen before in order to play them. So the evolution of my techniques is what I put up there. I developed techniques that quite honestly, I've never seen anyone do. I've never seen anyone deal with various aspects of the Theremin. So I decided to put up things that I thought it would really help. But then people started texting me or emailing me about the Theremini and how they were having trouble calibrating it. And that inspired an entire Theremini course. 

Rick Reid  24:43

Do you teach Theremin?

Kip Rosser  24:45

Sure.

Rick Reid  24:46

In person in Pennsylvania or online or...

 

Kip Rosser  24:49

Until COVID I could teach occasionally in person. Then COVID happened.

 

Rick Reid  24:55

So I guess now you're teaching more safely over the web.

 

Kip Rosser  24:59

It was actually my son that inspired me to do it. He asked me how come I've never taught online? And there really wasn't any reason why I couldn't. So I created a website just called ThereminLessons.com. People can go there and book a lesson. You look it up by selecting your date on a calendar, and it takes you to PayPal. I get notification. I always respond personally, and we work it out from there. I'd like to find out what model of theremin people are playing, how long they've been playing, do they play any other instruments. All of it helps me to understand where it is they're at and what types of things that we can work on when we're together. And it's great because you can do a lesson halfway across the world. It's fabulous.

Rick Reid  25:44

Let's finish the show now with some movie music by Kip Rosser. Here is the title theme from An Idle Mind is the Devil's Playground, a 2016 indie feature film directed by Michael Jason Allen.

Rick Reid 

That was Kip Rosser with the theme from An Idle Mind is the Devil's Playground. You can learn more about Kip by following the link in this month's show notes.

Thanks so much for joining me for another 30-minute trip into the ether. And thanks to Tharsis Project, Andrew Levine, Paulo Pascual, and Kip Rosser for providing the tunes. Also, thanks to Kip Rosser for sharing stories about his Theremin adventures. I've already started planning the next episode of the Theremin 30 podcast, but I have some room for more music. So if you have professional quality, original theremin music that's either your own composition or in the Public Domain, I'd love to share it with listeners around the world. So contact me through the website. Also please tell your friends about this show and share links to it on social media. You can also rate and review Theremin 30 on Apple Podcasts and Stitcher to help me get the word out. Until next time, I'm your host Rick Reid and I'll see you in the ether.

David Brower  29:47

You've been listening to the Theremin 30 podcast. Visit Theremin 30 on the web at Theremin30.com.
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[S04E07] March 2023 - Kip Rosser (The Juliet Shaw Legacy Project)

 


In the March 2023 episode of the Theremin 30 podcast, host Rick Reid plays theremin music from Mexico, Japan, Finland, and the USA. Rick's special guest is Kip Rosser, the Juliet Shaw Legacy Project coordinator. 

FEATURED MUSIC*

  • "The Virgin Rainbow" featuring Ernesto Mendoza [edit] - Sharigrama (Tepoztlán, Mexico)
  • "Three Intermezzi Op. 117 no. 1" [Brahms] - Yoko Onishi (Zushi City, Japan)
  • "Lake Theme for Saw, Theremin and Piano" - Kepa Lehtinen (Helsinki, Finland) 
  • "Beau Soir" [Debussy] - Juliet Shaw (Norwalk, CT, USA)
*The full-length recordings featured in this show were used with the knowledge and permission of the artists and composers. Please support the artists by visiting their websites, purchasing their recordings, and attending their performances. 

ADDITIONAL MUSIC

INTERVIEW GUEST

CALENDAR OF THEREMIN EVENTS

MEDIA LINKS

SUPPORT THIS PODCAST

CONTACT

CREDITS 

Copyright 2023 Rick Reid 


--------------------------------------------

TRANSCRIPT

Please note: This transcript was created with the help of speech-to-text AI.  It may contain some errors.

David Brower  00:04

This is "Theremin 30," thirty minutes of theremin music, news, events and interviews, with a new episode about every 30 days. Now, here is your host from Denver, Colorado, USA -- Rick Reid!

Rick Reid  00:20

Hey, welcome to the March 2023 episode of the Theremin 30 podcast. This is the final episode of season 4 of the Theremin 30 podcast. I wasn't able to produce a full 12 episodes this past year, either because some other projects got in the way, or I wasn't able to schedule guests at the right times, but I think the shows I did publish have some great music and informative interviews, so be sure to check out any episodes you may have missed.

This month, I've got music from Mexico, Japan, and Finland.  And my special guest is thereminist Kip Rosser. He'll tell us all about the Juliet Shaw Legacy Project."
Let's dive right into the music now. In a few minutes, I'll play a classical track from Yoko Onishi's current album. But first, I've got a recent release featuring Ernesto Mendoza from Mexico City.  This past December, he appeared as a guest thereminist on Mexican electronic music producer Carlos Sharigrama's new track called "The Virgin Rainbow."  It appears on the Quartz Reveal compilation album from the Adhara Records label. This track runs a bit too long to play in its entirety, so here is an edited version of "The Virgin Rainbow" by Sharigrama.


Rick Reid  10:16
We started this episode with an excerpt of ""The Virgin Rainbow" by Sharigrama, featuring Ernesto Mendoza on theremin.  You can listen to the full 8-minute track on the Theremin 30 YouTube playlist. 

After that, we heard some classical music from Yoko Onishi's current album, All Theremin 2. "Three Intermezzi, Opus 117, Number 1" by Johannes Brahms features Yoko performing with her vintage RCA theremin and a Moog Etherwave Pro. Yoko hosts the RCA Theremin Evening live-streaming recital on YouTube on the fourth Saturday afternoon of every month from her home in Zushi City, Japan. If you want to tune in, be sure to adjust for your time zone. Here, where I live in Colorado, the live stream starts on late Friday night.

I'll be right back with the Theremin 30 calendar and new music from Kepa Lehtinen. And later in the show, I'll visit with Kip Rosser about the Juliet Shaw Legacy Project.  So stay tuned!

Rick Reid  11:23

It's time now for a look at the Theremin 30 calendar of theremin events!  

The Octopus Project has a couple of concerts scheduled in Austin, Texas, on March 10th and 14th.

On Sunday, March 12th, Miss Therie will present a lecture and performance in Markelo, Netherlands.

Jumping back to Austin, Texas, Aileen Adler has a free show set for March 17th.

On the 18th, James Bohn performs at the Bleep Blorp Festival of Synthesis and Electronic Music in Lowell, Massachusetts. 

On the 20th, Ludger Schneider presents ""Music from the Aether -- Electronic Music in the Rhineland of the 1920s"" at VHS Monheim in the Cologne, Germany, area.

Peter Theremin teaches a series of theremin classes in Moscow beginning March 26th.

On March 28th, Marla Goodman demonstrates the D-Lev digital theremin at the American Computer and Robotics Museum in Bozeman, Montana.

On April 4th,  Polygraph Lounge presents a concert in Brooklyn that will also be available as a free live stream.

And coming up on April 13th, the punk duo Human Toys plays the Wild Weekend festival on Majorca island in Spain.

For details about these events and many more, check out the interactive calendar on Theremin30.com. If you have a theremin event you'd like me to list on the calendar, send me a note with all the details." Now, let's get back into the music with a new release from Finnish thereminist Kepa Lehtinen. From his brand new EP In the Heart of Winter, this track is called "Lake Theme for Saw, Theremin, and Piano."

Rick Reid  14:51

That was "Lake Theme for Saw, Theremin, and Piano" from the new release In the Heart of Winter. That recording features Kepa Lehtinen on theremin and piano, and Puka Oinonen on musical saw. You can listen to all seven tracks from In the Heart of Winter on Spotify and most other streaming services.

Coming up after this break, I'll visit with Kip Rosser about the Juliet Shaw Legacy Project, so stay right here."

Rick Reid  15:32

Kip Rosser is a professional theremin performer, recording artist, blogger, YouTube creator, and teacher based in Morrisville, Pennsylvania. I spoke with him a couple of weeks ago to learn about his efforts to archive the work of one of America's earliest thereminists, Juliet Shaw. Kip Rosser. Thanks so much for joining us on that Theremin 30 podcast.

Kip Rosser 15:53
You're very welcome. Happy to be here. 

Rick Reid  15:55
You're working on a project that involves a thereminist I've never heard of, Juliet Shaw.

Kip Rosser
That's right.

Rick Reid
Tell me about what you've been up to. 

Kip Rosser  16:03
In 2008 I happened to be rereading a book that I've read at least three or four times about Theremin himself. In the acknowledgement section there is a single sentence thanking Sandra Shaw Murphy and Karen Shaw for materials associated with their mother, American pianist and thereminist Juliet Shaw. That's all I ever knew. And I became fascinated. Who is that person? It's mentioned in this book, who is she? Through searches online, I found the music school that she founded called the Silvermine School of Music. Her two daughters Sandra and Karen were still alive. Julia died in 1994. So I was able to contact her two daughters. And in 2008, I went to meet them. The theremin was there and they said, it doesn't work. We've tried it. It doesn't work. But I've had enough experience with theremins to know that they're extremely temperamental. I plugged it in and after about 15 minutes, I was able to get it to work. I interviewed them they were incredibly funny and witty, and I was going to produce just a little 20 minute documentary about Juliet Shaw. That was it. They had a little shoe box and a couple of other little boxes of Xeroxes of newspaper articles and some photographs. And they told me at the time, we know there's a cassette tape or two around here, but we don't know where they are. So I took what I had and came home and promptly backed up the footage from the camera, got rid of the footage from the camera itself on its hard drive, backed it up on an external hard drive. A week or two later, my computer was stolen. And my hard drive busted and the data couldn't be recovered. So I lost everything couldn't do a thing. You know sometimes you'll save something on the computer, but you forget where you're saving it to?

 
Rick Reid
Yes.

Kip Rosser 
And about two years ago, I found six to eight minutes of footage, but not the interview stuff so I couldn't use it. Oh, I put together a small video for Sandra. Karen had died in 2019. I put an unlisted video on YouTube. It's interesting and she said it moved to tears because there are footage of Kara and Sandra together at Juliet's theremin demonstrating their mother's technique. She said I'd like to meet with you again. Can you come meet me? And then June of 2022 we met I got there and this living room of their house will see add people for a concert Wow. The living room is extraordinary. Three concert grand pianos it looks like it comes out of a different time period. Sandra is the executive director of the Silvermine School of Music and she still does recitals and concerts all the time. And there's the theremin in precisely the same place that I have left it 14 years before then she said doesn't work. Got it to work again. But this time all over the chairs are just piles and piles of foot high of old crumbling, oxidized newspaper articles, magazines, tons of spread everywhere, a stack of at least a dozen reel-to-reel tapes, and boxes and boxes of cassette tapes. None of it was in any particular order. And that's when I asked her if she would allow me to start helping her to organize at the time she was 84. And she just turned 85 on February 7. It's an overwhelming task. And I asked her if she would be willing to allow me to help her organize this thing. And that is when she consented to let me take everything to finally get all of the materials we can find whether it's ephemera, printed materials, audio materials, video materials, organize it, preserve it, archive it correctly, which it all is now and then donate it to an institution. We've approached a number of institutions that are two more we're going to approach there at Yale University at the Smithsonian, New York Public Library, Peabody Institute, and there's going to be one or two more and EMEAPP who has already agreed they want the whole thing. The reason why we're so assisting others as opposed to just give it to the Electronic Music Education and Preservation Project is because Karen and Sandra originally wanted to get it to Yale because Juliet's first public performance on a theremin took place at Yale University. I worked with vendors in Ohio, in Arizona, in New York City and other states to do the digitization of things that I couldn't do myself. I, at this point, spent between 800 and 900 hours. With the exception of certain proprietary types of tapes and audio, which I'm unable to do myself, I digitize everything, all the photographs, every lecture, all the handwritten sheets, recital programs, it's hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of artifacts that I digitize myself plus 21 audio cassettes 32 reel to reel tapes, 16 vinyl recordings, all of them have now been digitized. And believe it or not, audio cassettes 20 and 21, I just acquired yesterday. It's a tremendous legacy plus Juliet's theremin. Turns out Juliet Shaw acquired that theremin in the very early 1930s, as a result of visiting him in his apartment. She brought her RCA to him, she played for him, and he said, I am going to build you an extended octave range of six and a half octaves. There are handwritten accounts, plus audio accounts on tape, Juliet describing her meeting with what his apartment was like, which no one has ever described. And the fact that he said, I will build you this. So I think we pretty well established that it was built for her specifically. That's the term that he gave her or sold her I don't know whether she bought it or traded it with her RCA. It's in rough shape, but it's still played. She played that thing forever, up until the late 80s, early 90s When she could no longer play any of the others.

Rick Reid  21:47
Why is it important to you and to the listeners of this show that we preserve all of these artifacts from Juliet Shaw's life and career? 

Kip Rosser  21:57
The fact is that Theremin Clara Rockmore, Lucy rose and Samuel Hoffman, George Goldberg, and some of these other people. They're the absolute first generation of Theremin players. Julia Shaw is among that group. Did she tour the world know why she world famous? Not really, but what she did arguably was as unique as anything any of them ever did. First of all, she founded a music and art center called the Sasqua Hills Music and Arts Center. When she left West Hartford, Connecticut, she founded the Silvermine School of Music. She was a concert pianist from the very late 20s to early 30s. All the way through the rest of her life. She, as far as I know, is the only concert pianist, flash them in the world that has ever been her piano playing is extraordinary. And she devoted her life to being a teacher, a feminist and someone whose entire Mo was to bring culture and music to the area in which she lit her Silvermine School of Music was never just a school where piano students came there were concert, huge social gatherings, and she donated proceeds from her concerts to all sorts of causes the Red Cross to high schools that needed band uniforms or needed to go to Florida to compete in a band competition. She gave away 10s of 1000s of dollars raised at her concert, she created this thing called the 12 piano symphony. Where have you ever heard of 12 women in pink chiffon evening gown 12 pianos on stage playing for an hour concert. And she would break up this concert by playing theremin herself. She really played the theremin beautifully. She played in New York City. She played in Hartford. She played all around her area. And I think that is just as important as any of the other theremenists, she championed the instrument. She had nothing but amazing things to say about Theremin. And so she used to talk about it and lecture about it during her concert. She's one of the first generation just as valid, and I think just as important as any of the others. And the whole thing is just this huge body of work. To me, it's just worth preserving. It's fascinating to be able to be a part of this thing. That's why I'm doing it, how can people get involved. And now we're in the fundraising phase to try to raise enough money to make sure that Theremin is preserved and restored just a little bit. And also the pay for things like the cost of the vendors that have imported all these tape materials and video materials. I have been personally doing out of pocket. I've spent all my own money to get these things done, because I don't want to hold the project up. So the funding will pay for all of those costs. Hopefully that means reimbursement. But I'm not making done on this, to me, being the person who center entrusted with this, to put it together has been compensation and not because you just wouldn't believe what I've heard the things that I've been able to watch that no one has ever seen for 70 years and we keep discovering more. 

Rick Reid  24:56
If somebody donates I understand you have a premium or gift for them. 

Kip Rosser  25:00
Anybody who donates $20 or more will receive free the first volume of Julia Shaw's music ever to be released. There are recordings that are just absolutely astounding to listen to. And I'm including in this collection, mostly theremin music, but I want people to hear what kind of concert pianist she wants. I want people to be able to hear how her love of experimental contemporary music influenced what she did. 

Rick Reid  25:26
So how do people find out about this opportunity to support your efforts and to get this recording?

Kip Rosser  25:33
All anyone has to do is go to JShawLegacy.com All the information is there. All you have to do is click to make a donation. It goes right to paid now, I make absolutely nothing other than reimbursement for what I've already put out. And anything that's leftover if we reach the goal amount goes immediately to Sandra Shaw and the Silver Mine Music School. Simple as that. 

Rick Reid  25:56

Let's listen now to a recording from the archive. Here is Juliet Shaw playing the 1891 Claude Debussy composition, "Beau Soir" or "Beautiful Evening."

That was "Beau Soir," written by Claude Debussy and performed by Juliet Shaw. You can learn how to support the Juliet Shaw Legacy project and get a download of the upcoming compilation album by following the links and banners in this month's show notes at Theremin30.com.

With the moments remaining, I want to thank Sharigrama, Yoko Onishi, Kepa Lehtinen, and the estate of Juliet Shaw for allowing me to share their music with you. Also, a big thanks to Kip Rosser for telling us all about the Juliet Shaw Legacy Project. I'll have Kip back on a future episode to talk about some of his own theremin adventures.  And a special thanks goes to the listeners who support the show with small one-time and monthly donations or by shopping with the affiliate program advertisers that appear on the Theremin30.com website.

I will be back with season 5 of the Theremin 30 podcast in April. Thanks so much to many of you who have been listening since I got started back in 2019. I would be grateful if you would tell your friends about the show and spreading the word on social media.

Until next time, I'm your host Rick Reid. I'll see you somewhere in the ether.

David Brower  29:48

You've been listening to the "Theremin 30" podcast. Visit "Theremin 30" on the web at Theremin-three-zero-dot-com.


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[S04E06] January 2023 - Conall Gleeson and Alexx Mazonowicz

 

Alexx Mazonowicz and Conall Gleeson



In the January 2023 episode of the Theremin 30 podcast, host Rick Reid plays theremin music from the USA, France, Mexico, and the United Kingdom. Rick's special guests are Music Director Conall Gleeson (right) and Thereminist/keyboardist Alexx Mazonowicz (left) of the New Note Orchestra. They will be performing in Brighton, England on February 14th.

FEATURED MUSIC*

*The full-length recordings featured in this show were used with the knowledge and permission of the artists and composers. Please support the artists by visiting their websites, purchasing their recordings, and attending their performances. 

ADDITIONAL MUSIC

INTERVIEW GUEST

CALENDAR OF THEREMIN EVENTS

MEDIA LINKS

SUPPORT THIS PODCAST

CONTACT

CREDITS 

Copyright 2023 Rick Reid 


--------------------------------------------

TRANSCRIPT

Please note: This transcript was created with the help of speech-to-text AI.  It may contain some errors.

David Brower  00:04

This is "Theremin 30," thirty minutes of theremin music, news, events, and interviews, with a new episode about every 30 days. Now, here is your host from Denver, Colorado, USA -- Rick Reid.

Rick Reid  00:20

Hey, welcome to the January 2023 episode of the Theremin 30 podcast. I'm your host, Rick Reid, back after taking some time off to concentrate on other projects. I hope you missed me because I have to admit, I did miss you.

This episode is one you won't want to miss, because I have new theremin music from the USA, France, Mexico, and England.  And my special guests are Conall Gleeson and Alexx Mazonowicz from the New Note Orchestra.  They will be playing a concert in the Brighton, England, area on Valentine's Day.

To get things started, I am going to play a song that first appeared on the Octopus Project's 2007 album "Hello, Avalanche." I played it once before, back in September of 2021. This time around, though, it's a new arrangement recorded last April in the Moog Sound Lab in Asheville, North Carolina, to showcase the redesigned Moog Etherwave theremin. Yvonne Lambert plays the Etherwave in the traditional way, and bandmate Toto Miranda uses another Etherwave as a CV controller for a Moog Matriarch synthesizer. Here is The Octopus Project with "I Saw the Bright Shinies."

Rick Reid  08:51

"We started the show with The Octopus Project with their reworking of  "I Saw the Bright Shinies" recorded in the Moog Sound Lab. You can watch their video on the Theremin 30 YouTube playlist. After that, I played a brand new live-looping performance by French multi-instrumentalist and composer Charlotte Dubois. Charlotte performed that piece with a Moog Claravox theremin and a Moog Grandmother synthesizer. You can see her performance on the Theremin 30 YouTube playlist as well. There is a link to the playlist in this month's show notes at Theremin30.com. 

After a short break, I'll be back with the Theremin 30 calendar, some theremin news headlines, and a new recording featuring Ernesto Mendoza. And later in the show, I'll visit with Conall Gleeson and Alexx Mazonowicz from the New Note Orchestra. So, stay tuned!

Rick Reid  09:54

It's time now for a look at the Theremin 30 calendar of theremin events!  

Aleks Schurmer is featured in the soundtrack of the new French-language movie "Mistral Spatial," now playing in theaters in Montreal, Canada.

On January 27th, Yoko Onishi hosts the monthly RCA Theremin evening on YouTube.

On January 28th in New Bedford, Massachusetts, James Bohn will present a lecture and theremin demonstration prior to the Magic of Disney concert by the New Bedford Symphony Orchestra.

On February 8th, Thorwald Jorgensen performs in Montreal, Canada, and About Aphrodite has a concert in Hamburg, Germany.

Over the weekend of February 10th, Dorit Chrysler and Charles Hobbs will present a series of events in Graz, Austria, to celebrate the opening of the "Calder Plays Theremin" art installation.

And on Valentine's Day, the New Note Orchestra will be performing in the town of Hove near Brighton, England. We'll hear more about that later in the show.

For details about these events and more, check out the interactive calendar on Theremin30.com.

I also want to take a moment to share a couple of recent news items with you.

First of all, congratulations to Icelandic recording artist Hekla Magnusdottir for earning Album of the Year honors in the Rekyavik Gravevine music awards.

Also, thereminist Kip Rosser is helping raise awareness and funding for the Juliet Shaw Legacy Project, a campaign to preserve the archives of one of America's earliest professional thereminists. You can find details about the project by following the link in this month's show notes.

Now, let's get back to more music with a very cool new track from "Tharsis Project" featuring Ernesto Mendoza and Jon Carr.  This is called "Time Traveller."

Rick Reid  16:08

That was "Time Traveller," a new recording from "Tharsis Project" featuring Ernesto Mendoza on theremin and synthesizers and Jon Carr on drums. You can learn more about the artists by clicking on their names in this month's show notes.

Coming up after this break, I'll visit with Conall Gleeson and Alexx Mazonowicz from Brighton, England's New Note Orchestra, so stay right here.

Rick Reid  16:57

The New Note Orchestra is an eclectic music ensemble based in Brighton, England, that uses musical collaboration to help people in recovery from addiction. I recently visited with their music director Conall Gleeson and their keyboard and theremin player Alex Mazonavich, to find out how this most unusual charity organization works and how they incorporate the theremin in their live concert performances.

Conall Gleeson  17:02
Yeah, thank you for having us.

Alexx Mazonowicz  17:26
Thanks for inviting. 

Rick Reid  17:28
Conall, you're the music director?

Conall Gleeson  17:30
That's right. I've been working with New Note Orchestra since 2016. And what an amazing journey it has been for me. 

Rick Reid  17:37
And Alexx, you play keyboards and, of course, theremin. 

Alexx Mazonowicz  17:41
Yep, that's right. 

Rick Reid  17:42
What is the New Note Orchestra? 

Conall Gleeson  17:45
Well, New Note Orchestra was set up in 2015. Its focus is to attract people who are in recovery from drugs and substance abuse and using music as a way to sustain their sobriety and their well being. What we do is try to develop those persons as musicians. They've had a whole journey where they self-identified and come to terms with their addiction. People want to move on from that kind of way of self-identifying. And we help them self-identify as musicians, so they come as addicts and become musicians. And that's how we like to see it. 

Rick Reid  18:17
So, Alexx, how did you get involved with the orchestra? 

Alexx Mazonowicz  18:20
I am in recovery. And I have been in recovery for almost 15 years and a couple of months it will be since I had my last drink. I joined in 2020, about a month before we all locked down actually for COVID. It was just after I'd moved to Brighton, but I heard about the group from a friend in another recovery group. Somebody just mentioned to me about the orchestra. And I looked it up online and kind of liked what they were doing. And I listened to some of the music. I was quite impressed by it. And so I just found out where they were practicing. And I turned up one Tuesday in February 2020 With my theremin under my arm just basically where do I plug in? 

Rick Reid  18:34
What was that like to have a thereminist show up? 

Conall Gleeson  19:01
Oh, it was so weird because primarily we've got lot of people play guitars, we've got people doing keyboards, and we also have a multitude of people playing hand chimes. So when a theremin arrived at the door with Alexx I was thinking, well, how are we going to work this one into our sonic ambience? But Alexx has proved to be very versatile and imaginative with his theremin. And it's been a blessing and a wonderful addition to the orchestra. 'Cause it can do two things: it can play melodies, it also can add these strange textures to the sound that we make, you know. So that's really fantastic. 

Rick Reid  19:35
I guess we should define the word orchestra because the New Note Orchestra is not a traditional symphony orchestra. 

Conall Gleeson  19:42
It's called an orchestra because it's quite large in size, a bit larger than an ensemble or a band, though might have 20 to 25 persons so it kind of in size and embodiment constitutes an orchestra. That's where the name originally was come from, but we might call ourselves an electric orchestra. 'Cause we're plugged in, we're amplified. And we're a lot of guitars, we've got some wind instruments. And we've got lots of synths and we've got a theremin, yeah.\ 

Alexx Mazonowicz  20:06
I think orchestra, though, is a good description of the ambition of what we're trying to do. I think if we just called ourselves a group, a lot of people would be expecting a rock group or something like that. Whereas with an orchestra, there's this idea of something big and very long, ambitious pieces, that we did. So, it works for me. 

Conall Gleeson  20:24
Yeah. 

Rick Reid  20:26
I'm curious, from your point of view, Alexx, how you find your place in the orchestra. And I mean that both sort of philosophically as a thereminist, and also practically, where you need space around your instrument to be able to perform it correctly. 

Alexx Mazonowicz  20:34
One of the reasons I joined was because I wanted to play my theremin with a group, right? And I think that's a problem that a lot of thereminists I've spoken to have is that they spend a lot of time practicing at home, maybe playing to backing tracks, or tracks that they recorded themselves. Whereas I used to play electric guitar in alternative bands, and I missed playing with other people. And I've always liked to be a little bit different, right? Why would we choose such a difficult and weird instrument if we didn't like being different? So philosophically, where I like to fit within the group when I'm on theremin is kind of by bringing different textures to it. I play a Claravox now. I've got the delayed circuit on it. And it's got the different settings on it, which are really useful for bringing new textures in. And we do one piece in which people are playing recorders and stuff to emulate birds. And I like to actually break the rules and touch the pitch antenna with my fingers to try and make that chirping sound. Also, the Claravox has the white noise circuit on. I've used the software app to connect the pitch antenna to the filter. The Claravox has got that very beautiful Moog filter on it, to try and create kind of a wind effect. And you put that with some delay. So I can get a lot of textures that way. And that's really interesting, because when I started playing Ttheremin seriously, which was only about five years ago, I wanted to kind of get away from using it as a sound effects machine, which you know there's a little snobbery within the theremin community used for sound effects, which I kind of agree with to a point because when you can get melodies out of it they're very beautiful, but you know, in the orchestra situation, you give what you can, and I'm playing with other people. And sometimes it's really nice to be able to do that. 

Conall Gleeson  20:38
When we perform, we've kind of scripted our pieces. But when we get together, and we're collaborating, we're all improvising, and we're responding to the sounds other instruments make. So in that respect, it's really exciting then, finding how a theremin might blend and to add an interesting texture to a guitar drone, or to get to the theremin to sound like a percussion instrument. When we collaborate or meet every Tuesday, we're exploring these different ways that a stheremin might work with the rest of the orchestra. 

Rick Reid  22:53
I can imagine situations where you have to tell Alexx, you know, we don't really need a theremin in this song. 

Conall Gleeson  23:01
That's part of the flexibility and the genius of Alexx because he can also play the keyboard. It's never a case that we don't need a theremin. But it's often the case that we need someone to do some of the synth work. And then that's where Alexx brings in his expertise as well, because he's so talented. He's got such a wide range of skills, you know. Got to use them all. 

Alexx Mazonowicz  23:19
You flatter, you flatter me so, Conall. Going back to what you were talking about actual space. I think in the early days, I set my theremin up when we rehearsed, actually quite apart from everyone. And I'd be playing and people would come up and go, Oh, what's that? And, you know, obviously, the pitch would suddenly change. On stage it's been okay, I sometimes have to tune the pitch antenna quite tight, just to kind of make sure that nobody else gets into range. But we're a big group, so we have to have big spaces to play in anyway. 

Conall Gleeson  23:54
Ironically, the theremin takes up a lot of space doesn't it? 

Rick Reid  24:00
Also you have to have an amplifier. So how does that work? 

Alexx Mazonowicz  24:04
We've already got people playing bass guitars and electric guitars and we've got like rock drummers in there as well. So generally people are kind of fighting the volume. But Conall does a fantastic job of actually getting people to turn down. For me, learning to sit back a little bit whether I'm playing theremin or keyboards, there's been a really big learning experience. actually learning to step back a bit in the mix. It's been really good. But again, I've got a Claravox so I can always plug some headphones in. I can monitor the pitch on a pitch pedal. And I do have a small practice amp, and I'll use that sometimes at a low volume just to make sure I can hear. 

Rick Reid  24:44
Now you have a show coming up in February called Love Fest. Tell me about that. 

Alexx Mazonowicz  24:50
Love Fest, yeah. Well that's on Valentine's Day and we are playing in a church down the road with a few other artists from Brighton, but it's an alternative love show. So it's not just about romantic love. We're talking about brotherly love. We're talking about lots of different types of love. And we've got some kind of alternative love poems that we're going to be reading over our normal repertoire. But yes, an alternative Valentine's evening. 

Rick Reid  25:18
Thank you very much for taking the time to visit with me and I wish you good luck with the concert coming up. Love is always a good thing. And music is always a good thing. 

Conall Gleeson  25:27
Yeah, thank you. And I love your show. It's great. 

Alexx Mazonowicz  25:30
Yeah, it's fantastic. Thank you very much for everything you do, Rick.

Rick Reid  25:33

If you live in southern England, make a date to see the New Note Orchestra's Love Fest concert on Valentine's Day. Follow the link on the Theremin 30 calendar for details. Also, check out the New Note Orchestra website at newnote.co.uk.

Now with the time remaining, let's listen to an excerpt from a new experimental music piece by Modulight, a collaboration between thereminist Chris Conway and synthesist Jez Creek. From their recently released second album, "Liminal Vision," here is "Primordial Descent."

Rick Reid  29:06

Thank you so much to the Octopus Project, Charlotte Dubois, Tharsis Project, and Modulight for allowing me to share their music with you. Also, a big thanks to Conall Gleeson and Alexx Mazonavich from the New Note Orchestra for visiting with me. And a special thanks goes to the folks who support my efforts with small one-time and monthly donations and by shopping in the Theremin 30 online merch store and pro shop.  

If you'd like to get involved with this podcast, I'm always on the lookout for new, professional quality theremin music to play on the show and expert guests to interview.  So, reach me through the contact form on the website.

Until next time, I'm your host Rick Reid. I'll see you somewhere in the ether.

David Brower  29:50

You've been listening to the "Theremin 30" podcast. Visit Theremin 30 on the web at Theremin30.com.
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