On March 18th, I was a guest performer with the University of Colorado's Boulder Laptop Orchestra (BLOrk) at the Atlas Institute black box. I did visuals for 7 of their pieces and they invited me to perform a piece of my own to close out the night.
I performed a structured improv using ONLY the Nord Lead 4 with no playback, sequencing, or external effects. I maneuvered through patches I made over the last three years from INIT. For my own visuals for this piece, I created original patches using only live camera input as a source with audio-reactive elements so the visuals would match the tone of each movement and yet be dynamic allowing me to focus on playing and live sound design.
Recorded using a Zoom Q4N and audio is live from the room using the Q4N's built-in mics.
Enjoy!
https://youtu.be/ScpItttfGlY
Watch on youtube.com
PROGRAM NOTES
"Tonalities from Orbit" is an original structured improvisational piece inspired by the ground breaking work of Louis and Bebe Barron - who in the 1956 provided the soundtrack to the seminal Scifi film Forbidden Planet. The hand-built circuits they used to create the "electronic tonalities" of this film pre-dated the modern synthesizer and were limited to oscillators (producing mainly square, sine, & triangle waves), ring modulators, overdriven tubes, reverb, and delay (done with tape manipulation). Informed by these limitations, and using only a Nord Lead 4 synthesizer, Mark created 14 original and expressive "circuit states". In this performance he will play and morph between these states as a framework for the piece as he brings his version of the Krell to life. The performance will be complimented with Mark's real-time visuals using only live camera input as a source with audio-responsive automation.