We are 'rewinding' back to one of the first works ever composed by my father, Stan Shaff. I'll be performing them for the first time in 50 years, in total darkness, through 176 speakers.
Wonder what experimental San Francisco sounded like in the late 60s? Audium V: Rewind features field recordings and electronic sounds through 176 speakers that will take audiences back to 1969. Find yourself inside an old muscle-car, feel a Pan-American flight fly right through you, and meditate in a cacophony of fog horns. One can only imagine what audiences at that time (54 years ago!) must have thought.
Audium V was composed by Stan Shaff on tape in the late 60s. It premiered in 1969 at Audium's first home, an old lodge hall in San Francisco's Richmond District. Stan and Doug McEachern (Audium's co-founder and original system designer) saw the original theater's 80 speakers as a canvas on which to stretch and shape "sound sculptures." They were just coming into what would become a defining philosophy: treating sound and space itself as a composable entity.
Fast forward 50 years, much has changed technology-wise, but Audium's original aesthetic remains intact. Thanks to countless volunteer hours, the original Audium V tapes were digitized in-house as part of its ongoing archival program. Now, following in his dad's footsteps, David Shaff has reworked his father's sounds for Audium's current system and will perform each night.
"My goal in reworking my Dad's piece for Audium's current sound environment was not to faithfully recreate the piece as it was (Impossible! Not all the tapes were labeled!) but to adapt the work for our modern system. The tape sounds remain the same, but the contemporary space and context is vastly different, making the piece just as relevant now as it was back then." -- David Shaff (composer & son of Stan Shaff)
Image Credit: Photo by Alex Akamine
show less
Wonder what experimental San Francisco sounded like in the late 60s? Audium V: Rewind features field recordings and electronic sounds through 176 speakers that will take audiences back to 1969. Find yourself inside an old muscle-car, feel a Pan-American flight fly right through you, and meditate in a cacophony of fog horns. One can only imagine what audiences at that time (54 years ago!) must have thought.
Audium V was composed by Stan Shaff on tape in the late 60s. It premiered in 1969 at Audium's first home, an old lodge hall in San Francisco's Richmond District. Stan and Doug McEachern (Audium's co-founder and original system designer) saw the original theater's 80 speakers as a canvas on which to stretch and shape "sound sculptures." They were just coming into what would become a defining philosophy: treating sound and space itself as a composable entity.
Fast forward 50 years, much has changed technology-wise, but Audium's original aesthetic remains intact. Thanks to countless volunteer hours, the original Audium V tapes were digitized in-house as part of its ongoing archival program. Now, following in his dad's footsteps, David Shaff has reworked his father's sounds for Audium's current system and will perform each night.
"My goal in reworking my Dad's piece for Audium's current sound environment was not to faithfully recreate the piece as it was (Impossible! Not all the tapes were labeled!) but to adapt the work for our modern system. The tape sounds remain the same, but the contemporary space and context is vastly different, making the piece just as relevant now as it was back then." -- David Shaff (composer & son of Stan Shaff)
Image Credit: Photo by Alex Akamine
We are 'rewinding' back to one of the first works ever composed by my father, Stan Shaff. I'll be performing them for the first time in 50 years, in total darkness, through 176 speakers.
Wonder what experimental San Francisco sounded like in the late 60s? Audium V: Rewind features field recordings and electronic sounds through 176 speakers that will take audiences back to 1969. Find yourself inside an old muscle-car, feel a Pan-American flight fly right through you, and meditate in a cacophony of fog horns. One can only imagine what audiences at that time (54 years ago!) must have thought.
Audium V was composed by Stan Shaff on tape in the late 60s. It premiered in 1969 at Audium's first home, an old lodge hall in San Francisco's Richmond District. Stan and Doug McEachern (Audium's co-founder and original system designer) saw the original theater's 80 speakers as a canvas on which to stretch and shape "sound sculptures." They were just coming into what would become a defining philosophy: treating sound and space itself as a composable entity.
Fast forward 50 years, much has changed technology-wise, but Audium's original aesthetic remains intact. Thanks to countless volunteer hours, the original Audium V tapes were digitized in-house as part of its ongoing archival program. Now, following in his dad's footsteps, David Shaff has reworked his father's sounds for Audium's current system and will perform each night.
"My goal in reworking my Dad's piece for Audium's current sound environment was not to faithfully recreate the piece as it was (Impossible! Not all the tapes were labeled!) but to adapt the work for our modern system. The tape sounds remain the same, but the contemporary space and context is vastly different, making the piece just as relevant now as it was back then." -- David Shaff (composer & son of Stan Shaff)
Image Credit: Photo by Alex Akamine
read more
Wonder what experimental San Francisco sounded like in the late 60s? Audium V: Rewind features field recordings and electronic sounds through 176 speakers that will take audiences back to 1969. Find yourself inside an old muscle-car, feel a Pan-American flight fly right through you, and meditate in a cacophony of fog horns. One can only imagine what audiences at that time (54 years ago!) must have thought.
Audium V was composed by Stan Shaff on tape in the late 60s. It premiered in 1969 at Audium's first home, an old lodge hall in San Francisco's Richmond District. Stan and Doug McEachern (Audium's co-founder and original system designer) saw the original theater's 80 speakers as a canvas on which to stretch and shape "sound sculptures." They were just coming into what would become a defining philosophy: treating sound and space itself as a composable entity.
Fast forward 50 years, much has changed technology-wise, but Audium's original aesthetic remains intact. Thanks to countless volunteer hours, the original Audium V tapes were digitized in-house as part of its ongoing archival program. Now, following in his dad's footsteps, David Shaff has reworked his father's sounds for Audium's current system and will perform each night.
"My goal in reworking my Dad's piece for Audium's current sound environment was not to faithfully recreate the piece as it was (Impossible! Not all the tapes were labeled!) but to adapt the work for our modern system. The tape sounds remain the same, but the contemporary space and context is vastly different, making the piece just as relevant now as it was back then." -- David Shaff (composer & son of Stan Shaff)
Image Credit: Photo by Alex Akamine
show less
Date/Times:
1616 Bush Street, San Francisco, CA 94109
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