VOLUME @ South of Sunset
1218 W. Temple St.
Los Angeles, CA 90026
VOLUME is pleased to present a performance by Brooklyn based Byron Westbrook on the occasion of his new release on Root Strata. Westbrook is joined by fellow Root Strata artist Gregg Kowalsky and Kid606 preforming a rare ambient set.
About the Artists
Kid606 – One of the most playful artists in the American electronic music scene — as well as the founder of the Tigerbeat6 label. Lost in the Game, a set of tunes that embraced melody more than anything previously in his evolution, was released in 2012. The following year’s Happinesswas similarly melodic but much more cheerful, taking inspiration from a move to Los Angeles and the smooth sounds of Christopher Cross and Toto as well as Tangerine Dream. De Pedro went in an even mellower direction with 2015’s album Recollected Ambient Works 1.0: Bored of Excitement and EP Recollected Ambient Works 1.5: Discreet Music, which featured a cover of the Brian Eno piece of the same name.
After his debut album, Through the Cardial Window (Kranky, 2006), Kowalsky began composing and performing electro-acoustic music using cassette tapes loops, sine oscillators, mixer feedback, analog synths, contact mics and various acoustic instrumentation with a focus on multi channel, site-specific works with elements of psychoacoustic phenomena. He is most known for his Tape Chants series, which explores the acoustics where the performances occur by setting up cassette players around the space with tape loops tuned to sine waves using only the cassette players’ speakers for amplification.
Kranky released the first recorded version of Tape Chants in 2009. In 2011 he was commissioned to perform Tape Chants in the WWII Battery Townsley military bunker in the Marin Headlands in Northern California. The performance was recorded and later released on vinyl by Giuseppe Ielasi, who also collaborated on the release entitled Battery Townsley. Kowalsky also collaborated with Dutch Lutist Jozef Van Wissem on Movements Through Marble and Stone (Amish, 2012), which was the final release of the Tape Chants series. The album was a recorded, live performance at Issues Project Room in Brooklyn.
Byron Westbrook is an artist and musician based in Brooklyn NY. His electronic sound interventions play with dynamics of perception of space, sometimes as multi-channel sound performances or as installation work using video or lighting. He has presented work at ICA London, Cafe OTO (London), Clocktower Gallery, ISSUE Project Room, Roulette, Abrons Arts Center, Eyebeam (NYC), Human Resources, the wulf. (Los Angeles), Instants Chavirés (Paris), The LAB (San Francisco), International House (Philadelphia), VIVO (Vancouver), O’ (Milan), LOOP Festival (Barcelona), Radar Festival (Bogota) among others. He has also worked closely with Phill Niblock to produce concerts at Experimental Intermedia Foundation in NYC since 2005. He has an MFA from Bard College, where he studied with David Berhman, Marcus Schmickler, Laetitia Sonami and Marina Rosenfeld. He has been an artist in residence at Civitella Ranieri Foundation, Clocktower Gallery, Wassaic Project, Diapason Gallery and in 2016 will be an Akademie Schloss Solitude fellow in Stuttgart. He will have an LP out in October 2015 on Root Strata.
