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In 1966 ten New York artists and thirty engineers and scientists from Bell Telephone Laboratories collaborated on a series of innovative dance, music and theater performances, 9 Evenings: Theatre & Engineering, held in October at the 69th Regiment Armory, New York City. The artists included were John Cage, Lucinda Childs, Öyvind Fahlström, Alex Hay, Deborah Hay, Steve Paxton, Yvonne Rainer, Robert Rauschenberg, David Tudor and Robert Whitman. Archival material has been assembled into ten films, each of which reconstructs the artist's original work and uses interviews with the artists, engineers and performers in documentaries that illuminate the artistic, technical and historical aspects of the work.
Bandoneon! (a combine) is David Tudor’s first full concert work as a composer. Tudor played the bandoneon as the input into a complex sound and visual modification system that moved sound from speaker to speaker and controlled lights and video images, creating a work that animated the entire Armory space. This DVD documents the performance with film and vintage photographs as well as interviews with the performers, engineers and Tudor's fellow composers.
Bandoneon! is the third film in the 9 Evenings series from E.A.T. and ARTPIX. This rare and historical film was produced by Billy Klüver and Julie Martin of E.A.T. and directed by Julie Martin.
| Catalog Number: MC-1080 |
Type: Feature |
Genre: Art / Artist |
| Copyright: 2009 |
Length: 38:36 |
Format:
DVD Region: 0 (All) |
| TV System: NTSC & PAL |
ISBN: |
UPC: 880198108098 |
| Label: |
This title is available in Europe for Wholesale - List Prices: £16.99 / 25.00€
This is a Microcinema Exclusive title.
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Films In Compilation
Bandoneon! directed by
Julie
Martin
USA,
Art / Artist,
2009,
00:39:17
"My approach to the instrument had to have something to do with my concept of the difference between pulling and pushing the bellows so that the length of the phrases was determined by the amount of air in the bellows at a given time. My approach was to make a situation where I controlled the maximum number of tonal variables that I could obtain through the use of peripheral instruments. There was a lot to take care of during the performance. Without consulting my original score, I could tell you the number of tonal manipulations that I had under my control was 17 or 18, and part of the performance was in a sense controlled by my access to the tonal variations." - from an interview with David Tudor, September 1993
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2010-07-06 Educational Media Reviews Online
By Vincent J. Novara
American composer David Tudor (1926 – 1996) was an integral member of the twentieth century experimental music community. Aside from his pioneering compositions, he was also known as an organist and concert pianist, including debuting several of John Cage’s works for piano, most notably 4’33”.
Bandoneon ! (a combine) was Tudor’s first complete performance of one of his own works. The title refers to the type of concertina popular in Tango music that Tudor modified to control a series of electronic audio effects, lights, and projected images brought together into a “combine,” a term coined by the artist Robert Rauschenberg to indicate a work that is neither painting nor sculpture. Tudor adopted this concept as he incorporated many new experimental sound innovations presented at the legendary 9 Evenings: Theatre & Engineering series.
The 9 Evenings featured debuts of theater, dance, and music works that embraced the new technologies created by engineers from Bell Telephone Laboratories. The performances took place at the New York 69th Regiment Armory in 1966, during the early years of electronic music. Ten featured artists all from New York included: David Tudor, John Cage, Lucinda Childs, Robert Rauschenberg, Yvonne Rainer, Deborah Hay, Robert Whitman, Steve Paxton, Alex Hay, and Öyvind Fahlström. Microcinema International is releasing the filmed performances as a series of ten DVDs. Each performance was filmed in both color and black and white, and this film alternates between both types of footage.
The DVD menu is divided into four sections: Titles, serves as introduction to the whole series; Performance, lasts a little more than fourteen minutes; Documentary, is devoted to the performance, its place in Tudor’s career, and other works, genres, and composers that informed his composing this work; and Credits.
The performance footage gives the viewer a sense of the cavernous armory where the events took place. At stage right is a small platform hosting Tudor and his instrument surrounded by an array of electronics and other assistants/co-performers that contribute to this performance. The rest of the performance space – about 200 x 100 feet – is allotted to a series of screens for projected images and to various modified speakers connected to remote control vehicles, enabling the speakers to roam depending on the whims of the remote operator. The footage was captured from multiple perspectives including from behind the audience looking over the entire performance space, from within the platform area, and from alongside the floor where the mobile speakers traveled. The platform footage reveals the technology that went into realizing this performance and shows in-the-moment collaboration occurring as Bandoneon ! was presented.
As a composition, the resulting music is a relentless roar of distortion. Though innovative for its time, other works supplant this one in the pantheon of experimental electronic music, including some of Tudor’s subsequent compositions. During the introductory titles, Bell Telephone engineer Billy Klüver explains that the filmed performances “cannot represent the artist’s work in full.” The live experience of Tudor’s armory performance of Bandoneon ! does not transfer thoroughly to a video presentation. In order to hear and witness the complete work as intended, one needs to be engulfed by the variety of sound projections created by the roaming speakers in the structural setting of the armory. However, this video still serves as a fine representation of a highly complex performance.
The in-depth documentary features voice-over interviews with Tudor where he explains the work, his methodology, and what informed his thinking. His contemporaries are also interviewed, supplying additional context for experimental music of the 1960s. A detailed explanation is provided on how everything worked together to bring about Bandoneon !
This DVD is essential to any music or art library that supports experimental or cutting edge academic creative arts programs. Bandoneon ! (a combine) is an important example of the type of collaboration and experimentation that took place during the early era of electronic music. The opportunity to see David Tudor perform his own composition is also vital to students of experimental music.
| 0000-00-00 blogcritics.com
By Greg Barbrick
Next to John Cage, David Tudor (1926-1996) was one of the leading lights of the post-war avant-garde movement in the United States. Tudor actually premiered Cage’s most notorious piece, 4’ 33” (1952), which featured the pianist sitting stock still in front of his keyboard for exactly four minutes and thirty-three seconds. The “music” was provided by the sounds of the audience shuffling uncomfortably in their seats, and any other random noises heard in the hall.
Nearly 60 years after the fact, a performance such as 4’ 33” may seem quaint, even silly. Make no mistake though, David Tudor has had a direct, or indirect influence on every bleeding-edge artist of the past 50 years.
For example, Krautrock godfather Karlheinz Stockhausen dedicated his Klavierstück VI (1955) to Tudor. And most significantly to rock fans of today, Tudor premiered some of the early compositions of La Monte Young. Young went on to mentor John Cale, who then formed the Velvet Underground, which incorporated his theories. And as every punk fan knows, the VU have had an influence on just about every band since.
The context is important in understanding the DVD Bandoneon! (a combine). This is a documentary of David Tudor’s first full concert work as a composer. He was participating in a series titled 9 Evenings, presented in 1966 in New York. The other artists involved were John Cage, Lucinda Childs, Oyvind Fahlstrom, Alex Hay, Deborah Hay, Steve Paxton, Yvonne Rainer, Robert Rauschenberg, and Robert Whitman.
Tudor’s night was October 6, and the instrument he played was the bandoneon. The bandoneon is a Latin instrument, and is somewhat analogous to a small accordion.
As the DVD shows, though, Tudor’s bandoneon is an instrument unlike any other. With the help of technicians from Bell Telephone Laboratories, Tudor’s bandoneon was the driving force of a multimedia blitzkrieg. By connecting contact microphones to various switches, delays and loops, and even running some through an ancient harmonium, the sound of the instrument becomes an unbelievable wash of feedback.
I can only imagine how abrasive this sounded back in 1966, and the way the microphones are set to loop each other, the whole thing actually takes on a life of its own. The audience had a different listening experience than we get, as the speakers were in constant motion. They were hooked up to remote control carts, which were sent around the stage randomly by five of Tudor’s friends.
To add to the sensory overload, the sounds were fed into an oscilloscope, with the resulting images projected onto a huge screen at the rear of the stage.
The results are amazing. I defy anyone to watch and listen to this material even today and not be blown away. The fact that all of this is presented by short-haired, serious young men wearing suits makes it all the more disconcerting.
Bandoneon! (a combine) is an incredibly valuable historical document. My only problem with the DVD is its brevity. There are two parts to it: Tudor’s performance, and a documentary of what went into making the event happen. All of this is fantastic. The problem is that we only get 14 minutes of performance, and about 20 minutes of documentary footage. I wish there were more.
As for the visual quality of the footage, it is very good for the most part. The main body of the performance is shown in black and white, and was very well preserved. Apparently, Bell shot the event in color, for their own records, and some of it is used very briefly. Bell’s tapes were not cared for very well, and so the quality of the color footage is pretty poor. Most of the interviews in the documentary section were conducted in the 1990s, and are in fine shape.
In the end, I have to put my reservations about the brevity of the DVD aside. This performance is of such historical value that it is worth seeing regardless.
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Open Score by Robert Rauschenberg
MC-596, 2007
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In 1966 ten New York artists and thirty engineers and scientists from Bell Telephone Laboratories collaborated on a series of innovative dance, music and theater performances, 9 Evenings: Theatre & Engineering, held at the 69th Regiment Armory, New... more >
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ROBERT WHITMAN: Performances from the 1960s
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Robert Whitman created some of the earliest and most important performance works of the 1960s. In his performances, the poetic and often surprising interaction of film, lights, sound, live performers, props, and objects that take on a life of their... more >
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Simone Forti
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An ARTPIX release.
In the spring of 1961 Simone Forti presented a program titled Five Dance Constructions and Some Other Things in a concert series organized by her friend, composer La Monte Young, at the New York loft studio of Yoko Ono. These... more >
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Variations VII by John Cage
MC-749, 2008
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In 1966 ten New York artists and thirty engineers and scientists from Bell Telephone Laboratories collaborated on a series of innovative dance, music and theater performances, 9 Evenings: Theatre & Engineering, held in October at the 69th Regiment... more >
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