Alan Licht: About SOUND ART

About SOUND ART

Date: Saturday June 27, 2009, 1 to 4 p.m.

Artist: Alan Licht

Workshop: $5

Open Space hosted a discussion and listening session with New York author and musician Alan Licht. Licht is in town to perform in JazzFest International (Friday June 26, 8 pm, with Michael Snow and Aki Onda).

In Licht’s talk he presented a brief historical overview of Sound Art, and provided examples and commentary on the genre’s recent developments and trends. About SOUND ART was attractive to experimental, rock and contemporary musicians and enthusiasts; visual artists; filmmakers and anyone curious about the evolving cultural and artistic movements of the day.

Alan Licht (New York) is an American composer, guitarist, music writer, and a widely respected figure on the experimental music scene. Over the past two decades, Licht has worked with a veritable who’s who of the experimental world, from free jazz legends (Rashied Ali, Derek Bailey) and electronica wizards (Fennesz, Jim O’Rourke) to turntable masters (DJ Spooky, Christian Marclay) and veteran Downtown New York composers (John Zorn, Rhys Chatham). Licht is also renown in the indie rock scene as a bandleader (Run On, Love Child) and as a supporting player to legends like Tom Verlaine, Arthur Lee, Arto Lindsay, and Jandek. He has released five albums of compositions for tape and solo guitar, and his sound and video installations have been exhibited in the U.S. and Europe. With Sonic Youth’s Lee Ranaldo, he founded Text of Light, an ongoing ensemble which performs freely improvised concerts alongside screenings of classic avant garde cinema.

Licht has written extensively about the arts in many magazines and has authored two books: Sound Art: Beyond Music, Between Categories (Rizzoli, 2007) and An Emotional Memoir of Martha Quinn (2000, Drag City).

“Even if he had never touched a guitar, Alan Licht would still be god-send. He's probably one of the best music writers around and that's just something he does on the side.” – Jason Gross