Linda Bouchard, artistic director


About the Instructors

Brendan Aanes
Brendan Aanes is a sound and video artist working with the synaesthetic possibilities of media technology to transform and represent the world into unexpected dimensions. Recent work has focused mostly on interactive video-based installations, utilizing video tracking to examine such phenomena as the moving human eye and the small variations in handwritten text. Brendan has also composed music for award-winning modern dance performances, and designed lighting and sound for theatrical performances of varying genres. In the past, Brendan has performed as a violinist in premieres of compositions of various genres, as well as his own solo sets which utilize a handmade violin extended with a set of accelerometer motion sensors. Brendan holds an MFA in Electronic Music from Mills College in Oakland, where he worked with James Fei, Chris Brown, Pauline Oliveros, and others.

Orthographics by Brendan Aanes:
 

Brendan Aanes

Aram Shelton
Aram Shelton is a multi-instrumentalist on saxophones and clarinets, a composer & improviser, and creates electro-acoustic music through computer-based electronics. While the music he makes is spread across a variety of aesthetic lines, it is related by the importance of improvisation to develop material and express musical individuality.

When making electro-acoustic music Shelton primarily uses custom built patchers in MAX/MSP that focus on live sampling. Shelton's electro-acoustic compositions focus on a technique called phrase modification, where written phrases played by orchestral instruments are recorded in real time, rearranged, modified and reintroduced to the composition.

Settled is Shelton's electro-acoustic solo project. The music invokes moods through a cinematic style inspired by solitary walks, rainstorms with no thunder, fog & mist, the coast, empty city streets, the woods, books & coffee, bourbon & ice, and long afternoons. For the music of Settled, a bed of sounds is created using a combination of pre-recorded material, field recordings and found sounds. Live playing and processing of wind instruments interact with this material, and melodies evolve from existing tones found within the structure. www.aramshelton.com/electro.html

Beat by Aram Shelton:
 

 

Ben Bracken
For the past 15 years, Ben Bracken has slowly been creating a unique sonic language utilizing electronics, acoustic sound sources (guitar, cymbal, bells, found objects, etc), electric guitar, and field recordings.

Primarily interested in the possibilities of a kind of echo-relocation that exists with sound based art, his work has oscillated from performance to installation, often blurring the lines between the two. In both, the location of the event becomes an active participant, intimately shaping the nature and direction of each work.

After finishing a graduate degree in Electronic Music at Mills College in Oakland, CA, Ben moved on to his current technical support position at Cycling '74, the developers of Max/MSP, which he utilizes as one of many tools in his live performances. Ben also curated the Totally Intense Fractal Mindgaze Hut, a performance space in West Oakland, CA.

Some previous or current musical groups include Crystal Village (With Gregg Kowalsky), Flashpapr, Tiny Lights, Remote Viewing Ensemble, Duo with Luis Maurette, Duo with Zach Wallace, Bones (with Jacqueline Gordon).

Ben has improvised with Le-Quan Ninh, Brent Guetzeit, Kevin Drumm, Peter Kowald, Chris Cutler, Phil Minton, Rhodri Davies, Werner Dafeldecker, Fred Van Hove, Johannes Bauer, among others.

Common Ground by Ben Bracken:
 

 

Pamela Z
Pamela Z is a San Francisco-based composer/performer and media artist who works primarily with voice, live electronic processing, sampling technology, and video. A pioneer of live digital looping techniques, she creates solo works combining experimental extended vocal techniques, operatic bel canto, found objects, text, digital processing, and MIDI controllers that allow her to manipulate sound with physical gestures. In addition to her solo work, she has composed and recorded scores for dance, theatre, film, and new music chamber ensembles.

Her large-scale multi-media works have been presented at venues including Theater Artaud and ODC in SanFrancisco, and The Kitchen in New York, and her media works have been presented in exhibitions at the Whitney Museum (NY) , the Diözesanmuseum (Cologne), and the Krannert Art Museum (IL). Her multi-media opera Wunderkabinet – inspired by the Museum of Jurassic Technology (co-composed with Matthew Brubeck) has been presented at The LAB Gallery (San Francisco), REDCAT (Disney Hall, Los Angeles), and Open Ears Festival, Toronto.

Pamela Z has toured extensively throughout the US, Europe, and Japan. She has performed in numerous festivals including Bang on a Can at Lincoln Center (New York), Interlink (Japan), Other Minds (San Francisco), La Biennale di Venezia (Italy), and Pina Bausch Tanztheater Festival (Wuppertal, Germany).

She is the recipient of numerous awards including a Guggenheim Fellowship, the Creative Capital Fund, the CalArts Alpert Award in the Arts, The MAP Fund, the ASCAP Music Award, an Ars Electronica honorable mention, and the NEA and Japan/US Friendship Commission Fellowship. She holds a music degree from the University of Colorado at Boulder.

Bone by Pamela Z:
 

 


Visit The Lab website