S t u d i o F i v e B e e k m a n
sound and intermedia gallery
Michael J. Schumacher
The Secluded Vale
a continuous sound installation with interludes of the "Fidicin Drone", "Deep Thought", the resolution chord from "Frances" and the "Danse Antique"
Thursdays & Saturdays
2 - 9 PM
October 2 - 30, 1997
Michael J. Schumacher:
A composer of electronic sound installations using 2 - 14 speakers, computer-controlled random structures, never ending, never repeating ; of acoustic music realizing advanced formal schemes; of taped and live music (also improvised) fro prepared electric guitar, synthesizer, etc. ; also has composed two piano sonatas, numerous shorter works for solo piano, chamber music, songs, and orchestral music (including a symphony), these in more traditional forms. A graduate of the Juilliard School (Doctorate in composition, 1988) and the Indiana University School of Music (1982). Born 1961 in Washington, DC, a resident of New York since 1983.
In a 9 by 16 foot room hang 14 speakers, points in the spatial polyphony of SchumacherŐs music, a delicate counterpoint of interweaving voices, melding and emerging, obscuring and altering each other. The form is a continuous reorganization of the component parts, a shifting contextual filtering of the individual sounds. The underlying structure is a matrix of pitch constellations, revealed in their shifting relations, a newer concept of tonality, not the traditional one, linear and motivic, but one in which an array of tonal areas hover and mingle, become established and break apart. Over the course of a long listening the materials become known in both their elemental forms and in the exploded possibilities of their combinations.
La Monte Young says Schumacher's music is "proof that equal temperament can still be hauntingly beautiful."
for more information:
e-mail address: mschumacher@sprintmail.com
