Exploring the Hidden Music

The Other Half- March, 2020

EXPLORING THE HIDDEN MUSIC ’18: BOSTON

A magical mix of technology and heart (sometimes literally!), with contributions from some of the best musicians in the greater Boston area.

-Ken Field, composer, saxophonist
Radio host of The New Edge (WMBR)
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The richness of Janney’s careful choreography inspired brilliant improvisation at the hands of masterful musicians.
It was provocative and intellectually challenging – a sensorium of novel technique and dialogue.

-Elizabeth Goldring, Poet/Media Artist
(former Senior Fellow, CAVS/MIT)

Trained as a architect and jazz musician, Christopher Janney has been combining these two disciplines for more than thirty years. On the one hand, making architecture more like music, his installations include his MIT graduate thesis “SOUNDSTAIR- An Urban Musical Instrument” at the Boston Musuem of Science and “RAINBOW COVE” in the Logan Airport. On the other hand, making music more like architecture, he has created a number of performances including “HEARTBEAT:MB” with Mikhail Baryshnikov and “Visual Music” with SHEILA E.

On June 8, 2018 at Boston ‘university’s Dance Theater, Christopher Janney continued his explorations in “PHYSICAL MUSIC” with fellow explorers Stan Strickland, Josh Rosen, Jerry Leake and others. Among the works to be presented was a new interpretation of his “HEARTBEAT” piece with choreographer/dancer Jaime Brege. As well, he created new works-

“BUBBLE BEBOP” for tabla and snare with brushes with special guest drummer Jon Hazilla.

“DRONE DRONE” with Stan Strickland on EWI (Electronics Wind Instrument) and two drones carrying small wireless audio speakers.

As well, two of latest interactive colored resin/sound sculptures from his “INVISIBLE COLOR” were one view in the entrance lobby.
For more details, see video clips from the show.

Janney’s “Exploring the Hidden Music” does not conceal secret messages or codes, rather allows us to pierce through our hearts and find our innate sense of rhythm and harmony; connecting architecture with music, technology and our own sensory responses. A magical experience.

– Ivaana Muse
Storyteller/Music Research
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– Unplugged acoustic music.
– Synthesized environmental sound.
– EWI’s. Bass flutes. Soprano saxophones.
– Four flautists playing while walking from the four corners of the silent theater to center stage.
– Drones flying wireless speakers overhead.
– Provocative quotations projected on the large screen behind the musicians.

I walked out not understanding anything.
And ever since, I’ve been thinking and wondering about everything that went on during that two hours.

Can’t wait to do it again.

-Edward Rubesch, Program Director
Innovation Driven Entrepreneurship Center
Bangkok,Thailand
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It was a synesthetic experience, watching structures and colors unfold within a theater of sound. Ancient, timeless ideas emerged as the boundaries between sound, light and matter seemed to dissolve.

– Seth Riskin
MIT Museum Studio

Exploring the Hidden Music

The first ever collaboration of forward-thinking architect/composer Christopher Janney and legendary bassist / producer Bill Laswell was a wild ride on the highest artistic level. The duo, with its cast of world-class musicians, utilized music composition, dance, sound, and visuals.

Janney, renowned for his work interrelating architecture and music, received a B.A. in Architecture from Princeton University (magna cum laude), M.S. in Environmental Art and Performance from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, while continuing private studies in percussion and at the Dalcroze School of Music in New York. In his formative years, he worked with numerous artists including Jack Youngerman, Merce Cunningham, Sara Rudner, John Cage, Otto Piene and Claes Oldenburg.

A Visiting Professor at both The Cooper Union and Pratt Institute, Janney has created numerous permanent interactive sound / light installations attempting to make architecture more “spontaneous” and music “more physical.” The latter can be experienced in his new version of “HeartBeat,” a dance / music / cardiology mash-up, made famous In the 1990ʼs with Mikhail Baryshnikov. As well, in Janneyʼs “Visual Music Project,” he introduces visual music in “real time” performing on his custom “visual synthesizer.”

Acclaimed bassist / producer / visionary Bill Laswell provided the perfect match as the performanceʼs Musical Director. Over the course of three decades, the GRAMMY-winning producer has been one of the most prolific and restlessly creative forces in contemporary music. A sound conceptualist , he has put his inimitable stamp on nearly 3,000 recording projects by such artists as Mick Jagger, Yoko Ono, Iggy Pop, Laurie Anderson, Brian Eno, Bootsy Collins, Nine Inch Nails, Motörhead, Peter Gabriel, Blur, The Ramones, George Clinton, Pharaoh Sanders, Dalai Lama, Matisyahu, Angélique Kidjo, DJ Krush, RAMM:ΣLL:ZΣΣ, Sting,The Last Poets, Afrika Bambaataa, Julian Schnabel, Whitney Houston, Manu Dibango, and Herbie Hancock. Along with Chris Blackwell, founder of Island Records (Bob Marley, U2), he established the AXIOM label in 1989. M.O.D. Technologies, his most recent imprint is releasing projects by Method Of Defiance, Lee “Scratch” Perry, PRAXIS, Garrison Hawk with Sly & Robbie, Bernie Worrell, Jon Batiste & Red Hot Chili Peppersʼ drummer, Chad Smith, and progressive / futuristic music from Ethiopia and Morocco. Laswell has worked from everyone in Asian ancient music to avant-jazz, rock, hip-hop and DJ culture.

The performance featured world-class musicians including Trilok Gurtu (John McLaughlin, Joe Zawinul), Dave Revels (The Persuasions), Sheila E. (Solo, Prince, Ringo Starr) and Lynn Mabry (Talking Heads, Sly Stone, Stevie Nicks, Bette Midler). In Sara Rudner, Janney acquired a prominent choreographer and long-time collaborator who currently holds the position of Director of Dance at Sarah Lawrence College. The interactive sound / light installations at the door and a new interactive light work “Touch my Light” over DJ Adam Gibbons (Uhuru Afrika) set with live drumming rounded out the program.

Together Janney and Laswell “explore the hidden music” – found in spaces, the human body and in the meeting of artistic minds.

Walking into the Gramercy Theatre on 23rd Street in New York, the setup was the clue; the start of an evening of the unexpected. Beginning with this glowing red-lit space, it was hot and ready for action the likes of which you had never seen, together with “CyberMonks”, a quadraphonic audio environment moving sound images around the room. “Exploring The Hidden Music”, a passion of Architect/Composer Christopher Janney’s for over 40 years, brought together Bill Laswell, Sheila E, and Trilok Gurtu, to work the space, particularly for his well-known piece, “Heartbeat”. Janney and others lightly voiced patterns of sound over a syncopated score with the Sara Rudner-choreographed dancers that alternately agitated and soothed the room, accompanied by the blended sounds of these precisely matched, unique, and generous performers and their very special artistry. Janney’s work with sound and space, his “Sonic Forest” out on the sidewalk and “Visual Music”- Janney playing images live on a huge video wall behind the band- connect us in ways to both one another and the source and space of play that needs to be experienced. Listening is only part of the show.

– Lance Jay Brown, FAIA, DPACSA,
President- American Institute of Architects, New York Chapter